About this episode

Bhairav and Sanjay Rakshit discuss the overrated nature of LLMs in AI and explore various related topics.

About This Episode Bhairav sits down with Sanjay Rakshit, now at Poppulo, for his third or fourth appearance on the show. The conversation was sparked by a quote Sanjay gave at DSE (the digital signage industry event run by Invidis): "LLMs are the most overrated part of AI." They unpack what that actually means, and dig into agents, agentic systems, context engineering, data fidelity, AGI, robotics, and the future of engineering jobs. What We Cover - What Sanjay meant by his "LLMs are overrated" quote, and the DSE event where he said it - The difference between an agent and a chatbot: agency, planning, and achieving an outcome versus reactive output - Where LLMs actually fit inside an agentic system (as one tool among many) - Why context engineering, not the LLM call, is where most of the real work happens - Data fidelity versus data quality, and why it matters more than raw data volume - The mathematics underpinning AI, and why understanding first principles beats following influencers - Quantum computing's potential impact on AI going forward - AI, jobs, and the "power tools" analogy for engineering productivity - Sanjay's take on AGI, and why he remains sceptical - Robotics…

People in this episode

Host: Bhairav

Guest: Sanjay Rakshit

Topics covered

• LLMs
• AI
• agentic systems
• context engineering
• data fidelity
• AGI
• robotics

Keywords

• LLMs
• AI
• context engineering
• data fidelity
• AGI
• robotics
• agentic systems
• engineering jobs

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Poppulo, Invidis, Bayes Institute

More episodes of Atom CTO Podcasts

• Find Joy in the Process - Ramit Mehta Trailer · July 21, 2026 · 5 min
• Understand the Fundamentals - 5 Questions with Sanjay Rakshit · July 14, 2026 · 4 min
• Position Alone Doesn’t Give You Authority with Mateo Bervejillo · July 9, 2026 · 49 min
• Prepare for an emotional rollercoaster - Mateo Bervejillo Trailer · July 7, 2026 · 3 min
• Vibe Coding and Real World Problems: Why AI Still Needs a CTO · July 2, 2026 · 45 min
• Logical Thinking is more important in the age of AI - Anuraag Jain Trailer · June 30, 2026 · 3 min

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the Atom CTO Podcasts podcast page.