Adrian Macneil grew up packing kiwifruit in rural New Zealand, now he’s building the core infrastructure powering the future of robotics. After leading engineering teams at Cruise and Coinbase, Adrian co-founded Foxglove, a developer platform used by robotics companies worldwide, from autonomous tractors to warehouse bots.
In this episode, Adrian shares how Foxglove emerged from an internal Cruise demo, why robotics is finally having its “PC moment,” and what it really takes to build a startup that lasts. We cover:
• How Cruise helped pioneer self-driving cars (and what went wrong post-acquisition)
• Why developer tools are the missing layer holding robotics back
• Lessons from Coinbase, Cruise, and scaling teams from 30 to 1,200
• The case for Kiwi founders to leave New Zealand, at least for a while
• What robotics startups can learn from the rise of SaaS
• The value of building boring robots that just move rice
We also dive into Adrian’s early days hacking e-commerce in Thailand, how government jobs don’t prepare you for startups, and why he believes the robotics industry will 100x in the next decade.
🧠 Adrian Macneil’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adrianmacneil/
🛠️ Foxglove – Developer tools for robotics: https://foxglove.dev
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