Make AI help you beat impossible
For people at the top of their field, The Runts are a team and studio that builds, adapts, and applies advanced AI and similar technology, for world-class performance and your cause.
You push beyond excellence. But off-the-shelf tools aren't good enough yet.
Standard AI is built for common work "at scale." The world may need that. But it doesn't benefit the most advanced efforts.At the top of your field, you serve a cause larger than yourself. You demand the most from your tools.But high-end AI is still inaccessible behind layers of obscure tech. It might as well not exist for the needs of experts in any non-technical field.
We serve what you serve.
We apply AI, data, research, and custom solutions as levers for people who already perform at rare levels to get even better.What does that mean?We map deeply what impossibility you want to achieve, in the service of your mission. Then we work alongside you to design and build ways to make it possible.It might involve AI. Or something else might fit better. We hunt for tools that best serve to remove what stands between you and results you must reach.Two working modes:
Guided: You set direction. We help you execute with precision and speed.
Unguided: You hand us the aim. We assess the landscape, define the decisions, and propose a plan shaped to your real constraints.Everything remains custom to you and your mission.
01
Multi-method for you
We draw from AI research, cognitive science, and elite partners in a variety of fields.The approach is always custom to you. But the steps are deceptively simple:Cause: Whom/ what this serve and how
Intent: Success in utter clarity
Attention: What is now
Reflection: What must change but can't so far
Custom design: Solution for you and only you
Evolution with you: Refine until it holds under pressure
02
Partners of caliber
We don't try to match you. We have our own mission, for you:Be best in world at putting AI and similar tools in the service of the those who are best in world.The standard we hold for our own craft is likely quite similar to your own:Truth without fear | discipline without ego | curiosity without limit | pursuit of true excellence | cause beyond self
03
Our joint fit
We are not the right people for general AI projects, mid-level upskilling, or abstract “innovation” exercises. We are your go-to when the stakes are world-changing for your field.By the time you encounter us, we won't be close to as good as you. Not the point. And who could be anyway? But we'll have caught up and know what it takes to be good partners to you.Our small, permanent team asks trusted domain experts -- who truly understand you -- to join, catch us up, and be qualified conversation partners for you: Surgeons. Coaches. Founders. Researchers. Artists. Anyone pushing the boundary of what is possible in a similar (non-competitive) craft as yours.
04
Wherever you need us
We work worldwide, as useful.Our teams are based in Europe and the U.S. We're happy to host you But that may not be an option for you. So we've made our toolkit mobile and can support you where and how it works best.
Looking for Alpha partners
We're currently available to select sparring partners, who will push us further, as we fine-tune details of our work.If that sounds like you, excellent! If not, please still say hello below, and we will follow up when we are ready for your domain and topic.
A team in service to your cause
Our core team stays small (ok, small....ish). It keeps the work sharp, the decisions fast, and the standards consistent. We carry the technical depth, research grounding, and the operational discipline it takes to build solutions that hold up under the extreme conditions you need to put on them to be of help.Each of us works directly with you, as relevant. No layers. No handoffs. Our leaders are working leaders.You won't see domain experts here because we pull in partners from our roster specifically for our work with you.
Amina
Physiology, medicine, human-performance, co-studio lead
Martin
Advanced AI engineering, data science, robotics, full-stack development
Jonas
Operational modeling, simulation, experimentation, advanced non-AI tools
Lucía
Visual, audio, narrative, interior, and artistic design, co-studio head
Massimo
Interface and interaction design, services, human-machine interaction
Vijay
Studio operations, engagement design and leadership, complex planning
Chioma
Business, Law, Governance
Søren
Neuroscience, psychology, decision science, behavioral research
Min-seo
Mechanical, electric, industrial, and civic engineering, architecture
Tarek
Systems theory and engineering, manufacturing, physical builds
Let's push back impossible, together.
Someone may already have passed on you our contact info. If so, just use that. If we haven't met: hi! Please leave your email, how you want us to reach you, and in what time zone.We don't do sales conversations. You'll simply get to ask us whatever is helpful to gauge whether we’re the right people for you.Thanks for considering us!
Expect a thoughtful reply the same day.
Thanks for all you do for the world!
The Runts is not an active company. But the contact form will reach us. Site created for illustration. © Custom Lightning LLC (2025). All rights reserved.
About
Plain-speak
The Runts is a little, global advisory and tech solutions firm.We serve global experts and top performers in all fields of work, both for-profit and non-profit. We're more concerned with our clients than ourselves.Our specialty is to help you integrate AI and similar tech into complex or advanced work. In that, our explicit priority is to make AI serve you (not the other way around) and to focus not on the tech but on helping you get even better at what you do, no matter that you're already at the peak of your craft.We do that by building custom and semi-custom solutions to problems you solve, using a tight process and with ongoing feedback from you.
The point of our work
We help
those who push back what’s possible
to put technology and insights in service to
their effectiveness, their cause,
and being fully human.
Our tagline explains it
You may know our tagline, or you may not:The Runts
It’s not about usIt matters, and the story reveals lots.
We had another tagline all planned out: “It’s about you, not us”We learned that it wasn't good enough.We had shared it with extraordinary people, maybe just like you.They taught us that it’s likely not about you either. For those who succeed at reaching beyond mere excellence, it’s bigger than them:In small part, it’s about pursuit of perfection, sure. But at the very top, usually more: Your family. Doing right by opportunities granted to you. Your culture’s survival. Alleviating suffering. Human potential. Dignity. Beauty and wonder. A call from your god. Revealing the very universe.Self-centered excellence, these are not.And so we put our services not in your service but in accompanying you in the pursuit of what you serve.Turns out, the whole point, a purpose beyond any more tagline, is that when we say “it’s not about us” we also include you in that “us”.It’s not “us for you.” It’s “both of us for your cause.”May we serve it well.
Lived values
Most "value statements" are drivel. Either bland to the point of meaninglessness or litanies of weaknesses to wish away with pretty words.Not these, you better believe. You will see them explicitly and in practice everywhere:HIGHER
High-caliber as the bottom-rung baseline
Maniacal about our craft
dapting alwaysCLEARER
Unafraid of truth
Managing the double-edge of Human excellence
To the pointHUMAN
Serving your cause, not you
kind
Embracing all disciplines and experiences
In it together
Wearing responsibility light-heartedly
People before profit
What can we answer?
Q: What do you charge?
Easy question. Trickier answer, given the work we're talking about:We believe that money will work itself out if not made the center. The goals: You must be able to afford the work. You must care. And we must make a living after costs. Beyond that, we optimize for meaning, not money.We round efforts for simplicity to small, medium, large, or custom project size. The point is to make sure that you care and invest, not a specific amount of money.We use sliding scales to adapt to either what is reasonable to you specifically or to people like you, based on the equivalent of your hourly rate.Small projects are the equivalent of 4 hours of work, medium are 16, large are 1 week, and there's always custom, which need not always mean custom-large. It can also mean custom-small. For long-term joint practice, we can also do light ongoing check-ins as you implement what we created.For example, if you are a baseball star making $365 million, “four hours for a small project” would be a big amount. But if you are a nun in Kolkata, It will be a much smaller amount or even free. The point is to ensure that you care about the work and its impact on you.Yes, barter is an option in addition to money payment. But there are practical limits. We may not have much to offer you in trade if you’re an Olympic polevaulter. :) So money is still a good default.
Q: I’m super-busy. Will you talk to my team?
Sure, but only about logistics. We’ve found that one of the best signals for whether a peak performer wants to push further is if they invest their own time. We can’t get better for you. Even setting it up right will soon take you, personally.