The Next 20-Year Cycle In Business Software | by Ajay | Ideas from Bain Capital Ventures | Medium (November 2020) → Through the decades, software has navigated from client-server roots, through a journey to the cloud, and now into the user-centric future. Along the way, marketers have reached more (and more relevant) customers, salespeople have closed more accounts, and support staff have helped more subscribers reach a satisfactory resolution. For all that, software remains the best business opportunity on the planet.
Lightspeed’s SaaS 4.0: Say Hello to The Era of Cognition (June 2023) > Thanks to the astonishing growth in the capabilities of generative AI, we believe SaaS is now entering its fourth generation: a system of cognition. Generative AI will permeate every SaaS application. Incumbents and startups alike are sprinting to incorporate these capabilities into their products. In this new era, upwards of 50% of a knowledge worker’s job will be exposed to AI that can augment/supplement their existing workflows, depending on the task. Having met with hundreds of SaaS entrepreneurs recently, here are a few criteria we are thinking through at Lightspeed when evaluating investments: Proprietary data / frequency of interaction / depth of UI / 10x value proposition / low-level versus high-level intelligence
BVPs State of the Cloud 2023 (April 2023) > The Large Language Model revolution is one of the most significant developments in computing history. We believe artificial intelligence will not only multiply software and human capabilities, but also completely transform and expand the cloud economy in the process. In The State of the Cloud, Bessemer provides a founder’s guide on navigating the financing ecosystem for what will likely be the next 18-24 months. We also explore Bessemer’s view on the cloud economy and the AI imperatives that SaaS leaders must enact today or else be left behind.