You Don’t Need Another Foundation Model. You Need a Better Angle of Attack.
On July 8, WeShine brought together founders, investors, researchers, engineers, and technology leaders in Palo Alto to explore AI infrastructure, Physical AI, robotics, and deep tech. The program featured keynotes from Chun Xia, General Partner and Co-Founder of TSV Capital, and Sebastian Spitzer, Venture Partner at Omni Ventures and Niterra Ventures and AI infrastructure operator at HPE, followed by a panel and startup pitches.
Chun encouraged founders to look beyond popular technologies and focus on gaps foundation-model companies cannot easily address. He discussed AI’s limitations in physical environments and areas involving judgment, autonomy, emotion, and meaning, highlighting opportunities in Physical AI, personal agents, emotion AI, human-centered education, and roles supervising automated systems.
Sebastian explained why Physical AI and robotics develop more slowly than software. Real-world systems must overcome hardware, data, manufacturing, supply-chain, safety, and reliability challenges. These barriers make commercialization harder but can create durable advantages for companies that master specific environments.
The panel featured Chun Xia, Sebastian Spitzer, Amar Flora, Suresh Alla, and Jiachen “Amber” Liu, moderated by Roger Rappoport of Snell & Wilmer. The evening concluded with pitches from Kris Saunders of Power48, Cien Zhang of Topaas.AI, Misha Rubanov of ReflexBio, and Akash Saraf of Sanscritic.ai. The central message was clear: the strongest startups will win by solving difficult, specific, and valuable problems, not simply by using the newest AI model.
Key takeaways from the keynote and panel discussions included:
Defensibility is moving beyond the model into proprietary data, vertical expertise, customer relationships, workflow integration, regulatory knowledge, hardware, and deployment experience.
Physical AI is shaped by edge cases. Rare events can create major safety and operational consequences, making real-world data highly valuable.
A strong demo is not yet a product. Founders must plan early for reliability, manufacturing, regulation, maintenance, and commercialization.
Hard-tech companies need milestone-based capital strategies, supported where possible by grants, university programs, strategic partnerships, and non-dilutive funding.
Customer discovery should come before product development. Founders were encouraged to validate assumptions early and build around real customer problems.
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Thank you to Velda, PineLong Life, TheAgentic, StockFan, Langrenus Fund, and Snell & Wilmer for supporting the event and the WeShine community.
Upcoming WeShine Event
Physical Intelligence and AI Infra | VC Insights • Founder Pitches
📅 August 5
⏰ 5:30 PM to 8:30 PM
📍Palo Alto
Registration: https://luma.com/l56dhiul
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— The WeShine Team
Located in Silicon Valley, WeShine is a nonprofit driving innovation and supporting entrepreneurs. We connect founders, technologists, investors, and industry experts to turn ideas into impactful realities. Through online seminars, meetups, incubation programs, talent initiatives, and global startup events, we provide the resources and networks entrepreneurs need to grow. Join us and be part of a community where visions shine brighter.