The Moonshot Podcast

The Moonshot Podcast

https://feeds.megaphone.fm/moonshot
15 Followers 19 Episodes Claim Ownership
What if the keys to solve the world’s hardest problems – food security, energy resilience, the digital divide – were already within our grasp? Welcome to The Moonshot Podcast, where we go behind the scenes at X, The Moonshot Factory, to celebrate 15 years of Google’s innovation laboratory. Hosted by Astro Teller, Captain of Moonshots, this series gives you unprecedented access to the radical ideas and fearless inventors working to build a future we want to live in. Explore real-world moonshot...
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Episode List

The Moonshot Podcast Trailer

Feb 26th, 2025 8:21 PM

Premiering March 10th! The Moonshot Podcast chronicles the untold stories of innovation - both highs and lows - from 15 years inside Google’s Moonshot Factory. Go behind the scenes with the inventors and creators exploring the huge problems, radical solutions and breakthrough technologies that have the potential to reshape our world. Self-driving cars, superhuman hearing, robots, drone delivery, wildfire prediction and much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Episode 1: Driving The Future

Mar 10th, 2025 7:10 AM

Fifteen years ago, the world thought self-driving cars were impossible - even the experts doubted it. Today, they’re on the road. In this inaugural episode of The Moonshot Podcast, join Astro Teller inside X, Alphabet’s Moonshot Factory, to discover the early days of Waymo’s self-driving vehicles and Wing’s autonomous drone deliveries. Astro meets Sebastian Thrun, co-founder of X, to revisit the origin story of this innovation lab and, with leaders from Waymo and Wing, explores what’s next for driverless cars and drone delivery. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Episode 2: Essential Connections

Mar 17th, 2025 8:00 AM

Nearly 3 billion people still don’t have a reliable internet connection. In this episode of The Moonshot Podcast, Astro Teller dives into X’s decade-long mission to bring fast, reliable and affordable connectivity to people everywhere. We uncover the inside story of Loon - the audacious attempt to use high-altitude balloons for internet access - and how its legacy lives on in Taara, a revolutionary way to deliver fast, affordable connectivity over long distances using beams of light. Expect balloons in jail, monkeys causing mischief, and a digital leap over the world’s deepest river.Hosted by Astro Teller, Captain of Moonshots, The Moonshot Podcast goes behind the scenes with creators and inventors trying to find radical solutions and breakthrough technologies to the world’s biggest problems. These are the untold stories of innovation from 15 years of Alphabet’s moonshot factory. Thank you to Mahesh Krishnaswamy, Nick Kohli, Strive Masiyiwa and Sal Candido for featuring in this episode.The Moonshot Podcast is a Blanchard House production for X, the moonshot factory. It’s produced by Ellie Sans and Sophie Eastaugh. Original music by Louis Nanke-Mannell and Daniel Lloyd-Evans. Sound design and mix engineering by Louis Nanke-Mannell and Toby Matimong. The executive producers are Amica Sciortino Nowlan and Rebecca Maxted.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Episode 3: Machines That Think – The AI Moonshot

Mar 24th, 2025 7:00 AM

Artificial Intelligence is reshaping everything - but how did we get here? Dive deep with Astro Teller into the origins of Google Brain, meeting Andrew Ng and Jeff Dean, two of AI’s early pioneers. Their innovations helped shatter a decades-long computing block and catapulted deep learning from the academic arena to the commercial prime time. We’ll also explore Codey, an AI system that writes and rewrites software. How do those designing AI’s next generation think about its opportunities and challenges? Could AI revolutionize the process of innovation itself? Hosted by Astro Teller, Captain of Moonshots,  The Moonshot Podcast  goes behind the scenes with creators and inventors trying to find radical solutions and breakthrough technologies to the world’s biggest problems. These are the untold stories of innovation from 15 years of Google’s moonshot factory. Thank you to Andrew Ng, Jeff Dean, Scott Huffman, Benoît Schillings and Olivia Hatalsky for featuring in this episode.The Moonshot Podcast is a Blanchard House production for X, The Moonshot Factory. It’s produced by Ellie Sans and Sophie Eastaugh. Original music by Louis Nanke-Mannell and Daniel Lloyd-Evans. Sound design and mix engineering by Louis Nanke-Mannell and Toby Matimong. The executive producers are Amica Sciortino Nowlan and Rebecca Maxted. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Episode 4: Feeding The World 

Mar 31st, 2025 7:00 AM

Agriculture is the world’s oldest industry – and it’s racing to meet one of the newest and biggest challenges of our time: how to feed a growing global population that will soon hit 10 billion people. In this episode, Astro Teller explores how two moonshot teams set out to reinvent the way we grow food, using cutting-edge technology in some unexpected places. We follow the team behind Mineral, who began their journey with a pair of bicycles and a radical idea for rethinking farming from the ground up. And we head underwater with Tidal, where the team is using computer vision to transform ocean aquaculture.Hosted by Astro Teller, Captain of Moonshots, The Moonshot Podcast goes behind the scenes with the engineers and inventors using breakthrough technologies to try to find radical solutions to the world’s biggest problems. These are the untold stories of innovation from 15 years of Google’s moonshot factory. Thank you to Elliott Grant, David Guerena, Evan Rapoport, Rajesh Jadhav, Joe Sargent, Paul Nnko, Elifura Nassari and Elinansha Nanyaro for featuring in this episode. The Moonshot Podcast is a Blanchard House production for X, the moonshot factory. It’s produced by Ellie Sans and Sophie Eastaugh. Original music by Louis Nanke-Mannell and Daniel Lloyd-Evans. Sound design and mix engineering by Louis Nanke-Mannell and Toby Matimong. The executive producers are Amica Sciortino Nowlan and Rebecca Maxted. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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