The Death of the Feature: Management, Design and Engineering in an Agentic World | TiECon 2026
Speakers: Karandeep Anand - Character.AI CEO Tom Occhino - Vercel Chief Product Officer Moderator: Bala Kasiviswanathan ...
Incoming Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Walt Disney The
Search every verified Karandeep Anand interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Karandeep Anand, CEO of Character.AI, has discussed the company's focus on AI entertainment and its approach to safety and product development. At TiEcon 2026, he described Character.AI as the largest AI entertainment app, with 20 million monthly users who create and interact with characters from fiction and fantasy. He also spoke about the evolving role of product managers and developers, arguing that AI replaces process rather than people, and encouraged individuals to adopt a "builder mindset" by using AI tools to move from idea to working product. In a March 2026 conversation, he addressed the company's decision to pause development in certain areas despite competitive pressure, stating that Character.AI opted out of the "arms race" in foundational model development and drew red lines, such as not offering AI-powered therapy, due to the lack of medical licensing. Anand has also reflected on his prior roles, including as President and Chief Product Officer at Brex, where he oversaw the launch of Brex Travel and advocated for deeply integrated product experiences. He has spoken about the importance of adapting to rapidly changing markets, stating that the notion of a static product-market fit is outdated, and has emphasized that the cost of switching products includes retraining and behavioral change, requiring significantly more value to justify adoption. Earlier in his career, he worked at Microsoft on Azure AppFabric caching and at Meta, and he has commented on the economics of AI, noting that incremental users and tokens carry real costs, and that while models may not advance as quickly as some expect, the economic impact of current AI is understated.
Speakers: Karandeep Anand - Character.AI CEO Tom Occhino - Vercel Chief Product Officer Moderator: Bala Kasiviswanathan ...
Step into the Media Lounge with Karandeep Anand, CEO of Character.AI, as we catch up with him at TiEcon 2026. In this interview, we explore the evolution of AI agents, the future of product development, and how AI is reshaping the way we interact with technology. 🎙Speaker: Karandeep Anand — CEO | Character.AI #TiEcon2026 #MediaLounge #TiESiliconValley Visit https://tiesv.ai/ Follow us on / tiesv Follow us on / tiesiliconvalley Like us on / tiesiliconvalleychapter Tweet us at https://x.com/tiesv
Silicon Valley veteran Karandeep Anand became CEO of Character.ai a few months after the company was sued for alleged chatbot harms by a grieving mother who lost her 14-year-old son to suicide. Watch him in timely – and urgent – conversation with Shoma Chaudhury, Founder of Lucid Lines & Founder-Director, SYNAPSE, as they discuss the rise of “relational AI” – AI that we create and bond with – and explore its complex implications for culture, psychology, safety. Hear Karandeep Anand share the red lines he’s drawn for his company, unpack why AI should not be thought of as a black box, debate…
Mike Vernal (Partner at Conviction), Malte Ubl (CTO of Vercel), Karandeep Anand (CEO of Character.ai), and Tuhin Srivastava (CEO of Baseten) come together for a powerhouse panel on Breaking, Building, and Betting on AI. Hear how today’s leaders are navigating the risks, rewards, and realities of building in the AI era. #Sigsum #Statsig #AI #Startups #Innovation #TechLeadership
In this episode, Carlos Gonzalez de Villaumbrosia interviews Karandeep Anand, President and Chief Product Officer at Brex, one of the fastest-growing fintech companies in the world. Founded in 2017, Brex quickly became the go-to financial services partner for most Silicon Valley startups, with 80% of Y Combinator startups using their platform. This rapid growth led to over $1.2 billion in funding and a $12.3 billion valuation. Brex now serves a wide range of companies, from startups to large enterprises, including over 150 public companies with a combined estimated market cap exceeding $2.9 tr…
Karandeep Anand, President and Chief Product Officer of Brex, joins Justin Schuster, VP of Marketing at Spotnana, to discuss Brex’s strategy for adding travel to its product suite, the collaboration between Brex and Spotnana that led to the successful launch of Brex Travel, and the role of travel industry innovation in enhancing user experience for Brex customers. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 0:30 Guest introduction 2:09 Why Karandeep joined Brex 3:29 Vertical experience 5:57 First year of Brex Travel 7:19 Why choose Brex Travel? 10:15 Why add travel to Brex? 12:40 Why partner instead of build? 15:13…
In this session, I will be talking to Karandeep Anand, Chief Product Officer at Brex and a seasoned product leader specializing in building and monetizing Enterprise SaaS businesses and multi-sided marketplaces. Join us to hear Karan’s journey into product management, best practices building enterprise products and scaling products in emerging markets, how to craft a strong product strategy, and how to build and scale strong product teams. 📩 Follow the PM Learning Series to level up your Product career with advice from industry thought leaders and experts: / 6930736280242704384
Microsoft's Application Server is out and it's called AppFabric. Scott chats with Karandeep Anand from the Distributed Application Server group at Microsoft about Windows Server AppFabric. It's released and it's part of Windows itself. How does it relate to Azure? What's included, and where's Velocity?
Sign in to search the full transcript archive, filter by topic, and access every quote from Karandeep Anand.
The summary and quote tags on this profile are produced with AI assistance from verified, first-person interview transcripts, then checked by our team to confirm the speaker's identity and the accuracy of every quote. See how we verify →
Pro unlocks every transcript in full, plus unlimited search across every executive and company we cover.
50% off appliedPulling data at scale? The Data API gives you 30,000 transcripts a month over REST, MCP and JSON.
Compare all plans