The next wave of startups will force VCs to learn PE skills

AI native services startups compete with legacy agencies and studios, businesses that run on relationships, not technology. In services, trust is the moat. Clients don't switch providers because your demo is better, and no amount of outbound buys you a 20 year client relationship.

But you can acquire one.

That's why the sharpest AINS startups treat M&A as go to market. Buy a traditional firm and you buy its client book, its trusted faces, its cash flow, then swap the delivery stack underneath and watch the margins move. I'm seeing it in our own pipeline: decks with an acquisition list where the GTM slide should be, founders asking for capital to buy a firm in parallel of hiring a sales team, first questions about seller notes rather than pricing tiers.

The catch: nothing in the VC toolkit prepares you to support this. Backing an AINS startup on a buying spree means underwriting EBITDA, not just ARR. Structuring earn outs and seller notes. Reading a quality of earnings report for the first time. Reserving capital for acquisitions instead of runway. Helping a 25 year old founder earn the trust of a 60 year old seller. And post merger integration, the part PE will tell you is where roll ups go to die.

Those are PE skills. Some funds will hire them in. Others will build them.