Viaduct Ventures Fund 1

01/02/2026

Which Investment Strategies Still Make Sense, even with Talk of an AI Bubble?

With growing warnings about an valuation bubble, the real question isn’t whether AI is overheated, it’s which parts of the market remain fundamentally strong. The answer seems clear: vertical AI, where companies use AI to improve real business operations rather than trying to build the next foundation model.

Where the Real Value Is
The most resilient opportunities are startups applying AI to increase efficiency in areas like healthcare workflows, compliance automation, logistics, or enterprise productivity. These companies solve concrete problems with measurable ROI, making them less vulnerable to hype cycles.

Why the US Still Leads
The U.S. remains the best geography for AI investing thanks to its deep technical talent, mature early-stage capital ecosystem, and fast enterprise adoption.

The Teams that Win
Successful companies combine:
• Strong AI engineering
• Strong business ex*****on
• Ideally, a serial entrepreneur who knows how to scale
It’s no longer just about building technology, it’s about commercializing it.

The Safe Zone: Early Stage
Bubble fears mostly apply to the top of the market. Early-stage companies under $100M valuations remain attractive because their prices are still tied to fundamentals and their capital needs are manageable.

Bottom Line
Yes, there’s probably a bubble at the very top of AI. But vertical AI, U.S.-based, early-stage startups with balanced founding teams remain some of the best investment opportunities today

12/15/2025

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐀𝐈 𝐛𝐮𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐬𝐧’𝐭 𝐬𝐥𝐨𝐰𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐧. I𝐭’𝐬 𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐜!

The global race to build AI has 𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐥𝐞 𝐥𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐝𝐞𝐩𝐥𝐨𝐲𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐢𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 capital in history.

And, per Rudy Torrijos at , it is not hard to see why: we’ve entered a new economic reality where demand for processors is uncapped, because model performance scales directly with computing power.

The spending only truly gets validated when models reach the “𝟔𝟎% 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐝”, scoring higher than the average human adult on the ARC-AGI-2 benchmark.

That’s the gateway to agentic and true labor substitution. Once it happens, enterprise adoption accelerates, shifting from experimental chatbots to autonomous workflows that drive margin expansion.

Far from a speculative bubble, this looks like a structural industrial revolution, backed by record operating cash flows and the relentless physics of scaling intelligence

12/12/2025

𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐟𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐩𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐕𝐂𝐬: 𝐖𝐡𝐨 𝐞𝐥𝐬𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠?

But for early-stage founders, who sits on your cap table truly matters.
A couple of relevant points from of :
• There are fewer leads today, the number of funds leading Seed or Series A rounds on Carta has steadily decreased;
• Leads are taking a larger share of the round.

If you’re writing a small check, knowing which investor 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐚𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝟕𝟓% 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝 absolutely matters.

The question is frustrating, but in today’s market, it’s also unavoidable. Investors want to understand the context, the conviction, and the caliber of the partners who will help shape the company’s trajectory

12/05/2025

𝐇𝐨𝐰 𝐦𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐨𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝?

According to fresh 2025 data from Peter Walker at Carta, here is the median equity sold to VCs for US software startups:
𝐒𝐞𝐞𝐝: 19.5% 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐀: 18% 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐁: 14% 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐂: 10% 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐃: 7.5%

Note that these medians sit in the middle of very wide distribution ranges. Also, 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬: If you are in Deep Tech, you’ll typically have to sell a bit more equity in the early stages compared to these software benchmarks.

11/28/2025

𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟓 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐚 𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐮𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐥 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐀𝐈 𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐲 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐔.𝐒. 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐛𝐞𝐲𝐨𝐧𝐝. In 2024, 𝟒𝟗 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐩𝐬 𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐝 funding rounds of $100M or more. 2025 has matched that number in November. 2025 has also seen a rise in companies raising multiple rounds above $100M.

𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐔.𝐒. 𝐀𝐈 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐝 $100M 𝐢𝐧 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 2025:
, the maker of the viral vibe-coding platform -ai, raised $2.3B in a round that valued the company at $29B
Parallel Web Systems, which builds web infrastructure for agents, raised a $100M Series A
Hippocratic AI, a healthcare AI agent startup, raised a $126M Series C

U.S.-based AI startups continue to rake in venture funding with multiple companies already raising impressive rounds in 2025.

