I have startups doing $3-$5M ARR growing 100-400%+ that can't raise a Series A

I had a similar experience when I came to the valley right as dot com was taking off, but numbers were lower back then. instead of a $500k investment for 5 years to return a $20m company, VCs wanted to give out $500m and get a $5b company in 6 months. they invested in @home which hit those targets, but collapsed about 6 months after that.

SiliValley VCs are about selling quick to the greater fool before the marks wise up. If you're getting $5m arr, there's no way you can spin that as a billion dollar revenue company in 6 months no matter how good you are at scaling up sales pipelines.

no one knows how AI will make anything cheaper / faster / better. but investors out there have watched enough sci-fi to know AGI will happen "any day now." and when it does, it'll hockeystick like Facebook in the 2000s. we all know there's profit a few steps after collecting underwear, but it's a relief no one's figured out the middle steps. that means your portfolio firm started by your old dorm roommate's kid has as good a chance as any at cracking this nut. but a company wasting its time generating recurring revenue is absolutely not focused on getting that done.