AI Investing in 2026

Description

Astasia Myers, General Partner at Felicis, joins to share how top VCs are thinking about AI investing and why over 80% of Felicis’ recent bets are in this space. But not every AI investment is equal. We dive deep into where the real ROI is emerging, why most GenAI projects still fail to reach production, and what must happen for agentic systems to finally work at scale. This is not hype, it’s a front-row look at what’s actually driving returns in 2025 and where the smart money is headed next. Voice AI is having its moment in healthcare. Unlike Siri or Alexa, today’s voice agents are running real operations, handling patient scheduling, communication, and even negotiation with better accuracy and NPS than human operators. The big shift? Pricing models. Instead of selling software seats, these companies price against labor replacement, expanding the market by 10x. Astasia explains how this outcome-based model opens access to the $35 trillion labor spend market and why healthcare is finally ready for AI transformation after years of false starts. The challenge remains. MIT found that 95% of GenAI initiatives never make it to production. That’s a staggering gap, and it’s not just about execution. Infrastructure, evaluation systems, and continuous learning tools still lag behind. Astasia outlines what must evolve to close that gap, why VCs are refocusing on technical risk, and how they identify founders who can build lasting moats in a crowded AI landscape. We also explore the next phase of democratization. ChatGPT unlocked AI for consumers, but enterprise adoption depends on giving non-technical teams tools to build, deploy, and customize their own workflows. With portfolio examples like Runway for video creation and N8N for agentic workflows, Astasia shows why accessibility, not complexity, is the key to mass adoption and how that mindset could shape the next wave of AI success stories. Finally, we discuss the provocative idea of the one person billion dollar company. Could it happen? What would it take? Astasia breaks down what investors would look for if that future becomes real. Timestamped Highlights 00:31 What Felicis invests in and the AI categories dominating its portfolio 02:58 Why healthcare tech is finally ready for its AI breakthrough 08:15 How outcome based pricing is redefining startup valuations and TAM 13:26 The one person billion dollar startup myth or the next big frontier 17:18 Voice AI as the gateway for enterprise adoption and why it’s different from Siri and Alexa 20:08 Democratizing AI from ChatGPT to enterprise ready tools that let anyone build Subscribe for more deep dives on AI, enterprise tech, and how innovation really scales. #techleaders #startup #founder #softwaredevelopment #tech #careergrowth #techleadership #cto #engineering #softwareengineering #careeradvice #startups #ai #artificialintelligence #leadership #agenticai #agentic #selfimprovement #motivation #teambuilding #vc #venturecapital