No Fixed Route

Girum Tihtina
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  • Entrepreneurship
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No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced route founders take to get to Series B...for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the stuff nobody has time to write blog posts about yet incredibly important: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, surviving the messy middle. No Fixed Route is also the very first podcast to record inside a moving Zoox Autonomous Vehicle. It is hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-meta engineer, 2x founder, professional startup enthusiast. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind and knows where generic advice falls flat.

  1. May 25

    Priyanka: Why She Chose to Give Up Her Startup and Has Zero Regrets

    Priyanka co-founded Galen AI, a personal health intelligence platform that connected your lab results, wearables, genetic testing and EHR data into one reasoning layer that gave you proactive personalized health guidance. They were growing every single day through word of mouth and Reddit. And then ChatGPT for Health dropped. In this episode Priyanka walks through exactly what happened the morning her co-founder messaged her saying oh my god did you see the Twitter announcement, why their first reaction was we are screwed, how three months of weekly calls with Oura turned into an acquisition she was initially hesitant to take, what she would do completely differently if she started a consumer company again including opening a TikTok on day negative ten before writing a single line of code, why she thinks 75% of early consumer founder time should go to community before product, where she thinks the consumer health market is heading over the next five to ten years, and why nobody has meaningfully won the AI doctor race yet. If you are a consumer founder, building in healthtech, or just want to hear what it actually feels like when a lab with unlimited resources ships your product, this one is essential.Host: X: https://x.com/og_doctourist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daag/About No Fixed Route No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced paths founders take to reach Series B, for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the things nobody has time to write blogs about: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, and surviving the messy middle. Hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-Meta engineer, and two-time founder. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind, knows where generic advice falls flat, and is mostly here to learn for himself.Sponsored by Doctours: the most trusted medical tourism marketplace. Check them out here https://doctours.comNo Fixed Route is the first-ever podcast filmed inside a Zoox autonomous vehicle. Each episode features world-class guests exploring the intersection of technology, innovation, and the future of mobility. Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/194HVqbXPYrWFKlrVAOcmn?si=q5N-afFSSsmNMCR9nDDv3Q | Watch on YouTube:.youtube.com/@NoFixedRoutePod | Instagram: @nofixedroute | X: @nofixedroute

    30 min

  2. May 16

    She Made a Daily Game. Someone Broke Up Over It. Then a VC Called About His Wife.

    Helen Huang, founder of Trove and former PM at Microsoft, GitHub, and Zynga, sat down with us in a Zoox autonomous vehicle in San Francisco. Someone emailed her to say they broke up with their girlfriend over her app. Then one of her investors sent it to his wife and it led to a "heated discussion."That app is Trove — a daily choose-your-own-adventure game that reveals your personality through the decisions you make. Think Wordle meets Myers-Briggs, but what you build becomes portable identity data you can plug into any system. "Log in with Trove" — the way you log in with Google.In this episode:→ The daily game that's accidentally breaking up couples (and what that means)→ Why AI is making people desperate to understand who they actually are→ She went to university to win back her ex-boyfriend (and it worked)→ 800 job applications, every cover letter by hand — zero offers→ Her co-founder promised $200K. They didn't pay themselves for 18 months.→ She left Microsoft 6 weeks before a life-changing stock vest→ Her investor Jason Calacanis told her to burn all her money in 12 months→ The loneliness of being a solo founder that AI can't fix→ Betaworks: the accelerator backed Giphy, Bitly, Hugging Face — and now TroveFilmed inside a Zoox autonomous robotaxi in San Francisco. 🎙️ No Fixed Route — the first ever tech podcast filmed in a Zoox robotaxi.Host: X: https://x.com/og_doctourist LinkedIn: / daag Sponsored by Doctours: the most trusted medical tourism marketplace. Check them out here https://doctours.comListen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/194HVqb... | Watch on YouTube:. / @nofixedroutepod | Instagram: @nofixedroute | X: @nofixedroute#PersonalityAI #AIStartup #FounderStory #NoFixedRoute #Trove

