CodeStrap's "Code and Connor" Episode 19 features our friend August Chen, Co-Founder and CEO of Hazel. Hazel is an AI-powered procurement platform that helps federal, state, and local partners compress procurement cycles from months to minutes and save millions on what they purchase. Hazel launched out of Y Combinator in 2024 and is backed by the investors behind Palantir and Anduril. Before founding Hazel, August led mission-critical deployments at Palantir, including working with Connor and Dorian at their former employer. Our 19th episode examines government inefficiency through the lens of procurement, and why competitive pricing often breaks down in the public sector. We explore emerging tech approaches for fixing these gaps, including large-scale processing of unstructured data, LLM-driven solutions, and the broader willingness—or cultural resistance—within government to adopt new capabilities. The conversation also covers the expanding startup ecosystem focused on public-sector innovation, the rise of AI and data-center infrastructure, and why some tech CEOs are now (laughably) urging the government to help underwrite AI investment. Hazel Website: https://www.hazelai.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/hazel-ai/ Y Combinator: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/hazel-2 August: https://www.linkedin.com/in/augustschen/ CodeStrap Dorian: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dorian-smiley-97a72a14/ Connor: https://www.linkedin.com/in/connordeeks/ CodeStrap (X): https://x.com/CodeStrap411 CodeStrap (LI): https://www.linkedin.com/company/codestrap