Mignano: Rapid AI fundraising rounds force VCs to invest earlier
Michael Mignano · Why Lightspeed Bet on xAI, Neuralink, Suno, Granola, & Pika | Michael Mignano · Sourcery with Molly O'Shea · Dec 27, 2025 · at 12:56
Michael Mignano, Partner at Lightspeed, explains why major VC funds are moving to inception and seed-stage investing in AI startups.
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“Some of these companies, you know, they're growing revenue so quickly that the rounds are happening in such quick succession. And oftentimes, if you're the seed investor and things are going kind of well, you might quickly do the series A. And then by the time a new investor has an opportunity to come in, it's the series B. It's priced really expensively, but nothing has been de-risked yet. So you're paying this really premium price. You're having to write this gigantic check and you don't know anything more about the business, whether or not it'll, it'll fail or succeed. And so I think the natural fallout of that is you have to go earlier and earlier.”
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