Siqi Chen is the founder and CEO of Runway, an a16z and Initialized funded startup enabling operators to know their enterprise without having a level in finance. As an operator and founder, he served because the CEO of Sandbox VR (a16z), VP of Product and Development at Postmates (later acquired by Uber), CEO of Hey, Inc (Google-funded, acquired by Postmates), Head of Product at Zynga (IPO 2011) and CEO of Severe Enterprise (funded by Lightspeed, acquired by Zynga).
Along with his operational roles, Siqi is an investor in almost 100 corporations, together with notable names like ElevenLabs, Amplitude, Pipe, and Proprietor.com. Previous to his entrepreneurial ventures, Siqi made vital contributions at NASA JPL, the place he achieved the excellence of being the only recipient of a Congressional House Act award whereas nonetheless at school. This recognition was a results of his contributions to machine imaginative and prescient know-how on the Mars Exploration Rovers.
Are you able to clarify the idea of ‘ambient intelligence’ and the way it differentiates Runway from different AI-driven monetary platforms?
Ambient Intelligence is a very new expression of how AI can be utilized in merchandise.
Most merchandise deal with AI as a separate creature proper now—it’s both an agent working by itself, or a chat interface you must discuss to. These are the default experiences, however there’s one other solution to do it: by making the AI invisible.
Should you take a look at how individuals truly use AI at work, GitHub Copilot might be probably the most extensively used instrument. It isn’t a separate chatbot or agent. It’s extra delicate, and so deeply embedded in GitHub’s platform that it simply makes what you’re doing sooner and extra environment friendly. With the present capabilities of AI fashions, that type of seamless integration is a significantly better expression of AI.
Apple did the identical factor with its newest iOS announcement at WWDC. They didn’t add separate brokers or chatbots. They simply constructed AI into their workflows, so it will possibly remedy math equations as you sort them or summarize textual content in real-time.
That’s how AI ought to be expressed: as a instrument for thought, working quietly within the background. At Runway, we name it Ambient Intelligence.
We agree with Joel Spolsky, who labored on Microsoft Excel, and as soon as stated: “Google makes use of Bayesian filtering the best way Microsoft makes use of the IF assertion.” That’s how deeply ingrained know-how ought to be in a workflow.
It’s the identical with AI. 4 years in the past, we thought of calling ourselves “CFO.ai.” We have been suggested in opposition to it as a result of calling our product “AI-powered” would quickly sound as dated as labeling it “powered by AJAX” or “powered by AWS.” All know-how finally turns into outdated, so the main focus ought to be on enhancing consumer expertise as a substitute.
In Runway, AI is deeply embedded in workflows and doesn’t must be prompted. It routinely explains what your mannequin does or why your actuals are completely different out of your forecast. That’s what we imply by Ambient Intelligence—an expression of AI that’s a local a part of your workflow, so it enhances every little thing you do and makes you go sooner.
What impressed you to create Runway, and what key challenges in monetary planning are you aiming to deal with with this platform?
In 2020, after I was the CEO of Sandbox VR, our income dropped to zero after the COVID-19 pandemic hit. No one knew how lengthy the pandemic would final, so we would have liked to create a number of contingency plans for emergency funding—starting from 3 months to 2 years.
We needed to create these eventualities manually in Google Sheets, utilizing electronic mail and Slack to collaborate. It was such a clunky and error-prone course of, that I requested my CFO if there was a greater instrument for this process. He stated: “No, that is it.” I couldn’t consider it. We had instruments like Notion, Figma, and Airtable, however nothing constructed particularly for finance.
Everybody discovered finance—and by extension, enterprise—obscure. However nobody had solved that downside. So I requested myself a easy query: what if everybody may perceive how their enterprise truly works? That’s why I began Runway.
Our purpose is to make enterprise accessible and comprehensible to everybody. Runway exhibits how all features, from gross sales and advertising and marketing to product and engineering, match collectively. It provides groups a transparent, shared understanding of the enterprise, to allow them to align on strategic selections and create extra affect.
Ambient Intelligence goes additional. As a result of it’s deeply embedded in Runway, it makes your work clearer, higher, and sooner. It routinely provides useful context, and surfaces deep insights that can assist you make higher selections effortlessly.
How does Runway’s Ambient Intelligence proactively help finance groups with out being intrusive?
The brief reply: by not turning AI right into a separate creature—like an agent or a chatbot—that you must work together with.
Ambient Intelligence is invisible; it’s a part of your on a regular basis expertise with Runway. It really works quietly within the background, with out interrupting. It’s constructed into the platform, so it will possibly anticipate intent and allow you to with out being prompted. In the identical manner the GitHub Copilot autocompletes your code, or Apple Intelligence solves formulation as you write them, Runway’s Ambient Intelligence makes your work clearer, sooner, and extra environment friendly.
What meaning is you don’t must hint a driver by way of your total mannequin to know the way it connects with every little thing else—we simply let you know that, in plain English. You don’t must test in case your actuals match your forecast—we spotlight deviations and allow you to perceive what occurred. All of that occurs routinely—Ambient Intelligence doesn’t make any modifications to your mannequin or eventualities, and doesn’t must be instructed which context or perception is most related to you within the second. It simply does the job.
Might you elaborate on the ‘Driver Explanations’ function and the way it enhances understanding throughout the group?
In any enterprise mannequin, the drivers are interconnected and type a fancy community. Meaning you must hint a driver by way of all the mannequin to know the way it’s calculated and what it impacts.
