Mike Krieger is the chief product officer of Anthropic and the co-founder of Instagram. After leaving Meta, he co-founded Artifact, an AI-powered news app that I absolutely loved, and joined Anthropic to lead product in 2024.
*In this episode, you’ll learn:*
1. How Anthropic uses AI to write 90-95% of code for some products and the surprising new bottlenecks this creates
2. Why embedding product managers with AI researchers yields 10x the impact of traditional product development
3. The three areas where product teams can still add massive value as AI gets smarter
4. How Anthropic plans to compete with OpenAI long-term
5. How to use Claude as your product strategy partner (with specific prompting techniques)
6. Why Mike shut down Artifact despite loving the product, and what founders can learn from it
7. Where AI startups should build to avoid getting killed by OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google
8. Why MCP (Model Context Protocol) might reshape how all software works
9. The counterintuitive product metrics that matter for AI
10. How to evaluate whether your company is maximizing AI’s potential or just scratching the surface
*Transcript:* https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/anthropics-cpo-heres-what-comes-next
*Brought to you by:*
Productboard—Make products that matter: https://www.productboard.com/lenny
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*Where to find Mike Krieger:*
• X: https://x.com/mikeyk
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikekrieger/
*Where to find Lenny:*
• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com
• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/
*In this episode, we cover:*
(00:00) Introduction to Mike Krieger
(04:25) What Mike has changed his mind about regarding AI capabilities
(07:43) How to avoid scary AI scenarios
(09:00) Skills kids will need in an AI world
(11:58) How product development changes when 90% of code is written by AI
(17:12) Claude helping with product strategy
(21:21) A new way of working
(24:00) The future value of product teams in an AI world
(27:23) Prompting tricks to get more out of Claude
(29:57) The Rick Rubin collaboration on “vibe coding”
(32:47) How Mike was recruited to Anthropic
(36:00) Why Mike shut down Artifact
(42:46) Anthropic vs. OpenAI
(47:16) Where AI founders should play to avoid getting squashed
(52:03) How companies can best leverage Anthropic’s models and APIs
(54:34) The role of MCPs (Model Context Protocols)
(58:30) Claude’s questions for Mike
(01:03:20) Claude’s heartfelt message to Mike
*Referenced:*
• Anthropic: https://www.anthropic.com/
• Claude Opus 4: https://www.anthropic.com/claude/opus
• Dario Amodei on X: https://x.com/darioamodei
• AI 2027: https://ai-2027.com/
• Tobi Lütke’s leadership playbook: Playing infinite games, operating from first principles, and maximizing human potential (founder and CEO of Shopify): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/tobi-lutkes-leadership-playbook
• Claude Shannon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Shannon
• Information theory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory
• TypeScript: https://www.typescriptlang.org/
• Python: https://www.python.org/
• Rust: https://www.rust-lang.org/
• Bending the universe in your favor | Claire Vo (LaunchDarkly, Color, Optimizely, ChatPRD): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/bending-the-universe-in-your-favor
• Announcing a brand-new podcast: “How I AI” with Claire Vo: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/announcing-a-brand-new-podcast-how
• A conversation with OpenAI’s CPO Kevin Weil, Anthropic’s CPO Mike Krieger, and Sarah Guo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxkvVZua28k
• Jack Clark on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-clark-5a320317/
• Artifact: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artifact_(app)
• Joel Lewenstein on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joel-lewenstein/
• Daniela Amodei on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniela-amodei-790bb22a/
• Boris Cherny on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bcherny/
• Gunnar Gray on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gunnargray/
• The Model Context Protocol: https://www.anthropic.com/news/model-context-protocol
…References continued at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/anthropics-cpo-heres-what-comes-next
*Recommended books:*
• The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement: https://www.amazon.com/Goal-Process-Ongoing-Improvement/dp/0884271951
• The Way of the Code: The Timeless Art of Vibe Coding: https://www.thewayofcode.com/
• The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business when There Are No Easy Answers―Straight Talk on the Challenges of Entrepreneurship: https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Thing-About-Things-Building/dp/0062273205
_Production and marketing by https://penname.co/._
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Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.