    38 min

  3. May 4

    Oliver Hull: He Was Digging Clams. Now He Builds AI Radios for 2.7B Workers

    Six years ago Oliver Hull was digging clams on the coast of Massachusetts with an anthropology degree. Today he is building Memo, a VC-backed hardware company backed by NVIDIA giving 2.7 billion frontline workers access to AI for the first time. In this episode we get into how he went from clamdigger to Congressional bodyman for a US Congressman where he helped evacuate over 200 families from Afghanistan, why trying to join the Marines and getting medically disqualified was the moment that launched everything, why 80% of the global workforce has been left completely behind by software and AI, how Motorola built such an unbeatable brand on reliability that you can sell a better cheaper radio and still lose nine out of ten times, why the radio industry has not seen real innovation in 80 years and the incentive problem that explains it, and why Oliver believes typing is a tax we pay to do work and voice is the future of how humans interface with computers. If you are a founder building against an incumbent, an investor looking at the physical world, or someone who has ever wondered who actually builds everything around you this one will change how you think about technology. Host: X: https://x.com/og_doctourist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daag/ About No Fixed Route No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced paths founders take to reach Series B, for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the things nobody has time to write blogs about: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, and surviving the messy middle. Hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-Meta engineer, and two-time founder. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind, knows where generic advice falls flat, and is mostly here to learn for himself. Sponsored by Doctours: the most trusted medical tourism marketplace. Check them out here https://doctours.com No Fixed Route is the first-ever podcast filmed inside a Zoox autonomous vehicle. Each episode features world-class guests exploring the intersection of technology, innovation, and the future of mobility. Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/194HVqbXPYrWFKlrVAOcmn?si=q5N-afFSSsmNMCR9nDDv3QWatch on YouTube: youtube.com/@NoFixedRoutePod | Instagram: @nofixedroute | X: @nofixedroute

    18 min

  4. Apr 22

    Marshall Gould: The AI That Caught a Life Threatening Allergy Doctors Missed

    It takes nine years on average to be diagnosed with a chronic illness. During those nine years most people are seeing dozens of doctors, waiting months for appointments, and largely not being heard. Marshall Gould is building Juno to sit with those patients in the moments the healthcare system completely ignores. In this episode we get into how a genomics researcher from Oxford co-founded SharedGenes, conducted over a thousand patient interviews, and built an AI companion that reached 50,000 users and 2 million conversations in just a few months. We talk about the patient whose life threatening allergic reaction was flagged by Juno before the doctors caught it, why ChatGPT cannot replace what Juno does for people with chronic illness, why people actually prefer talking to an alien avatar over a human one, what the problem with modern medicine really is and why it keeps failing people with chronic disease, and how Marshall thinks about building a product for a community that has been let down by every institution that was supposed to help them. If you are building in healthtech or consumer AI or you or someone you love is living with a chronic condition this conversation will stay with you. Host: X: https://x.com/og_doctourist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daag/ About No Fixed Route No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced paths founders take to reach Series B, for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the things nobody has time to write blogs about: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, and surviving the messy middle. Hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-Meta engineer, and two-time founder. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind, knows where generic advice falls flat, and is mostly here to learn for himself. Sponsored by Doctours: the most trusted medical tourism marketplace. Check them out here https://doctours.com No Fixed Route is the first-ever podcast filmed inside a Zoox autonomous vehicle. Each episode features world-class guests exploring the intersection of technology, innovation, and the future of mobility. Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/194HVqb... | Watch on YouTube:    / @nofixedroutepod   | Instagram: @nofixedroute | X: @nofixedroute

    35 min

  5. Mar 30

    Mark Pothen: I Cancelled My Lease the Same Day to Build Beacon Health

    Mark Pothen cancelled his lease, moved everything to his parents house, and went to work unpaid at a primary care practice for six months. No salary. No product. No investors. Just him and his co-founder figuring out how healthcare actually works from the inside. That is how Beacon Health started. In this episode Mark breaks down how he went from working for free at a 2000 patient practice to closing a deal covering 40000 patients, why value based care is the biggest broken system in American healthcare that nobody talks about, how they integrated into five different EHR systems in a single week to save a deal, why selling outcomes instead of software is the only way to avoid being commoditized by AI, and what it actually looks like to bring joy back to primary care when doctors are drowning in admin work managing 2000 patients as one person. If you are building in healthcare, selling into enterprise, or just want to hear what it looks like to go all in on a problem before you have any of the answers this one will stay with you. Host: X: https://x.com/og_doctourist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daag/ About No Fixed Route: No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced paths founders take to reach Series B, for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the things nobody has time to write blogs about: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, and surviving the messy middle. Hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-Meta engineer, and two-time founder. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind, knows where generic advice falls flat, and is mostly here to learn for himself. Sponsored by Doctours: the most trusted medical tourism marketplace. Check them out here https://doctours.com No Fixed Route is the first-ever podcast filmed inside a Zoox autonomous vehicle. Each episode features world-class guests exploring the intersection of technology, innovation, and the future of mobility. Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/194HVqbXPYrWFKlrVAOcmn?si=q5N-afFSSsmNMCR9nDDv3Q | Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@NoFixedRoutePod | Instagram: @nofixedroute | X: @nofixedroute

