Business Insider’s 2026 Rising Stars of Venture Capital list highlights a new generation of investors reshaping the industry amid a dramatic shift from easy money to disciplined investing. The venture capital landscape has transformed from sky-high valuations and generative AI hype to a focus on sustainable businesses with real customers and revenue.
The list features young VCs who are driving AI investments across multiple sectors, from enterprise software to defense, robotics, and healthcare. These rising stars are sourcing deals early, building founder relationships, and making bold bets before the broader market catches on.
Key investors and their AI deals include:
Max Abram of Scale Venture Partners led investments in AI agents companies Tavus and Bland, both raising $40 million Series B rounds after Scale’s Series A. He also shaped the firm’s $60 million Series B investment in GC AI, a legal software company building AI-powered “second brains” for general counsels.
Sophie Beshar at Insight Partners led a $32 million Series A for Delve at a $300 million valuation, an AI compliance startup founded by MIT dropouts that scaled faster than typical for its stage.
Adil Bhatia from Redpoint Ventures invested in Physical Intelligence (robotics software) and Irregular Security (AI security), while also backing space infrastructure company K2 Space. He emphasized that successful VCs should build with AI themselves, using tools like ChatGPT’s deep research modes.
Samantha Borja at Menlo Ventures co-led the Series B for Lovable, the European AI coding startup, at a $6.6 billion valuation. She built detailed models and Python scripts to understand the company’s rapid growth trajectory.
Sudhee Chilappagari at Battery Ventures focused on voice AI investments, leading a $20 million Series A for financial advisor startup Jump AI and backing Liberate, an AI voice startup in insurance.
James Flynn at Sequoia Capital worked on high-profile deals including OpenAI, Neuralink, and ElevenLabs, convincing the partnership to invest in ElevenLabs at a $6.6 billion valuation by demonstrating the company’s market leadership in voice AI.
The shift reflects a maturing AI investment landscape where due diligence, customer validation, and revenue quality matter more than hype, creating opportunities for sharp young investors to make their mark.
Key Quotes
In 2026, there will be more ‘head-fake’ businesses than ever before. In today’s market, many companies can go $0 to $5M in run-rate in a year. The savviest investors will discern between low and high quality revenue, and what will lead to true durability over time.
Yaz El-Baba from Emergence Capital warns about the challenge of evaluating AI startups in a saturated market. This insight is crucial as it highlights how easy initial traction in AI doesn’t guarantee long-term success, requiring investors to dig deeper into revenue quality and business fundamentals.
The biggest opportunities are in large, established markets where legacy incumbents still dominate, but where AI-native workflows can fundamentally change how work gets done. That kind of transformation takes patience, conviction, and a willingness to revisit assumptions alongside founders as the market evolves.
Sofia Dolfe from Index Ventures identifies where AI investments will create the most value. Her perspective emphasizes that the real AI opportunity lies in disrupting traditional industries rather than creating entirely new markets, requiring patient capital and adaptive thinking.
I started digging deep into the financials that the company sent over, which were gorgeous. It became clear that we are still so early in the voice AI wave and that customers viewed ElevenLabs as the undisputed market leader.
James Flynn from Sequoia Capital explains how he justified investing in ElevenLabs at a $6.6 billion valuation. This quote demonstrates the importance of combining financial analysis with market research to identify category leaders in emerging AI segments like voice technology.
People underestimate how important it is to just be a good person in this business.
Samantha Borja from Menlo Ventures emphasizes that relationship-building and kindness remain essential in venture capital, even as AI tools automate more tasks. This human element becomes even more valuable as the industry becomes more competitive and selective.
Our Take
The 2026 Rising Stars list reveals a venture capital industry recalibrating after the generative AI gold rush. What’s striking is how these young investors are betting on practical AI applications—voice agents, legal AI, compliance tools, and coding assistants—rather than foundational models. This suggests the next wave of AI value creation will come from vertical solutions and workflow automation rather than general-purpose technology.
The emphasis on revenue quality over growth-at-all-costs marks a return to fundamentals that will separate sustainable AI businesses from those riding temporary hype. The fact that multiple investors highlighted voice AI (ElevenLabs, Bland, Jump AI, Liberate) suggests this sector is reaching an inflection point where technology meets genuine market demand.
Most telling is how these VCs are using AI themselves to source deals and conduct diligence, creating a feedback loop where AI tools help identify the best AI investments. This meta-trend will likely accelerate, giving tech-savvy investors an edge in an increasingly competitive market.
Why This Matters
This story signals a critical maturation phase for AI venture capital after years of frothy valuations and speculative investments. The shift from generative AI hype to sustainable, revenue-generating businesses reflects growing market discipline and suggests that only AI startups with real product-market fit will survive.
The prominence of AI agents, voice AI, and vertical AI applications in these rising stars’ portfolios reveals where smart money is flowing: toward practical AI implementations that solve specific business problems rather than general-purpose tools. Investments in companies like Tavus, Bland, ElevenLabs, and GC AI demonstrate that AI is moving from experimentation to production workflows.
For AI startups, this means the bar is higher—founders need to demonstrate not just impressive technology but clear paths to revenue, customer retention, and market dominance. The focus on “high quality revenue” versus “head-fake businesses” suggests many AI companies that grew quickly on initial hype may struggle to raise future rounds.
For the broader tech ecosystem, this represents a healthy correction that will likely produce more durable AI companies while weeding out unsustainable business models built on cheap capital and inflated expectations.
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Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/venture-capital-industry-rising-stars-list-2026-1