USV’s New $900M Fund: Fred Wilson, Rebecca Kaden & Mike Mignano

<p>USV spent 20 years keeping its funds small on purpose. Its new $900M raise is the largest fund cycle in the firm’s history.</p><p>I sat down with USV General Partners Fred Wilson, Rebecca Kaden and Michael Mignano at the firm’s New York office to unpack why one of venture capital’s most disciplined early-stage firms is getting bigger now, and what they think the next era of AI will look like. Together with General Partner Nick Grossman, they’re leading USV into its next chapter.</p><p>USV was early to Twitter, Coinbase, Stripe, MongoDB, Twilio, Etsy, Duolingo and Abridge. More than 20 years after Fred Wilson and Brad Burnham laid out the firm’s original internet thesis, Fred believes AI today looks a lot like the internet in 2003. The infrastructure is here, but many of the defining applications have yet to be built.</p><p>We get into why AI is making products cheaper to build but breakout companies potentially more expensive to create, why ARR can hide weak retention, the growing importance of founder storytelling, personal AI agents, the “Rebel Alliance” around open AI infrastructure, and why energy may be one of the cleanest bets on AI.</p><p>At the center of USV’s new thesis is “obliterate, don’t automate.” Instead of making existing industries incrementally more efficient, AI could completely restructure them. Fred’s version is simple. Don’t hire a lawyer, use an AI lawyer. Don’t hire an accountant, use an AI accountant. Don’t hire a doctor, use an AI doctor.</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Fred Wilson: </strong><a href="https://x.com/fredwilson"><u>https://x.com/fredwilson</u></a></p><p><strong>Rebecca Kaden:</strong> <a href="https://x.com/rebeccakaden"><u>https://x.com/rebeccakaden</u></a></p><p><strong>Michael Mignano:</strong> <a href="https://x.com/mignano"><u>https://x.com/mignano</u></a></p><p><strong>Molly O’Shea:</strong> <a href="https://x.com/MollySOShea"><u>https://x.com/MollySOShea</u></a> </p><p><strong>Sourcery:</strong> ⁠<a href="https://x.com/sourceryy"><u>https://x.com/sourceryy</u></a> <br></p><p><br></p><p>𝐄𝐏𝐈𝐒𝐎𝐃𝐄 𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐊</p><p>YouTube: <a href="https://youtu.be/sYH4fKKtSPw" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferer">https://youtu.be/sYH4fKKtSPw</a><br></p><p><br></p><p>𝐒𝐏𝐎𝐍𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐒</p><p>• <a href="https://brex.com/sourcery"><strong>Brex</strong></a>—The modern finance platform, combining the world’s smartest corporate card with integrated expense management, banking, bill pay, &amp; travel. <a href="https://brex.com/source