Show Notes
Nine years after being forced out of Uber by his own investors, Travis Kalanick is back in the spotlight—and he isn’t apologizing.
Once viewed as the poster child for Silicon Valley's unchecked "tech bro" culture, Kalanick has resurfaced with Atoms, a bold new venture leveraging AI, automation, and robotics to prepare and deliver food without human intervention. But his comeback also signals a massive cultural vibe shift: why is Silicon Valley celebrating the founder it once treated as a cautionary tale?
Fortune Finance & Crypto Editor Jeff John Roberts joins Fortune Daily to unpack what changed—Kalanick, the technology, or the venture capitalists writing the checks. Plus, Jeff breaks down Robinhood’s new agentic trading features and what automated investing means for the retail market, followed by a preview of Fortune’s upcoming AIQ conference with Fortune AI Editor Jeremy Kahn.
Fortune Articles mentioned:
Robinhood: https://fortune.com/2026/09/29/robinhood-trading-agents-hood-openai-anthropic/
AIQ 75: https://fortune.com/ranking/aiq/
Subscribe to Fortune: https://fortune.com/subscribe/
Illustration by Nigel Buchanan for Fortune
Additional images courtesy of Getty Images
00:00 Kalanick's Return
15:46 Robinhood's AI Agents
20:31 AIQ Summit
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