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Home > This Week in Startups > Orchestrating Smarter AI Systems with AI21 Labs’ Yoav Shoham | AI Basics with Google Cloud
Podcast: This Week in Startups
Episode:

Orchestrating Smarter AI Systems with AI21 Labs’ Yoav Shoham | AI Basics with Google Cloud
Category: Technology
Duration: 00:22:26
Publish Date: 2025-07-10 14:56:53
Description:

In this episode of AI Basics, Jason sits down with Yoav Shoham — Stanford professor emeritus and co-founder of AI21 Labs, creators of Jurassic-2, Wordtune, and the new orchestration system Maestro.

They unpack:

  • Why enterprise AI struggles with reliability
  • What orchestration really means (and why LLMs alone aren't enough)
  • The pitfalls of “agent-washing”
  • Small vs large models, agent-to-agent protocols, and where real opportunities lie


This one is for founders building with AI — if you're navigating hallucinations, chasing automation, or exploring multi-agent workflows, this episode is a must.

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Timestamps:

(0:00) Yoav Shoham joins Jason to discuss AI Basics.

(1:05) What AI21 Labs is building — from Jurassic-2 to Maestro

(5:49) The overuse and confusion of the seductive term “agent”

(8:22) Small models vs large models: what's best for enterprise?

(10:53) The verticalization of AI: legal, accounting, and beyond

(12:17) The challenge of agent-to-agent communication and shared semantics

(17:08) What’s overhyped vs underhyped in AI — Yoav’s advice for founders

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Uncover more valuable insights from AI leaders in Google Cloud's 'Future of AI: Perspectives for Startups' report.

https://goo.gle/futureofai

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Explore Further

Google Cloud’s Report: The Future of AI

Get insights from 23 leading experts on how startups can leverage AI for real business impact.
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