Investments in intelligenza artificiale (AI) are experiencing a interval of unprecedented enlargement. Amid stellar valuations, rising startups, and resounding bulletins, it turns into more and more troublesome to tell apart between hype and actual worth.
Throughout the AI Week, the worldwide fund Langoustia Capital shared a transparent and strategic imaginative and prescient: the true potential of AI lies in concrete purposes, particularly in vertical software program enhanced by synthetic intelligence.
The explosion of AI investments in 2025
In keeping with Goldman Sachs, in 2025 investments in AI will exceed 200 billion {dollars}, with an acceleration pushed by enterprise capital, personal funds, and enormous tech corporations.
Listed here are some knowledge that show the scope of the phenomenon:
- OpenAI is near a fundraising spherical that may convey it to a valuation of 340 billion {dollars}.
- Determine AI, energetic in humanoid robotics, has gone from 2 to 40 billion in valuation in only one 12 months.
- Corporations like Disney, Nvidia, Google DeepMind, and Elon Musk’s X.ai are integrating synthetic intelligence into their processes and merchandise.
However not all that glitters is gold: the case of the Chinese language mannequin DeepSeek has triggered a billion-dollar crash within the inventory market, confirming that the AI market is extremely speculative and reactive.
Classes from the previous: from the {hardware} increase to utilized AI
In keeping with Langoustia Capital, to grasp easy methods to spend money onsynthetic intelligence at the moment, it’s helpful to have a look at the historical past of expertise.
Within the ’90s, the market rewarded corporations like HP, IBM, Cisco, protagonists of the {hardware} revolution. Over time, nonetheless, the true worth shifted to software program: Google, Amazon, and Microsoft grew due to their capability to create scalable platforms.
The infrastructure turns into commoditized. The software program defends itself, scales, and generates lasting worth.
Vertical software program and AI: the brand new paradigm for startups and funds
The long run lies within the mixture of vertical software program and generative AI, that means tailored options for particular person sectors that leverage the ability of synthetic intelligence to optimize, automate, and scale processes.
Langoustia Capital is investing proper on this house. Listed here are some examples:
- Toast: restaurant administration software program, now valued at over 20 billion {dollars}, has generated returns of 160x for the preliminary traders.
- ServiceTitan: software program for tradespeople (electricians, plumbers, and so forth.), with a 60x return and a billion-dollar IPO.
- TaxGPT: AI copilot for accountants and tax advisors.
- Harvey: AI for the authorized sector.
- Cybergrant: startup based by Italians that makes use of AI for cybersecurity.
These rising AI startups are concrete proof that AI utilized to verticals is fertile floor for these searching for strong funding alternatives.
Langoustia Capital: world AI funds with an Italian soul
Langoustia Capital is an AI funding fund primarily based in San Francisco, New York, Miami, and Milan. Supported by the Del Vecchio household (Luxottica), it is without doubt one of the few funds on the planet devoted solely to the software layer of synthetic intelligence.
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Strengths:
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- 11 startups in portfolio in simply 12 months
- Common return of +150% IRR
- Deal with AI-powered software program and vertical startups
- Community of enterprise companions in Europe and Silicon Valley
Langoustia presents itself as a “mongoose in Silicon Valley”: agile, selective, with a transparent imaginative and prescient on the place to generate actual worth.
Why concentrate on vertical AI investments
The message from Langoustia is obvious: one of the best funding alternatives in AI are usually not present in chips or generalist fashions, however in specialised purposes able to fixing concrete issues in conventional sectors.
The aim is to find and help the longer term Google, Amazon, and Meta of AI — startups prepared to remodel healthcare, finance, eating, authorized, logistics, and extra.
Conclusion: AI that creates worth is concrete, specialised, and scalable
In an ecosystem dominated by sensationalist headlines and exaggerated guarantees, it’s important to investigate in depth the place and easy methods to spend money on synthetic intelligence.
Langoustia Capital represents at the moment one of many few concrete examples of a fund that doesn’t comply with the hype, however builds worth by way of disciplined methods, sector by sector.