The 'together tech' wave might be the most intriguing startup bet of 2026

Equity

TechCrunch

Entrepreneurship, Business News, News, Business, Technology

4.2 • 372 Ratings

🗓️ 5 June 2026

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

While the AI fundraising machine keeps breaking its own records, some founders are building in the other direction. Mirror founder Brynn Putnam just raised money for Board, a startup focused on bringing people together through in-person games and social experiences. Cyberdeck creators are going viral crafting whimsical DIY computers that literally encourage users to touch grass. Unlike the AI-free browser crowd, this doesn't just feel like backlash, but also people genuinely gravitating toward things that feel a little more human. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane dig into the week's headlines, from the "together tech" wave to what Anthropic's confidential IPO filing means against the backdrop of Alphabet's $80 billion AI raise, and whether the money is all flowing back to the big guys anyway. Listen to the full episode to hear: Why ex-Meta CTO Mike Schroepfer raised $250 million for climate tech specifically, at a moment when almost nobody else is How rocket engine startup Impulse raised $500 million — and is loudly emphasizing that those funds will be spent on people, not AI A look inside Anthropic's S-1, and what the team is looking forward to once we can finally compare the AI labs' financials What two YouTube directors cracking the box office tells us about creator economy power Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 01:45 YouTubers are taking over the box office 02:46 Everyone's fleeing climate tech — except this $250M fund 07:03 Impulse Space raises $500M and is hiring humans 13:03 Anthropic quietly files for IPO as Alphabet drops $85B on AI 21:52 The token bubble is starting to burst 26:08 From Board games to DIY cyberdecks, founders are betting on IRL 33:09 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome back to Equity TechCrunch's flagship podcast about the business of startups.
0:06.2	I'm Kirsten Koresak, transportation editor here at TechCrunch, and I'm joined as always by our weekend editor, Anthony Ha, and senior reporter, Sean O'Kane.
0:14.2	I'm wondering if you have watched Obsession or backrooms?
0:21.6	I have seen obsession and I am hoping to see backrooms this weekend.
0:26.6	And I think the reason that you're mentioning them is because those were the two biggest movies last weekend at the box office.
0:33.6	And they were both directed by people who first made their names on YouTube.
0:38.1	Movie time is a pretty hard one to line up with a five-year-old when you require a babysitter
0:43.8	to get out for a few hours. So I haven't seen either of them. I will say, boy, the YouTube
0:49.6	ad-rev share must be so low these days that you have to go out and make a movie and make
0:54.0	some money.
0:54.9	I think, I mean, it's interesting because, well, for a variety of reasons, but, you know, I was trying to describe this to my wife a couple of days ago, and she was like, wait, YouTubers? You mean, like, guys who just, like, you know, like do essentially, I guess, what we're doing now, except for a much bigger audience on YouTube? And no.
1:11.7	It's people who use YouTube as a distribution mechanism for stuff that kind of
1:16.0	looks more like traditional filmmaking.
1:18.6	Like, I mean, backrooms started as sort of like a short film on YouTube that was like
1:23.1	a special effects demo reel.
1:24.9	It had this kind of real retro vibe.
1:27.1	The director of obsession, Curry Barker also, like, posted like a 60 effects demo reel had this kind of real retro vibe. The director of
1:27.6	obsession, Curry Barker also posted like a 60-minute horror film, like found footage horror
1:32.7	film on YouTube. So it's not what we would think of as kind of typical YouTube, but just
1:37.1	people who like found it an easy way to like get their, you know, early filmmaking efforts out
1:43.0	to a wide audience.
1:48.5	The logical end state here clearly is YouTube buying a bunch of ailing movie theaters,
	...

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