AGI House Newsletter

October has been a busy month at AGI House. From hosting paper readings to hanging out with a cooking robot, we're excited to share what we've been up to and what's coming up next month at AGI House.

Author

Melissa Daniel
October 24, 2025 • Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes

⭐️ Upcoming Build Day

Self Evolving Agents - Nov 1st @ AGI House

Self-evolving agents represent the next leap: systems that don’t just execute instructions, but learn from their own actions, refactor their workflows, and evolve new capabilities over time. Instead of static copilots that plateau, these agents continuously improve – discovering new strategies, integrating tools, and optimizing themselves without human-in-the-loop retraining.

a16z AI Infra × AGI House: Why Language Models Hallucinate – October 12th

As part of SF Tech Week, we co-hosted a paper reading session with a16z AI Infra featuring Ofir Nachum and Edwin Zhang, researchers at OpenAI and co-authors of Why Language Models Hallucinate. The evening brought together founders, researchers, and engineers to explore one of AI’s most pressing questions: why large language models hallucinate and how to make them more reliable.

Through a mix of theoretical discussion and open debate, we examined the role of model objectives, data composition, and architecture in shaping truthfulness and reasoning. Participants exchanged ideas on how to build grounded, verifiable AI systems, and what trustworthy reasoning might look like in the next generation of models.

⭐️ Upcoming Build Day

Small Language Build Day - Nov 8th @ NYC

The future of AI is not just about scale. It is about efficiency. At this one-day build sprint, you will get hands-on with AWS Trainium, AWS’s purpose-built AI chip designed for high-performance training that enables breakthroughs in efficient model development. Participants will work with Trainium instances, Hugging Face integrations, and streamlined fine-tuning workflows to build working SLM prototypes in under 12 hours.

80+ MIT AI Conference VIP Speakers Dinner @ AGI House on October 17, 2025

AGI House had the honor of hosting the speakers from the MIT AI Conference for an intimate dinner at the house.

Posha Robot Chef visits AGI House

Never worry about cooking dinner again…

An afternoon with AGI House. Demoed to some of the sharpest builders and founders around. That energy is contagious. | Raghav Gupta

An afternoon with AGI House. Demoed to some of the sharpest builders and founders around. That energy is contagious.

Harvard Law Professor Lunch @ AGI House - Discussion on AI Governance

A recent lunch between Harvard Law's Jonathan Zittrain, former Facebook General Counsel Chris Kelly, and AI founders from AGI House (including Cresta's Zade and Udia's Ashish Agrawal) revealed core tensions in AI governance. The group debated whether premature regulation might target the wrong problems, noting that automobile safety rules emerged decades after cars were invented. Hands-on experience from AGI House suggests current AI agents are less advanced than headlines imply. A key market insight: corporate legal departments view AI as cost optimization rather than investment. The central challenge remains that AI development creates societal externalities that traditional limited liability frameworks can't contain, and no one has figured out how to align all stakeholders' incentives.

💻 Hackathon Events Recap

Small Language Model Build Day – October 4, 2025

The future of AI isn’t just bigger; it’s leaner, faster, and more efficient. On October 4, AGI House and AWS co-hosted the Small Language Model Build Day, a one-day sprint to prove that smarter design beats sheer size. Over 120 builders explored AWS Trainium and Hugging Face integrations, racing to create production-ready SLM prototypes in under 12 hours. Projects tackled everything from text-to-SQL assistants to lightweight reasoning copilots, demonstrating that power and efficiency can coexist.

🥇 SLM ai – Detects exposed secrets and API keys in source code in real time using fine-tuned SLMs, enabling automated security remediation and compliance monitoring.

🥈 Cloak – PII-aware transcription tool that automatically redacts sensitive information using a compact fine-tuned model.

🥉 BabelBooks – Translates English texts into Hindi with integrated text-to-speech, making audiobooks accessible across languages.

Huge thanks to our judges and mentors from AWS, Forethought, Decart AI, and Cignia for guiding participants through a day of high-speed innovation.

Read a blog post from a builder here:

AI4Science Hackathon – October 11, 2025

The frontier of science is evolving and AI is leading the way. As part of a16z’s SF Tech Week, AGI House teamed up with MatNex, supported by Viridien, Khosla Ventures, and NVIDIA, to host the AI4Science Hackathon on October 11. Over 100 researchers, founders, and engineers came together to apply AI to scientific discovery, from materials science to life sciences.

🥇 Perov – Designs optimal perovskite solar materials for any region on Earth, tailoring compositions based on sunlight, humidity, and cost to accelerate clean energy transition.

🥈 MatSyn – Predicts synthesis routes for novel compounds using a knowledge graph and agentic reasoning, continuously learning to enable faster scientific breakthroughs.

🥉 Material Arena – Transforms vague product briefs into precise material choices through natural-language translation, interactive exploration, and a gamified discovery mode.

⭐ Special Prize: Cat Pain Detection Model – A cross-species EEG model using domain-adversarial training to detect feline pain, advancing animal welfare research.

A massive thank-you to all participants, mentors, and judges who helped redefine the future of AI-powered science.

💼We’re hiring, and our portfolio companies are too

  • Photo Labs is building personalized generative AI models that preserve both identity and context in photos. Backed by a16z, and founded by two of Adobe’s leading AI researchers, they’re reimagining how we capture and edit real moments. Hiring for roles listed here. Email [email protected] if interested.

  • Develop Health is building AI automation to enable prescribers. Backed by Wing VC and other leading investors, they are reimagining how care is delivered Hiring: AI Engineer, Product Engineer, and Platform & Security Engineer. Email [email protected] if interested.

  • AGI House is building the infrastructure for AGI and looking for exceptional candidates to join our core team. Hiring: AI Researcher / PhD in Residence, Product & Frontend Engineer, and Operations Manager. Email [email protected] if interested or read more here .

Till next time,

AGI House Team

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