Author: Jay Wong
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April 2025 AI Financing Report
Last month, the top AI news was mostly about infrastructure and export restrictions as the trade war heated (note: Liberation Day was April 2). AI infra was dominated by Nvidia’s planned $500 B U.S. supercomputing program and the EU’s €200B initiative to fund 13 AI‑chip gigafactories, even as power‑supply constraints pushed Amazon and Microsoft to slow…
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Checkr Acquires Truework to Expand Consumer Verifications
https://checkr.com/blog/checkr-acquires-truework https://www.truework.com/resource-center/blog/truework-acquired-by-checkr
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Exploring ChatGPT Operator: A Glimpse into the Future of Agentic AI
OpenAI’s new ChatGPT Operator is an early preview of an AI agent designed to interact with the web much like a human would—navigating pages, clicking buttons, scrolling through content, and even filling out forms. This technology leverages a model known as the Computer-Using Agent (CUA) and represents a shift from passive AI responses toward proactive,…
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DeepSeek’s Wake-Up Call
Over the past month, and especially in the past 48 hours, a Chinese company called DeepSeek has been creating an unexpected divide in Silicon Valley, as industry leaders grapple with the economics of an evolving landscape. Companies like OpenAI and Google have invested billions in developing advanced AI models, only to find themselves shouldering the…
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Why Traditional Valuation Methods Fall Short for AI-native Companies
Picture this scenario: your traditional valuation methods might suggest a $100M valuation for an AI-native company, yet the market values it at $1B based on the most recent fundraise. This isn’t an isolated incident – it’s a pattern we’re seeing across the AI landscape. At Stepmark Partners, the premier investment bank dedicated to the AI…
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Software Revenue Models: The Key to Building a Successful Business
When it comes to starting a startup, figuring out your revenue model is as important as developing the product itself. A great revenue model that aligns with your customer needs can be an incredible flywheel. On the other hand, a business model that is incongruent with customer needs can lead to the startup’s closure. If…
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From Pixelated Blackberries to 4K Streaming: A View on Technological Progress
In 2008, as a young auditor at Ernst & Young, I attended my first college football game. My audit senior had won tickets and invited me along. Like many professionals at the time, I carried a company-issued Blackberry 8830 – then considered the pinnacle of “smart phone” technology. I used it to capture a video…
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