The EIS Navigator 80 A VC perspective on AI's impact on startups with James Pringle of Portfolio Ventures
Anyone with a passing interest in technology or venture capital cannot have missed the rapid increase in interest in AI over the past few months. We are overdue talking about it on the podcast, so we got an expert in James Pringle. He used AI as a founder and it now impacts how he invests so he is the ideal guest to discuss the topic.
We start off by covering some of the basics, drawing out what AI is currently capable of. We discuss broadly how AI works, how it has developed over the past few years and what has changed to bring it to such prominence now.
James explains how AI affects startups and what he is investing in. He discusses how it can supercharge employees, enabling them to move faster with less resources and how management needs to handle that. He talks about how this leads to an investment approach that focuses on applications rather the fundamental building blocks of AI.
Finally, we discuss some of the risks around AI, especially around the speed of change and how that affects James as an investor as well as workers and the wider economy.
PS Encouraged by James, we used AI to generate the title for the podcast - hope you like it!
Links
Portfolio Ventures website - https://portfolio.ventures/
James on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/thejamespringle/
Subscribe to the EIS Navigator podcast on most services here: https://the-eis-navigator.captivate.fm/listen
Suggested book
The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman
Bio
James Pringle
Portfolio Ventures
James Pringle is a VC investor at UK venture capital fund Portfolio Ventures. James also co-hosts Riding Unicorns, one of Europe's top venture podcasts. Prior to investing, James founded a VC-backed SaaS company.