What NFX Is Thinking

Synthesized from 15 recent items.

AI & agents

AI captures labor value, not software value — TAM jumps from $1T software to $50–60T global labor. What Comes Next Is Bigger Than SaaS Ever Was
A 12-person startup can operate at 1,200-person capacity today. Software is an employee, not a tool. 1,000 Simultaneous Experiments
Best AI products win by removing attention demands — ambient, screenless, acting without supervision. The Screenless Startup
AI drives marginal cost of humanness to zero. Therapy, hospice, education, digital clones are the new frontier. Software with a Soul
AI-native games window: 36 months. Incumbents won’t win it. Start with AI, ask what engages people second. AI Games Are Coming
Token costs dropped ~90% in one year. Category-defining products haven’t launched yet — most big opportunities undiscovered. What Comes Next Is Bigger Than SaaS Ever Was
AI automates execution; pure expression becomes the only defensible moat — Bowie over defensiveness, always. The Infinite Game

Seed-stage biotech can now reach human trials for under $10M — same infra cost collapse as cloud. In Vitro, In Vivo, In China
China overtook the US in clinical trial volume in 2025; 30–40% lower costs, growing regulatory friction risk. In Vitro, In Vivo, In China
Capstan: dosed in China seed-stage, acquired by AbbVie for $2.1B mid-Phase I. The playbook works. In Vitro, In Vivo, In China
Centivax in Phase 1 for universal flu vaccine; platform extends to pan-herpes Alzheimer’s, malaria, universal antivenom. Centivax Universal Flu Vaccine
Women’s health is the biggest undervalued market in healthcare; platform play targets $30B by 2030. Cyclana Bio
Longevity crossed from fringe to mainstream in 2025. NFX frames aging itself as a startup-sized problem. The Founder’s Guide to JPM

Run 50–100 parallel experiments at seed — 100 experiments yield ~99% probability of finding what works. 1,000 Simultaneous Experiments
Conviction + vision are the moat now. Capital and talent access are fully commoditized. What Comes Next Is Bigger Than SaaS Ever Was
Hire for high agency, multi-domain fluency, low ego + high self-worth. Unlearning beats domain depth. 1,000 Simultaneous Experiments
AI expands the territory — defensiveness is the losing move. Go further into the water than you feel capable. The Infinite Game
Be the founder who builds the codec before building the game. Infrastructure fluency precedes breakthrough products. AI Games Are Coming

Space launch costs follow containerization’s 36x collapse exactly: $54,500/kg → $2,700 (Falcon 9) → <$100 (Starship). Ports, Rails, Roads, and Orbits
Space infra window mirrors AWS 2006 — upper stack layers (compute, navigation) still undefined, closing fast. The Stack Above the Cloud
U.S. has one to two decades before China erodes its launch and orbital compute lead. Ports, Rails, Roads, and Orbits
Portfolio bets: Stoke Space (24-hour turnaround), Earthtraq (precision tracking), Starcloud (orbital computing). The Stack Above the Cloud

Last updated: 2026-04-15 15:48 UTC