In this episode of Deep, the former Stanford president, RISC chip pioneer, and current Alphabet chairman shares about the long arc of innovation: why the last 10 years have delivered AI’s biggest payoffs, how universities fuel trillion-dollar industries, and why cutting basic research now could cost the U.S. its technological edge.
Hennessy unpacks the mix of corporate, academic, and startup R&D that drives progress, the push to make AI models more efficient, and the leadership lessons that scale from lab teams to boardrooms.
Plus, he shares his perspective on the future of computing, Silicon Valley’s evolving role, and what it really takes to turn breakthrough science into world-changing companies.
About John L. Hennessy
John Leroy Hennessy is an American computer scientist and chairman of Alphabet Inc. Hennessy is one of the founders of MIPS Technologies and Atheros, serving as 10th president of Stanford University from 2000 to 2016.
