In December 2004, 19 years in the past, I began VC Cafe with the easy objective of sharing insights, sources, and views on enterprise capital and startups (with a highlight on Israel). What started as a facet venture has grown right into a ardour that has accompanied the evolution of the tech ecosystem over almost twenty years. My motivation for beginning VC Cafe within the early days of running a blog (Techcrunch began in July that yr), was pushed by a way of curiosity to expertise the back-then new tech, but in addition with a objective: to offer information in regards to the bourgeoning Israeli startup ecosystem that went past the conflicts it’s possible you’ll learn within the information. Whereas the conflicts remained, my curiosity and my sense of mission remained and even grew. Immediately, as I have a good time 19 years of VC Cafe, I’m reflecting on the journey to date and the transformative modifications we’ve seen over the previous yr.
Wanting Again: A 12 months Outlined by Generative AI
2024 will go down in historical past because the yr generative AI actually went mainstream. Instruments like ChatGPT, MidJourney, and DALL-E 3 pushed the boundaries of creativity and productiveness. LLMs developed shortly and supplied startups highly effective new instruments to construct firms on. It wasn’t simply startups leveraging generative AI—corporates like Adobe, Salesforce, and Google built-in AI-powered options into their core merchandise, making it ubiquitous.
As an investor, I noticed first-hand how generative AI seemed to reshape complete industries. From content material creation to drug discovery, firms leveraged this expertise to cut back prices, speed up workflows, and unlock new enterprise fashions. On the identical time, we noticed a frenzy of AI-related investments with over 30% of US enterprise {dollars} flowing to AI firms in 2024. But, 2024 additionally served as a cautionary story: valuations skyrocketed, however not each generative AI firm delivered tangible outcomes. This strengthened an vital reminder—tech innovation with out clear product-market match stays dangerous.
Highlights from VC Cafe in 2024
Over the previous 19 years, VC Cafe advanced from protecting information (a difficult process for a 1 man present) to specializing in the areas of curiosity for us at Remagine Ventures (the pre-seed fund I co-founded with my companion Kevin Baxpehler) in addition to key traits shaping the Israeli startup ecosystem.
- Publication Progress: I began the #Firgun publication in 2020, within the peak of Covid lockdowns, with the objective of giving the Israeli startup neighborhood a purpose to have a good time, even when every little thing seemed bleak and to unfold positivity. In 2024 the #Firgun publication has organically grown to six,000 subscribers with expanded its readership considerably, fuelled by a rising urge for food for curated insights into tech, enterprise capital, and business traits. Extra on what’s “Firgun” and why it issues right here.
- Deep Dives: I explored matters like spatial computing, sports activities tech, B2B SaaS Benchmarks, requests for startups and naturally my annual assortment of Israeli startup panorama maps, serving to founders and traders navigate rising alternatives.
- Group Impression: The VC Cafe Community on LinkedIn grew to 35,748 members, comprising of primarily investor professionals and entrepreneurs. Are you a part of of it but? Be part of right here.
I’m extremely grateful for the readers, contributors, and companions who make VC Cafe a vibrant house for concepts and studying. Thanks for being a part of this journey!
Predictions for 2025: What’s Subsequent in Tech and Enterprise
The prophecy was given to the fools, nevertheless it’s exhausting to withstand the temptation to make a number of predictions on what 2025 would possibly appear like for tech and enterprise.
- AGI within the horizon? Generative AI will proceed to create worth and can proceed to drive enterprise adoption. As LLMs compete to get to AGI, we’ll see extra groundbreaking enhancements in mannequin reasoning, actual time multi modal AI that may perceive and talk again with video and audio in actual time. Equally, we’ll see the bubble burst a bit – GPT wrappers that have been constructed on hype with little tech differentiation may have a reckoning.
- The yr of robotics: the developments in multi modal AI are enabling the rise of humanoid robots. We’ll see extra robots being shipped to shoppers and companies alike, beginning with repetitive guide duties.
- Shopper makes a comeback: for some time it appeared like VCs have distanced themselves from B2C startups. With restricted enterprise adoption, generative AI discovered that buyers (or pro-sumers) are early adopters that don’t thoughts spending on new experiences and capabilities. Classes that have been beforehand monopolies like search and social will confide in competitors. And M&A on this house goes to develop.
- Large consolidation in enterprise continues: The variety of lively enterprise capital traders has dropped by greater than 1 / 4 from a peak in 2021, and about 35% of US enterprise fundraising is concentrated in 8 funds (!). Consequently, we’ll see smaller, early stage VC funds like Remagine Ventures return to the roots of investing in founders and making bets on massive concepts that appear contrarian at first. The pendulum will shift again to rising managers when that is performed.
- The Trump administration may have a giant constructive impression on tech: It’s nonetheless too early to foretell the complete impression of the brand new administration, however the indicators (and appointments) to date level for a beneficial setting for tech, targeted on holding the US a world market chief. This implies the returns of IPOs, extra tech M&A, elevated adoption of crypto and decreased red-tape. Let’s see. I referred to this in a latest interview collection revealed by Calcalist.
Right here’s to a hopefully a lot better 2025
The journey of VC Cafe has taught me one factor above all: ecosystems thrive on collaboration. Founders—encompass your self with advisors who problem you and friends who encourage you. Traders—look past the traits and discover the outliers who’re fixing actual issues and don’t neglect investor connectivity. The following particular person you meet would possibly change the remainder of your life!
As we navigate the twists and turns of 2025, I’m excited to continue to learn, sharing, and rising along with all of you. Thanks for 19 unbelievable years—hope to see VC Cafe proceed to develop within the years to come back.
I am a former basic companion at google ventures, head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe and founding head of Campus London, Google’s first bodily hub for startups.
I am additionally the founding father of Techbikers, a non-profit bringing collectively the startup ecosystem on biking challenges in assist of Room to Learn. Since inception in 2012 we have constructed 11 colleges and 50 libraries within the growing world.