The way in which individuals try this right now is by digging by way of spreadsheets and tracing every little thing manually. Understanding a single system is just not sufficient; you must know the way one driver impacts others, and the way all the community is structured. That’s the way you construct deep instinct in regards to the enterprise and determine the levers you possibly can pull.
Runway makes that simpler. If you hover over a driver, we present you a transparent, concise, automatically-generated rationalization that helps you perceive the way it works. You don’t must ask a chatbot what ‘Gross Margin’ is and the way it suits into your mannequin—we clarify every little thing in plain English. That’s how ‘Driver Explanations’ work—seamlessly, invisibly, and routinely, so everybody at your organization can perceive your mannequin.
Runway claims to show hours-long duties into seconds. Are you able to share particular examples or metrics that spotlight this enchancment
This was a quote from one in all our prospects Andrew Maher, Head of Finance at Superhuman. Learn the complete story here.
“With Runway, we noticed our effectivity skyrocket with a 50X to 100X enchancment, turning hours-long duties into seconds,” stated Andrew Maher, Head of Finance, Superhuman. “Complicated monetary fashions have been distilled into clear, actionable insights, making it simpler to reply rapidly to key executives. Runway was like including a contact of magic to our monetary technique, turning information into actionable intelligence—think about having a co-pilot in finance that brings important insights alongside quantity crunching.”
How does Runway’s integration with present enterprise instruments like accounting software program and CRM methods improve its performance?
We provide you with a holistic understanding of your small business by pulling in each information and context.
Runway integrates with over 650 of the commonest instruments, and we transcend common integrations like basic ledgers and HR methods. We join with CRMs, databases, spreadsheets, and even challenge administration software program like Jira.
We consider that finance is not nearly finance; it is about understanding how every little thing within the firm suits and works collectively. By integrating with challenge administration instruments and databases, for instance, we join necessary context to your small business mannequin. This manner, completely different departments work with a single supply of fact, and get a shared understanding of your small business.
How does Runway place itself in opposition to rivals like conventional monetary planning instruments and different fashionable AI-driven platforms?
Our core perception locations us in a completely completely different class from different monetary options.
The principle problem of contemporary finance is collaboration. However the concept that finance ought to be collaborative isn’t new; it’s been round endlessly. And but, nobody has truly constructed a product that allows actual collaboration. Why is that?
As a result of conventional instruments solely allow you to save time or provide you with extra management. That’s the place they cease. Our core perception is that these items are desk stakes. What fashionable finance wants is one thing that helps everybody instantly and intuitively perceive how the enterprise works. Actual collaboration can solely occur as soon as everybody has that shared context.
It’s understanding that lies on the middle of this downside. That’s what Runway solves for finance, product, gross sales, advertising and marketing, and each different staff.
To make enterprise comprehensible, we begin by connecting your information to necessary enterprise context and your roadmap. We use abstractions that really map to how individuals suppose. And other people don’t consider plans when it comes to numbers on a spreadsheet—they consider selections and timelines. So we present plans in a manner that’s intuitive, and that everybody can simply play with. Anybody in your staff can modify these plans, and see how completely different selections would affect your mannequin. That’s how we ship a shared understanding of how your small business works.
Our deep concentrate on creating readability units us aside. Our prospects, like Superhuman, AngelList and ConvertKit (soon to be Kit), are already seeing the distinction with Runway.
What methods are you using to keep up Runway’s aggressive edge and proceed its fast development available in the market?
We don’t compete with those that construct monetary merchandise for finance groups.
We’ve prospects in finance, however the core worth we ship is that this: actual collaboration throughout all the group, pushed by true understanding.
We’re uniquely targeted on creating deep, intuitive understanding. Our design and engineering efforts are targeted on this single purpose. Nobody else available in the market shares our stage of concentrate on fixing this particular downside.
I don’t suppose we’ve got any competitors in any respect. We’re taking part in a completely completely different sport.
How do you envision the position of AI and ambient intelligence evolving within the finance trade over the following 5 years?
As AI capabilities evolve, I feel we’ll see a significant shift in how work basically will get executed. Whereas I don’t suppose fashions are fairly there but, it’ll occur in a short time. When it does, we’ll see a big improve within the quantity of leverage individuals have—one particular person will do the work of ten, 100, or perhaps a thousand individuals.
Enterprises will leverage AI to get extra output with the identical headcount, and planning will grow to be exponentially extra complicated. However individuals will nonetheless have to make strategic selections and perceive how the enterprise works—solely a lot sooner, and far more effectively than ever earlier than.
We’ll want radically higher instruments for thought simply to maintain up. Ambient Intelligence can allow that by enhancing human functionality effortlessly, with out getting in the best way.
As a CEO and AI influencer, what are your ideas on the broader implications of AI in enterprise planning and decision-making?
Let’s put aside AGI, ASI, and the concept of technological singularity for a second—as a result of in that world, the place AI does every little thing and we’re all lounging by a pool, it’s a very completely different story.
Earlier than we attain that time, although, I feel we’ll see an exponential increase in human functionality—the place one particular person can do the work of tons of. Human output will attain unprecedented ranges, making companies and methods rather more complicated. We’ll want AI to assist us perceive what’s occurring and to make smarter selections.
It’ll all go hand-in-hand—AI will drive elevated leverage, which in flip will add to the complexity of methods. To handle elevated complexity, we’ll want much more superior instruments to additional improve human functionality.
Thanks for the nice interview, readers who want to be taught extra ought to go to Runway.
