Nikolas Kairinos is the co-founder and chief executive officer of RAIDS AI, short for Rogue AI Detection System, which monitors AI in real time to catch issues.
In this week’s Founder in Five Q&A, Kairinos discusses focusing on good, solid research that builds working products rather than chasing trends or bowing to investor pressure.
What advice would you give to a first-time founder?
If you’re entering the AI space, you’ll quickly feel the tension between investor urgency and engineering integrity. The pressure for growth hacks and fast MVPs is real – but the best founders know that technical truth comes first.
If the maths doesn’t work, neither will the product. The most enduring AI systems are provably sound before they scale. Focus on fundamental research that builds defensible IP, not just clever applications of existing models. The real opportunity lies in creating the infrastructure that will underpin the next 20 years of innovation – not in chasing short-term wins or quick exits....