VC10X - Startups, GTM, Investing, Venture Capital, Asset Management, Private Equity, Family Office VC10X - How To Win In The AI Era? - Rishi Taparia, Co-founder & GP, Garuda Ventures
Sep 16, 2025
Rishi Taparia, Co-founder and General Partner at Garuda Ventures, has a rich history as an operator at Poynt and Legion. He discusses the dramatic shifts in B2B SaaS driven by AI, highlighting the necessity of customer trust as a competitive edge. Rishi introduces his investment framework focusing on team, market, product, and vision. He candidly shares his emotional journey in entrepreneurship and the complexities of early-stage investments, emphasizing the importance of founder autonomy and developing strong relationships in a volatile market.
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From Early Employee To Operator-Investor
- Rishi joined Point as the seventh employee and first business hire and ran everything outside product and engineering for five years.
- By the time he left they served 130,000 merchants and processed $13 billion in volume, shaping his operator-to-investor path.
Invest Where You Can Add Real Value
- Garuda focuses on the very first round where they can add operational value beyond capital to founders.
- They invest in intelligent applications, commerce enablement, and modern infrastructure to leverage deep founder help.
AI Changes Pricing And Margin Norms
- AI is rewriting software rules, changing expectations, pricing, and marginal costs for usage-heavy products.
- Usage will make products more expensive to serve, forcing re-evaluation of SaaS margin profiles and pricing models.