Episode #103: Scarce to Itself: NVIDIA, Apple, a Driverless Zoox, and the Real Fight Over the Future of Cars

In this episode of Stewart Squared, Stewart Alsop III and Stewart Alsop II dig into the fast-moving world of self-driving cars — from Cruise's rocky history and Waymo's expansion to Zoox's driverless design and NVIDIA's growing role as the go-to OEM partner for automakers building software- and AI-defined vehicles — before the conversation branches into dual-use tech lessons from Ukraine, the US-China race in autonomy and semiconductors, the DRAM memory shortage squeezing Apple and the gaming industry, Slate's stripped-down electric truck, and a closing riff on performance-based, subscription-driven podcasting.

Timestamps

00:00 — Self-driving cars and the fallout from Cruise’s collapse; where AVs are operating now, plus the role of NVIDIA in autonomous vehicles.
00:05 — Software-defined cars, Level 4 autonomy, and why Waymo and Zoox matter; how regulation and city-by-city permits shape rollout.
00:10 — Dual-use autonomy in war zones, liability, and the shift from consumer adoption to fleet adoption; NVIDIA’s place as a supplier, not a prime.
00:15 — Why NVIDIA is strategically positioned across chips, software, and cars; comparisons with Tesla, Rivian, Ford, and GM.
00:20 — China’s open-source AI push, RISC-V, control vs openness, and the tension between state control and innovation.
00:25 — The rise of neo-primes like Anduril, how the Pentagon buys systems, and why the U.

S. defense market favors trust and scale.
00:30 — A broader debate on capitalism vs communism, China’s economic strain, and whether the future looks more centralized or decentralized.
00:35 — The memory crisis: DRAM, GPUs, Apple, and video games getting squeezed as AI demand drives prices up.
00:40 — Cheap EV disruption with Slate, new form factors, and how car design may split between utility-first and premium autonomous vehicles.
00:45 — The city itself changing: AVs, urban planning, flying-car ideas, and how autonomy could reshape Los Angeles and beyond.
00:50 — Pricing scarce compute, NVIDIA’s leverage, and the idea that some companies become scarce to themselves.
00:55 — A long-range view: centralized vs decentralized tech cycles, RISC-V, and the possibility of open hardware reshaping everything.

Key Insights

1. Autonomous vehicles are consolidating around a small set of platform players. Waymo, Tesla, Zoox, and Rivian lead the US market, while China's fleet is dominated by companies like Geely-backed operations. Regulation moves city by city, so scale depends as much on winning local approval as on the technology itself.
2. NVIDIA has built a stealth position as the OEM backbone of autonomous vehicles. Rather than compete with carmakers, NVIDIA supplies the compute platform nearly every manufacturer relies on, letting it profit from the industry's growth without taking on liability or betting on any single winner.
3. Liability, not technology, is the biggest brake on driverless fleets. Once a car has no human driver, responsibility shifts entirely to the fleet owner. Zoox's steering-wheel-free design in San Francisco is the clearest test case for how that liability question gets resolved.
4. The DRAM shortage is a downstream effect of the AI buildout. Massive GPU demand for LLM training soaked up memory supply, driving up DRAM prices for everyone else — squeezing Apple, gaming consoles, and now the auto industry, which needs growing amounts of compute per vehicle.
5. China's dominance in EVs coexists with deep structural weakness. A shrinking, aging population, price wars that erase margins in sectors like solar, and a government that reins in entrepreneurs when they get too powerful (DeepSeek's blocked IPO) complicate the narrative of unstoppable Chinese industrial growth.
6. "Scarce to itself" describes a new kind of market power. Companies like NVIDIA and Apple aren't scarce because of demand tricks — they're supply-constrained on their own hardware, which lets them set pricing on their own terms rather than compete on it.
7. Podcasting may be shifting from ads to direct subscription models. Inspired by ideas like Trump's paid early-access posts, Stewart Alsop and Stewart Alsop II are testing "performance podcasting" — charging listeners directly for real-time access instead of relying on sponsorships.