Podcasts · This Week in Startups

What VCs Really Think About Personal AI Agents | E2347

· 1 h 19 min

Episode What VCs Really Think About Personal AI Agents | E2347

0:00 1:18:47

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Today’s show:

A personal AI agent that’s still invite-only just hit a $10 billion valuation. Guest host Deedy Das of Menlo Ventures is joined by Kanu Gulati of Khosla Ventures, Chris Farmer of SignalFire, and Sheel Mohnot of Better Tomorrow Ventures to debate whether Instinct can beat Meta’s Muse, what they actually use their own agents for, and what breaks when everyone’s agent makes the same move.

Plus we’re also talking about OpenAI’s math breakthroughs, the Factory vs. Cognition fight, and whether SaaS is still worth funding. Catch the whole debate on this week’s VC roundtable.

Guests:

Deedy Das on X: https://x.com/deedydas

Menlo Ventures: https://menlovc.com

Kanu Gulati on X: https://x.com/KanuGulati

Khosla Ventures: https://www.khoslaventures.com

Chris Farmer on X: https://x.com/chriswfarmer

SignalFire: https://www.signalfire.com

Sheel Mohnot on X: https://x.com/pitdesi

Better Tomorrow Ventures: https://www.btv.vc

Relevant Links:

OpenAI’s 722 math manuscripts from an unreleased internal model → https://github.com/openai/math

OpenAI’s earlier Navier–Stokes Millennium Prize result → https://openai.com/index/navier-stokes-solution/

Pramaana Labs, the Khosla-backed startup turning tax rules into provable logic → https://pramaanalabs.ai

Logos Research, the Imperial College spinout verifying AI-written financial code → https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/articles/2026/logos-research-plans-to-make-ai-reasoning-trustworthy-in-high-stakes-environments/

EvenUp, SignalFire’s AI company for personal injury law → https://www.evenuplaw.com/

WindBorne Systems, the Khosla-backed weather balloon company Kanu mentioned → https://windbornesystems.com

Gokul Rajaram’s X Post: https://x.com/gokulr/status/2107851356019290569?s=20

micro1, the AI training data company Chris and LAUNCH backs → https://www.micro1.ai

Vercel’s data on companies shifting to open-weight models → https://vercel.com/i/open-weight-models

Instinct raises $1B at a $10B valuation (SiliconANGLE) → https://siliconangle.com/2026/09/28/everyday-personal-ai-assistant-startup-instinct-raises-1b-at-10b-valuation/

Meta introduces Muse, its personal AI agent → https://about.fb.com/news/2026/09/introducing-muse-personal-ai-agent/

Wajo, maker of the Fo agent Kanu uses → https://wajo.ai

Factory’s CEO accuses his board adviser of spying for Cognition (TechCrunch) → https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/30/factory-ceo-just-accused-his-vc-board-advisor-of-spying-for-cognition/

xAI rents its Colossus 1 data center to Anthropic (Data Center Dynamics) → https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/musk-spacex-xai-is-actively-seeking-more-ai-compute-customers-following-anthropic-deal/

Bending Spoons agrees to buy Miro, weeks after Airtable → https://investors.bendingspoons.com/newsroom/bending-spoons-agrees-to-acquire-miro

The FCC’s new rule on foreign-made robots → https://www.fcc.gov/covered-list-faqs-robots-inverters

Timestamps:

00:00:00 VC roundtable with guest host Deedy Das

00:01:23 If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off!

00:02:11 OpenAI's math results and what's left to invest in

00:05:10 Formalizing taxes and code so AI can prove its work

00:06:37 Why science breakthroughs still need the real world

00:09:44 Odoo: The all-in-one business platform. Your first app is free! Get started today at https://Odoo.com/twist

00:10:54 Can startups compete with the labs on compute?

00:13:02 Private data and vertical AI as the moat

00:18:54 Would you invest in AI training data companies?

00:20:34 Got a new business idea? Northwest Registered Agent helps you bring it to life. Get a free domain, email, phone number,…

Links in the notes 20

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