S11 E20: Alex Halkin, Competera AI

S11 E20: Alex Halkin, Competera AI

Author: Noah Labhart - Startup Founder & CTO October 7, 2025 Duration: 26:59
Alex Halkin can't remember a time where he wasn't doing tech. Funny enough, he does remember a time before internet was common place. In 6th or 7th grade, he got a computer and immediately disassembled it. And eventually, he built an internet service provider for his community, eventually dropped out of university, and sold his internet provider. Outside of tech, he has always been into sports - cycling, motorcycles, etc. And though he doesn't have much time for it anymore, he is big into Brazilian Jujitsu. At his old role, Alex started to pitch subscription pricing for their products. The timing wasn't right for deep machine learning for pricing, so his boss turned him down. Several years later, he and his team are leveraging the power of Contextual AI to calculate and optimize price combinations. This is the creation story of Competera AI. Our Sponsors: * Check out Cash App and use my code CASHAPP10 for a great deal: https://click.cash.app/ui6m/mt82fpxl #CashAppPod. Cash App is a financial services platform, not a bank. Banking services provided by Cash App’s bank partner(s). Prepaid debit cards issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC. See terms and conditions at https://cash.app/legal/us/en-us/card-agreement. Cash App Green, overdraft coverage, borrow, cash back offers and promotions provided by Cash App, a Block, Inc. brand. Visit http://cash.app/legal/podcast for full disclosures. * Check out Plaud AI and use my code CODESTORY for a great deal: https://plaud.ai Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Behind every successful software product is a story, often untold, about the pivotal choices and challenges that shaped its journey. Code Story: Insights from Startup Tech Leaders brings those narratives to the forefront, hosted by Noah Labhart, a startup founder and CTO who understands the terrain. This podcast moves beyond theory to focus on the real-world experiences of SaaS founders, engineers, and product leaders. You'll hear firsthand accounts of building an initial MVP, the grind of securing those crucial first customers, and the delicate process of finding true product-market fit. Conversations delve into the technical and strategic crossroads that define early growth, from foundational engineering decisions and pricing experiments to the unforeseen infrastructure bottlenecks that emerge when scaling accelerates. It’s a resource for technical founders in the trenches, offering practical insights into navigating the complexities of building, launching, and growing a software business. Each episode of this podcast serves as a candid case study, revealing the lessons learned behind the code.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 100

Code Story: Insights from Startup Tech Leaders
Podcast Episodes
S12 E1: Dylan Ratcliffe, Overmind [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:55
Dylan Ratcliffe lives in San Francisco (for less than a year), but grew up on a farm in the bush in Australia, riding motorbikes and playing video games. He fondly remembers the days whenever you could get a free version…
Season Favorite - Sam Partee, Arcade.dev [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 22:11
Sam Partee started out his love for tech/engineering by working on cars. After many y ears of working on cars, and even starting his own car stereo installation business, he decided that cards were finite and moved onto…
Season Favorite - Jens Neuse, Wundergraph [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 32:59
Jens Neuse grew up in Germany, originally planning to be a carpenter. In his 2nd year as an apprentice, he was in a motorcycle wreck that thrust him into a process of surgery and healing. Eventually, he decided he wouldn…
S11 E30: Brandon Card, Terzo [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 21:50
Brandon Card has always been involved in sports. In High School, he was a 3 sport athlete and still plays today, along side working out, doing yoga and pilates. He's heavily interested in holistic healing and alternative…
S11 Bonus: Juan DeAngulo, Inselligence [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 28:10
Juan DeAngulo was born and raised in South America - then eventually, came to the status in 2017 for college to play Tennis. He kept playing throughout college and into his 40's, at which point he switched to golf and ne…
Developer Chats - Petr Petrenko [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 14:44
Today, we are continuing our series, entitled Developer Chats - hearing from the large scale system builders themselves. In this episode, we are talking with Petr Petrenko, Senior PHP Backend Engineer. Petr will take us…
S11 E29: Sarah Lucena, Mappa [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 28:23
Sarah Lucena lives in San Francisco, and starts here day at 4:30 am to lead her LATAM team. She's originally from Brazil, born and raised on the north east side of the country. She studied in South Paulo, and spent 5 yea…
S11 Bonus: Tucker Callaway, Mezmo [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 23:34
Tucker Calloway grew up in Alamo, California, in the Easy Bay Area. And has returned to that area to raise his family - 25-30 minutes outside of the San Francisco area. He studied computer science at Cal, but eventually…
S11 E28: Hojjat Jafarpour, DeltaStream [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 22:12
Hojjat Jafarpour lives with his family in California. He got his PhD in databases and data streaming, back when the landscape was different and data streaming wasn't "cool" yet. He was an early member at Confluent, but a…
Developer Chats - Svyatoslav Babinets of Meta [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 31:28
Today, we are kicking off a new series, entitled Developer Chats - hearing from the large scale system builders themselves, sponsored by our friends at Beyond Tech. Beyond Tech is a top tier consulting company, specializ…