Google Software Engineer, Podcaster, Quit to Pursue AI Startup
- AI, as-told-to, big-tech, Business, Careers, entrepreneurship, Finance, google, jacob-zinkula-tout-collection, job-market, podcast, software-engineer, startup, Tech
- June 22, 2026

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Aashna Doshi, a 23-year-old former Google software engineer based in New York City. The following has been edited for length and clarity. I took a big risk to get my Google job. Now I’m taking another one by leaving it. Around February 2024, months before graduating
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Elon Musk’s Neuralink and OpenAI-backed Merge Labs are pushing forward with brain–computer interface (BCI) technology in the U.S. Meanwhile, Chinese serial entrepreneur Phoenix Peng is building rival efforts through two startups: NeuroXess, which develops implantable BCI systems, and a second company, Gestala, developing non-invasive ultrasound-based BCIs. Gestala has raised $21.6 million (CN¥150 million) just two
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