Jeremiah Owyang's Linkedin Analytics

We're on a path to seeing a solo employee startup with $1B Valuation and also companies that are generating $100M per employee. TECH WAVES: I’ve been in tech for a few waves, here's what I've experienced: -2000: The DotCom era and remember sky-high valuations with no business model. -2005: Web2: sky-high valuations driven by user adoption—still no revenue model till years later -2010: Sharing/ On-Demand economy: Real revenues, but mostly dependent on workers and contractors in a marketplace -Today: GenAI Wave: Here's a screenshot of the Lean AI Leaderboard, which is showing dozens of AI startups founded in the last 3 years with over $1M Revenue Per Employee. They are generating real revenue with ultra lean teams --in fact most of the "employees" are AI agents. COMPARISON: TRAD SAAS: REVENUE PER EMPLOYEE (RPE), in THOUSANDS - $200K (aprox) The average SaaS company - $318K HubSpot - $479K Salesforce - $700K Adobe GEN AI STARTUPS: REVENUE PER EMPLOYEE (RPE), in THOUSANDS - $12,500K Midjourney - $5,000K Anysphere aka Cursor - $3,000K Cal AI - $2,500K Mercor - $2,500K Chai Research - $2,000K Eleven Labs - $2,000K Stackblitz - $1,818K Fal AI - $1,786K Gamma - $1,667K Lovable - $1,600K Markable AI These young AI startups operate with “AI-First” principles: use AI before hiring humans, and maximize efficiency from day one. Link below in comments to the leaderboard. thanks Henry Shi

Lean Unicorn Club: The Future of Companies. Shocking new slide I’ve created for my speeches, and I’ll talk about this briefly in my opening remarks at tomorrow’s Llama Lounge: The AI Event Series -I'm continuing to pour through the data provided by AI founder Henry Shi of the Lean AI Startup Leaderboard (link in comments). -Let's zoom into the AI startups that are valued at over $1B (and actually have millions in revenues). -These startups have 50 employees or fewer, $5M+ in revenue, $1B+ valuation, and an AI-first culture. -The ultra-lean AI startup: small team, fast execution, low burn, and high revenue per employee. Just 20–50 people, most in the SF Bay Area. Most important thing is the culture: AI-First: Build and use AI before hiring more humans.