The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

20VC: Benchmark's Eric Vishria on Where is the Value in AI: Chips, Models or Apps | Why Nvidia Will Not Be The Only Game in Town | The Commoditisation of Foundation Models | Which AI Apps Have Sustaining Value vs Hype and Short Term Revenue


Listen Later

Eric Vishria is a General Partner @ Benchmark Capital, one of the world's leading venture firms. At Benchmark, Eric has served on over 10 boards including Confluent (CFLT), Amplitude (AMPL), Benchling, Contentful, Cerebras and several other private companies. Prior to joining Benchmark, Eric was the Co‐Founder and CEO of RockMelt, acquired by Yahoo in 2013.

In Today's Episode with Eric Vishria We Discuss:

1. How to Make Money Investing in AI Today:

  • How does Eric think through where value will accrue in the stack between chips, models and applications?
  • Why does Eric believe foundation models are the fastest commoditising asset in history?
  • Why does Eric believe that Nvidia will not be the only game in town in the next 3-5 years?

2. How to Invest in AI Application Layer Successfully:

  • How does Eric analyse between a standalone and deep product vs a product that foundation model will commodities and incorporate into their feature set?
  • How does Eric differentiate between the 10 different players all going after customer service, or sales tools or data analyst products etc?
  • How does Eric analyse the quality of revenue of these AI application layer companies? What does he mean when he describes their revenue as "sugar high"?

3. How the Best VC Firm Makes Decisions:

  • What is the decision-making process for all new deals in Benchmark?
  • As specifically as possible, how does the voting process inside Benchmark work?
  • What deal was the most contentious deal that went through? What did the partnership learn?
  • How has the Benchmark decision-making process changed over 10 years?

4. Does AI Break Venture Capital Models:

  • Does the price of AI deals and size of their rounds break the Benchmark model?
  • Will foundation model companies all be acquired by the larger cloud providers?
  • Unless multiples reflate in the public markets, does venture as an asset class have hope?
  • Why does AI make paying ludicrously high prices potentially rational?

 

...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The PitchBy Harry Stebbings

  • 4.4
  • 4.4
  • 4.4
  • 4.4
  • 4.4

4.4

478 ratings


More shows like The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

View all
This Week in Startups by Jason Calacanis

This Week in Startups

1,281 Listeners

a16z Podcast by Andreessen Horowitz

a16z Podcast

1,040 Listeners

The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS | Founders | Investors by SaaStr

The Official SaaStr Podcast: SaaS | Founders | Investors

178 Listeners

Founders by David Senra

Founders

1,934 Listeners

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy by Colossus | Investing & Business Podcasts

Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy

2,289 Listeners

Equity by TechCrunch, Rebecca Bellan, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, Max Zeff, Theresa Loconsolo

Equity

339 Listeners

Y Combinator Startup Podcast by Y Combinator

Y Combinator Startup Podcast

228 Listeners

All-In with Chamath, Jason, Sacks & Friedberg by All-In Podcast, LLC

All-In with Chamath, Jason, Sacks & Friedberg

9,276 Listeners

No Priors: Artificial Intelligence | Technology | Startups by Conviction

No Priors: Artificial Intelligence | Technology | Startups

129 Listeners

The Ben & Marc Show by Marc Andreessen, Ben Horowitz

The Ben & Marc Show

125 Listeners

BG2Pod with Brad Gerstner and Bill Gurley by BG2Pod

BG2Pod with Brad Gerstner and Bill Gurley

464 Listeners

AI + a16z by a16z

AI + a16z

31 Listeners

Lightcone Podcast by Y Combinator

Lightcone Podcast

21 Listeners

Training Data by Sequoia Capital

Training Data

43 Listeners

Uncapped with Jack Altman by Alt Capital

Uncapped with Jack Altman

36 Listeners