Agentic Shift in Microservices | Mark Fussell, CEO of Diagrid

Infinite Curiosity Pod with Prateek Joshi

Infinite Curiosity Pod with Prateek Joshi
Agentic Shift in Microservices | Mark Fussell, CEO of Diagrid
Jul 09, 2025
Prateek Joshi

Mark Fussell is the CEO of Diagrid, a developer platform that provides tools and services for building cloud native applications. They've raised $24.2M from Amplify and Norwest. He is also the co-creator of Dapr, an open source tool used by 40,000 companies. 

Mark's favorite books: 
- Crossing the Chasm (Author: Geoffrey A. Moore)
- Good to Great (Author: Jim Collins)
- The Dispossessed (Author: Ursula K. Le Guin) 

(00:01) Opening and Introduction
(00:09) The Origins of Dapr: Solving Developer Pain
(01:53) Why Launch Diagrid After Building Dapr at Microsoft
(03:36) Why Dapr Gained Traction Among Developers
(05:30) Open Source Commercialization: What to Charge For
(07:51) When Do Companies Turn to Diagrid for Help?
(09:53) Key Features: PubSub, Workflow, and Catalyst
(11:48) North Star Metrics and Innovation Philosophy
(13:17) Pricing Strategy for Infra and Dev Tools
(15:28) Competing Against Hyperscalers Like AWS & Azure
(17:32) Who Diagrid Competes With and Role of Platform Engineering
(19:29) The Agentic Shift in Microservices
(21:28) How AI Is Changing Microservices Design
(22:59) What's Coming Next at Diagrid: Roadmap and AI Features
(24:51) Lessons from the First Five Customers
(26:59) Rapid Fire Round

--------
Where to find Mark Fussell: 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mfussell/

--------
Where to find Prateek Joshi: 

Newsletter: https://prateekjoshi.substack.com 
Website: https://prateekj.com 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/prateek-joshi-infinite 
X: https://x.com/prateekvjoshi 

Episode Artwork Agentic Shift in Microservices | Mark Fussell, CEO of Diagrid 34:08 Episode Artwork Building the Android for Robots | Jan Liphardt, founder of OpenMind 46:43 Episode Artwork AI Infra for Long Context Model Training | Anna Patterson, founder of Ceramic AI 39:31 Episode Artwork Building an AI+Data Startup Studio | Tom Chavez, cofounder of super{set} 52:57 Episode Artwork Decentralized Data Foundry for AI | Rowan Stone, CEO of Sapien 38:22 Episode Artwork Converting Cameras into Autonomous AI Agents | Rish Gupta, CEO of Spot AI 38:50 Episode Artwork Are AI Phone Agents Ready for Prime Time? | Alex Levin, CEO of Regal 45:21 Episode Artwork What it Takes to Build a BI Platform | Colin Zima, CEO of Omni 40:07 Episode Artwork Building Billing Infrastructure for AI Companies | Alvaro Morales, CEO of Orb 38:21 Episode Artwork Turning Legal Services to APIs | Jay Madheswaran, CEO of Eve 41:02