GFR Fund Co-hosts 'The Shape of Business Transformed by AI from the Frontlines of the U.S.' (9/18 Fri) / VCHUB

⚠️ [Participants: VCHUB and ARCH members, invited guests by the organizers] This event is targeted at VCHUB and ARCH members, as well as those who have been individually invited by the organizers. Hello everyone. This is Iketani from the Tokyo Venture Capital Hub management office. We are pleased to announce that we will be co-hosting a study session with GFR Fund, which invests in startups based in San Francisco, focusing on the latest trends of AI and startups in the U.S. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ The Shape of Business Transformed by AI from the Frontlines of the U.S. 📅 Date: September 18 (Friday) 11:00 AM - 1:00 PM📍 Location: Tokyo Venture Capital Hub 🤝 Co-hosted by: GFR Fund, Tokyo Venture Capital Hub📝 Registration: https://luma.com/waz8svhn (Luma Link) 👥 Participants: VCHUB and ARCH members, invited guests by the organizers 🗂️ Agenda for the day (tentative): - Latest AI and startup trends from macro data - How far has AI started to replace human jobs? - How is AI being utilized in the field of startups? ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━【Background of the Plan】 In the U.S., there continues to be significant movement centered around AI, such as a concentration of startup investment in the AI sector and larger fundraising rounds. On the other hand, there are noteworthy trends in the startup scene, such as an increase in solo founders and small teams, and rising revenue and company value per person. This time, we will overview what is happening in the U.S. startup market from macro data and introduce examples where AI has begun to establish itself as a significant business in fields such as healthcare, finance, and legal. Furthermore, based on interviews with GFR Fund's portfolio companies, we will also discuss how startups are leveraging AI in development, marketing, customer support, operations, and the results they are achieving. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━【Speaker】 Yasushi Komori GFR Fund | General Partner Joined GFR Fund in 2016 and leads startup investments in North America and Europe. Engaged in Seed and Series A investments, focusing on games, entertainment, creator economy, and consumer AI. Has lived in the U.S. for 12 years. Prior to joining GFR Fund, engaged in technology and product development as a backend engineer and game product manager. GFR FundEstablished in 2016, a VC based in San Francisco. Invests primarily in the consumer and entertainment sectors, focusing on Pre-seed/Seed rounds, and has recently increased its focus on AI. Notable investments include VRChat, RTFKT, SkyMavis, and Animoca Brands. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━【Main Content】(tentative) ✅ Overview of the latest trends in AI and startups from macro data, including a concentration of investment in the AI sector in the U.S., larger fundraising rounds, an increase in solo founders and small teams, and rising revenue and company values per person. ✅ How far has AI started to replace human jobs? We will introduce examples of startups where AI has taken over tasks previously performed by humans, particularly in healthcare, finance, and legal, and how they have grown into significant markets and businesses. ✅ How is AI being utilized in the field of startups? Based on interviews with GFR Fund's portfolio companies, we will introduce specific examples of AI utilization in development, marketing, customer support, and operations, showcasing how small teams are achieving high productivity and revenue. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ This is an opportunity to learn about the latest trends in the U.S. AI and startup markets and the practical use of AI in startups from a perspective close to the local investment scene. Companies, corporate venture capitals, and VCs interested in the latest trends in the AI sector are encouraged to join us. We look forward to your participation.