    23 min

  6. Mar 23

    Jerry Shu: We Raised $110M at Seed by Doing Less Not More

    Most businesses send out an invoice and assume the money is coming. It is not. The gap between billing and actually collecting is where millions of dollars quietly disappear every single month and Jerry Shu built Daylit to close that gap permanently. Jerry is the co-founder of Daylit, an AI agents company for accounts receivable that raised $110 million at seed stage after starting with nothing but his own pocket money on the line. In this episode we get into how he and his co-founder bought financial assets themselves before raising a single dollar, why they built their own sprint process from scratch because every existing model was broken, how they built a hiring pipeline out of MIT and Harvard winter internships that no one else was competing for, why the old way of organizing engineering teams is completely obsolete, and the one lesson from building product that changed how he thinks about everything: do less but do it very well. If you are a founder, a finance leader, or anyone building a company in the age of AI this conversation will make you rethink how you work. Host: X: https://x.com/og_doctourist LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daag/ About No Fixed Route: No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced paths founders take to reach Series B, for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the things nobody has time to write blogs about: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, and surviving the messy middle. Hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-Meta engineer, and two-time founder. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind, knows where generic advice falls flat, and is mostly here to learn for himself. Sponsored by Doctours: the most trusted medical tourism marketplace. Check them out here https://doctours.com No Fixed Route is the first-ever podcast filmed inside a Zoox autonomous vehicle. Each episode features world-class guests exploring the intersection of technology, innovation, and the future of mobility.

    38 min

  7. Mar 19

    How to Build a Consumer Health OS Before Big Tech Gets There

    A founder who arrived in San Francisco knowing two people, pivoted her company mid accelerator when OpenAI changed everything, and has sat through ten days of silent meditation twice sits down inside a moving driverless Zoox to talk about the future of health. Karina Repko is building Miora, an AI health agent that books your workouts before the spots are gone, cancels them when your sleep data says you need rest, orders your groceries based on your goals, and manages all of it without you lifting a finger. In this episode we get into why Big Tech will never win the consumer health space, how she grew a loyal audience on LinkedIn by posting things people were too scared to say out loud, what Vipassana taught her about building a company through the hard moments, why the highest state you can reach is not happiness but peacefulness, and how she is thinking about community as the one moat that OpenAI simply cannot build. If you are a founder in consumer health, wellness or AI or just someone trying to take back control of your time this one will stay with you.

    33 min

  8. Mar 16

    How Abrar Rahman Sold His Startup Using a Jay-Z Line

    A former founder who was publishing AI research in high school sits down inside a moving driverless Zoox to unpack one of the most honest startup stories you will hear this year. Abrar Rahman built Dorsal FYI to fight medical bill overcharges, recruited co-founders in their 50s from Blue Cross Blue Shield and Cigna, got acqui-hired by govtech company Promise backed by Jay-Z's Rock Nation, and still feels conflicted about it. In this episode we get into why Epic Systems has only ever lost one customer, why healthcare AI is not the gold rush investors think it is, how to recruit experienced operators to an early stage startup, what the acqui-hire process actually looks like from the inside, and why the cold start problem killed a company that had everything else going for it. If you are building in healthtech, navigating a tough fundraise, or just want to hear a founder speak with radical honesty about what it really costs to build something from scratch this one is for you.

    36 min
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About

No Fixed Route is a podcast about the nuanced route founders take to get to Series B...for founders tired of generic advice. We talk about the stuff nobody has time to write blog posts about yet incredibly important: hiring, GTM, scaling your team, surviving the messy middle. No Fixed Route is also the very first podcast to record inside a moving Zoox Autonomous Vehicle. It is hosted by Girum Tihtina, CEO of Doctours, ex-meta engineer, 2x founder, professional startup enthusiast. Girum has lived the Series A/B grind and knows where generic advice falls flat.

Information

  • Creator
    Girum Tihtina
  • Years Active
    2K
  • Episodes
    13
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Girum Tihtina
  • Show Website
    No Fixed Route