11/17/2025

Are AI tools actually helping data engineers, or just making them busier?
A new MIT Technology Review survey in partnership with Snowflake found that 77% of data engineers have heavier workloads despite adoption.
Why? Tool sprawl.
83% of organizations use AI-powered data engineering tools, but 45% cite integration complexity and 38% face fragmentation across disconnected platforms.
The paradox: AI speeds up individual tasks but creates more complex systems to manage. Two years ago, data engineers spent 19% of their time on AI projects; now it’s 37%, expected to hit 61% in two years.
The lesson: more tools don’t mean more progress. Teams that simplify their stack, strengthen governance, and treat data engineers as strategic partners will be the ones ready for agentic AI, before everyone else gets stuck in pilot mode

Data engineers are spending nearly twice as much time on AI projects as they did two years ago, yet 77% report heavier workloads. A new survey reveals why enterprises are trapped in a productivity paradox and what to do about it.

11/14/2025

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐝𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐛𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐚 𝐢𝐬 𝐛𝐲 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐝𝐮𝐜𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐟

Sam Udotong, co-founder of .ai, writes: "We were desperately chasing our entrepreneurial dreams. An notetaker was our last hope. We told our customers there was an AI that'll join a meeting. In reality it was just me and my co-founder calling in to the meeting sitting there silently and taking notes by hand. After taking notes for 100+ meetings, we were finally able to automate everything in 2017. Since then, we have scaled Fireflies.ai to a $1B valuation."

11/09/2025

𝐒𝐭𝐨𝐩 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐩 𝐟𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬

Don’t confuse valuations in the zone of attention for the full market valuations. 𝐀 𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐥𝐲 𝐫𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫: the vast majority of startup funding rounds never make headlines, and that’s okay.

According to Carta (via Peter Walker), based on nearly 1,000 U.S. AI seed rounds so far in 2025, the median post-money valuation for AI startups in the Bay Area is $26M, compared to $18M elsewhere.

But the headlines you see? They come from the 90th-95th percentile, where valuations stretch past $100M to $160M+

11/04/2025

Navan 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐩𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐜 𝐨𝐧 𝐍𝐚𝐬𝐝𝐚𝐪, 𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐮𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐚𝐭 $𝟔.𝟕𝐁. Companies like Navan are showcasing the real operating power of AI across corporate travel, payments, and expenses. Wall Street’s latest AI wave has now reached corporate travel, Navan’s IPO on October 30 marks a significant step for the sector. With AI at its core, Navan offers an all-in-one platform for business travel and expense management, helping companies simplify workflows while ensuring compliance with internal policies.

Navan’s prominent backers include Andreessen Horowitz, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Zeev Ventures, and Greenoaks

10/31/2025

Per , investment banking giant will buy private shares platform to meet growing investor demand for stakes in fast-growing . has over 800,000 registered users and has processed 450 private companies since its inception in 2013.
Major financial institutions are increasingly building capabilities to connect clients with private companies, provide liquidity for pre-IPO shares and capitalize on the rising appetite among investors for early exposure to high-growth startups

Investment banking giant Morgan Stanley said on Wednesday it will buy private shares platform EquityZen, as Wall Street races to meet growing investor demand for stakes in fast-growing startups.

10/19/2025

Global investment rose from $112B in Q2 to $120B in Q3, making the fourth consecutive quarter of robust investment. Per , continued to dominate VC activity. Global exit value was $150B, the highest since 2021, driven by renewed activity.



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Global venture capital (VC) investment rose from $112 billion in Q2’25 to $120 billion in Q3’25—marking the fourth consecutive quarter of robust investment, according to the latest edition of Venture Pulse from KPMG Private Enterprise.

10/15/2025

has unveiled , a suite of developer tools for building agents. want to push hard on the enterprise, but are they too big to really tackle this opportunity?

Per , investors still bet that specialized startups can still have an edge over the likes of OpenAI. The advantages of agentic AI startups are speed and agility. The AI category has been growing rapidly, with deal count and value more than doubling since 2023. AI agent startups have raised $6.4B so far this year, surpassing $4.6B in 2024

Following the company's unveiling of AgentKit, investors aren’t sweating the ChatGPT maker’s move up the stack, citing focus and agility.