About this episode
Michael is the co-founder and CEO of Prepared, the AI assistant for 911 calls that helps dispatchers capture information faster, translate emergency calls in real time, and deliver lifesaving context to first responders. Founded out of Yale in 2019, Prepared grew from a school safety app into a critical platform for emergency communications, disrupting a notoriously tough market. This mission-driven journey just reached a major milestone: Prepared was acquired by Axon, the global public safety technology company.
In this conversation, Michael joins Meka to share the inside story of building in a tough market, the counterintuitive strategies used to crack government procurement, and why their mission is a competitive moat.
In today’s episode, we discuss:
Why school shootings were the catalyst for building safety software
Navigating the most challenging customer base: government and public safety agencies
Why Prepared gave away its first product for free — for years
Lessons from evolving a wedge product into an AI-driven suite
How Michael balanced conviction with customer feedback
Building long-term investor relationships
Staying true to the mission through headwinds and tailwinds
And much more…
Where to find Michael:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelchime/
Where to find Meka:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mekaasonye/
Twitter/X: https://x.com/bigmekastyle
Where to find First Round Capital:
Website: https://firstround.com/
First Round Review: https://review.firstround.com/
Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/firstround
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@FirstRoundCapital
This podcast on all platforms: https://review.firstround.com/podcast
References:
Axon: https://www.axon.com/
Dylan Gleicher: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dylan-gleicher/
March for Our Lives: https://marchforourlives.org/
Neal Soni: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neal-soni/
OpenAI: https://openai.com/
Peter Thiel Fellowship: https://thielfellowship.org/
Prepared: https://www.prepared911.com/
Sam Altman: https://x.com/sama
Slack: https://slack.com/
Uber Eats: https://www.ubereats.com/
Yale University: https://www.yale.edu/
Timestamps:
(3:03) Staying mission-oriented under pressure
(3:54) Negotiating an acquisition from a hospital bed
(06:25) How Sandy Hook shaped the Prepared story
(09:15) From school safety app to 911 platform
(10:02) Why are 911 systems so outdated?
(13:02) Prepared’s first product iteration
(16:04) Why attempt to tackle the govtech mar
