‘Everybody knows you’re out of touch’: Palantir CEO Alex Karp says his own exec told him to stop hyping Foundry
Karp told a room of CEOs that his best ideas are the ones his team says can't work, and that VCs once asked him: "Where's the parasite?"
Palantir CEO Alex Karp shared a story about an executive telling him to stop hyping the company's Foundry platform. Karp recounted how Ted Mabrey once advised him not to discuss how big Foundry would get, calling it "depressing" and "out of touch." Karp stopped talking about Foundry for about six months before adopting a more measured approach to decision-making.
He explained that he has an "esthetic idea" of what will work and what won't, often making decisions that seem unlikely to others. Karp relies on his long-term colleagues to give him honest feedback, even if it's harsh. The CEO noted that Foundry is now the centerpiece of Palantir's fastest-growing business, with U.S. commercial revenue growing 149% year over year to $764 million in the second quarter.
The platform is also being adopted by companies like Zeta, which recently announced a seven-year partnership with Palantir to rebuild its Data Cloud on Foundry. Karp explained that early on, Palantir struggled to raise money because investors didn't understand its unique business model, which avoids creating "parasitic" software that locks users in.
He argued that second-rate AI can now cripple a business, unlike in the past when a weak software rollout might only cause minor setbacks.
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