By coinnews 
00:00 Speaker A
In the past quarter, KPMG found that AI and software continue to dominate US venture capital spending in the first quarter, driven by major deals for OpenAI and Anthropic. But could tariff related uncertainty put those investments at further risk? Here with more on the tech sector, we’ve got Cameron Amsari. He’s the managing partner of Capital Ventures, former principal and venture partner at Greycroft, also formerly with Pinterest. So, Cameron, you’ve got a great overview of the tech space more broadly here. We’ve obviously seen the Mag 7 shedding money from its stock and market cap basis here. How much conviction do you have in tech investments right now?
00:51 Cameron Amsari
So, I think, you know, the tech investing space is not a single monolith, right? And the venture space, where I spend most of my time, is also separate between early stage, you know, seed and series A companies that are just starting, you know, business plan, a couple of guys kind of getting together and and creating something from scratch versus the anthropic opening ideals that you see that are major outliers, right? Those are extraordinary one-off companies and very late stage and established. I think OpenAI said they have like three or four billion in revenue or something. These are not startups anymore. So, um, the early, early stage investing market has not really been impacted yet. Uh, seed stage investing, which is a horizon of, let’s say, seven, eight, 10 years, people are not saying, I’m not going to do a great seed deal now because I’m worried about tariffs. Uh, but I do think the later stage is is deeply impacted, particularly the IPO pipeline now being totally clogged and essentially at at a pause, a standstill.
02:18 Speaker A
How do you anticipate that pipeline being impacted by these tariffs a little bit further out?
02:28 Cameron Amsari
Uh, the keyword is uncertainty, right? I think Anne touched on that as well. I mean, uncertainty is is what the markets hate, and there’s so much uncertainty right now around interest rates, around policy, around the pope passed away this morning. It’s like, there’s so many things going on, so the last thing we need. Uh, and so all of that uncertainty, I think, leads to um, cautionary investing style. And I think that’s also led to Klarna, stuff of all these companies saying, look, it’s not a good time for us to come out, and because of that, you really have a lot of pausing in the overall cycle.
03:25 Speaker A
And and what about sort of deal doing outside of IPOs, Cameron? You know, strategics are still sitting there with quite a lot of cash relative historical levels. Do you think they’re going to step up? Are they going to start going bargain hunting now and start buying out some of these VC back businesses?
03:49 Cameron Amsari
We thought that would happen. Uh, you know, when this new administration came in, there was a thought there was going to be renewed M&A activity, uh, more friendly environment towards deal making and less scrutiny in terms of antitrust. You saw the Wiz deal announced as the biggest deal, I think, that’s ever happened in the venture space. I’m not sure if that’s closed or if that, you know, if that’s going to go through some kind of process, so you know, you always kind of have to wait to to make sure everything’s done before it’s done. But, um, because we’ve seen things like Figma fall apart, we saw the Visa deal for Plaid not happen, etcetera. Um, but deal making has not picked up either, right? Because I think, again, the uncertainty is so prevalent that the only firms I see doing actively looking at deals are private equity funds that still look for great software companies with recurring revenue that are affordable in the public market.
05:02 Speaker A
And in terms of different sectors, Cameron, are you seeing where are you seeing opportunity? Are you focusing on Fintech? Are you focusing on health? Are there sort of areas that look compelling?
05:15 Cameron Amsari
Yeah, I focus primarily on Fintech, as well as some e-commerce and commerce tech investing. Uh, certainly healthcare is a hot hot area. AI is is a mega category at this point that really pervades every kind of deal. I think it’s hard to say like I’m an AI investor because AI is sort of a foundational layer now in most categories of companies. And then there are certain kind of spaces like climate is still very active. I see deals in that area. It’s not really my focus, but I saw a number of companies last week here in New York doing that that type of work. And then, um, crypto is as always, blockchain and crypto deals still are pretty active, and that’s an area that continues to see activity.
06:15 Speaker A
Have you seen an adjustment in the kinds of pitches that are crossing your desk to accumulate around the tariff risk in the room? Obviously, mentioning AI as many times as possible was a proven strategy. Are you now seeing more mentions of tariff hedging or supply chain issues?
06:40 Cameron Amsari
Uh, not really for the fundamental reason that most early stage venture companies are not companies with components or hardware or real supply chain that relies on uh, kind of cross-border transport of goods. Some do, I mean, in some cases, you may have a component, a chip or something, but the vast majority of early stage venture companies that most funds look at are software. Uh, so really your product is intellectual property and code, uh, which is not thankfully at this point tariffed. Um, so not yet, but I think if you’re looking at companies that do have a hardware component, that’s certainly going to be part of the conversation, no question.
07:41 Speaker A
Yeah, absolutely. Well, Cameron, thank you so much for coming in studio. We really appreciate it. Thank you for your insights, too.
07:48 Cameron Amsari
Thank you.