Smart Humans with Slava Rubin

The episode contains some useful data points (Waymo revenue trajectory, ride volume projections, valuation multiples) and one genuinely interesting mechanism about Waymo intentionally capping market share to optimize utilization, but the density is low - large portions are audience poll management, host personal anecdotes, and generic bullishness with no analytical substance behind it.

“the sort of line of argument for Waymo to stay around this 25, 30% market share zone...they are actually sort of skimming...increasing their utilization because folks are using Waymos at these high traffic times”

“Yeah, I think there's a, there's a, you know, um, there's a good chance that it's going to be just very similar.”

The vast majority of takes are consensus: Waymo is the leader, Tesla might catch up, China is cheaper, parking lots will disappear. The utilization-optimized market share argument is the one genuinely non-obvious structural point; everything else recycles familiar AV industry narratives without any first-principles challenge.

“by staying at a, at a somewhat lower, um, market share, they are actually sort of skimming...they're increasing their utilization because folks are using Waymos at these high traffic times”

“I think they have produced the clearest proof that this business works, that the technology works”

Jan-Erik Asplund is a competent research analyst at Sacra with reasonable command of public data, but he is not an operator or practitioner who has built anything in this space; he repeatedly hedges on basic facts like prior valuations and revenue figures for companies he is supposed to be briefing on, which limits his authority.

“Uh, I don't have it off the top of my head, no.”

“I don't think it's. Yeah, it's hard to say. It's probably a lot of contract project driven stuff. Really hard to estimate.”

The episode does supply a reasonable number of concrete figures - Waymo's $355M annualized revenue, $126B valuation, 500K rides/week, Applied Intuition's $830M ARR, Wave's $8.6B valuation, Wabi's $3.75B - but several key claims are vague, math is occasionally muddled, and China/Baidu comparisons receive no numerical treatment at all.

“355 million in February, um, 2026. Uh, you know that basically doubling annualized revenue a little more than doubling from the end of 2024”

“supposedly 830 million annual recurring revenue”

The host asks some legitimately probing questions (355x revenue multiple, supply constraint dynamics, Uber vs. Waymo relative pricing) but consistently collapses into agreement and personal opinion-sharing rather than pressing the guest when answers are thin; the format is more co-pundit-roundtable than rigorous interview.

“So a $126 billion valuation is a 355x revenue. I mean, Elon would be proud of that. I mean, Elon doesn't even get 355X's sometimes.”

“I love this visual and also this perspective.”