Square's product chief on the death of the penny and the future of money
Decoder with Nilay Patel
- Published
- December 8, 2025
- Duration
- 1h 13m
- Summary source
- description
- Last updated
- Jun 14, 2026
Discusses Today, I’m talking with Willem Avé, who’s the head of product at Square. You know Square — it was st…
Summary
Today, I’m talking with Willem Avé, who’s the head of product at Square. You know Square — it was started by billionaire Jack Dorsey of Twitter fame more than 15 years ago, and it got big on the back of that little magnetic reader that once plugged into the headphone jack of the iPhone and let small businesses accept credit cards. Nowadays, of course, Squ…
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Show notes
Today, I’m talking with Willem Avé, who’s the head of product at Square. You know Square — it was started by billionaire Jack Dorsey of Twitter fame more than 15 years ago, and it got big on the back of that little magnetic reader that once plugged into the headphone jack of the iPhone and let small businesses accept credit cards. Nowadays, of course, Square is more than a credit card reader, and sadly, the headphone jack is ancient history. The company itself is now part of parent organization