105 startups in this batch
This cohort emerged during the Agentic Pivot, a period where the startup world shifted from simple LLM wrappers to autonomous, industry-specific agents. Macro conditions were defined by a "flight to utility," as YC focused heavily on biotech acceleration, AI-native professional services, and the infrastructure needed to measure Artificial General Intelligence.
This batch validated that high-stakes professional services—from legal reviews to protein characterization—could be compressed from weeks to hours using AI-native workflows. They proved a massive enterprise willingness to pay for outcome-based pricing rather than traditional seat-based SaaS, particularly in sectors where human expertise was the primary operational bottleneck.
Many startups in this batch eventually struggled because they over-invested in proprietary model fine-tuning for problems that were later solved by foundational model updates. The core lesson for today's builders is that workflow moats and deep integration into the customer's data stack are more defensible than the underlying intelligence layer itself.
There is a massive wedge in micro-vertical agentic networks—taking the partnership intelligence or legal speed pioneered in W26 and applying it to hyper-niche, underserved industries. Today's solo builders can leverage multi-agent orchestration to automate entire departmental functions that W26 founders could only partially augment with human-in-the-loop systems.
The AI-native platform for next-generation protein characterization.
AI benchmarks that measure general intelligence and inspire new ideas
AI-native legal services for startups with same-day turnaround and elite lawyers handling final reviews.
AI agents for hardware design that catch risks and tradeoffs early
Enterprise data transfer protocol delivering 10x faster file transfers than TCP for AI, robotics, satellite, and defense applications.
Realtime AI for sales calls that provides instant answers to handle technical questions and objections during live calls.
a platform for maximizing the thrill of collecting trading cards
Reinforcement learning environments for long horizon agent journeys
AI-powered operating system for satellite constellation management that predicts link failures and autonomously reroutes traffic.
The most powerful AI agents for Financial Crime Compliance
Building the First Hotel on the Moon
Real-time Building Simulations to Optimize Energy and Operational…
AI-powered toolkit for risk teams to detect, investigate, and mitigate fraud trends.
AI Agents for ERP / CRM Configuration, starting with Salesforce
We turn clinical trial data into FDA submission documents in minutes
Firewall that controls access to information across AI and humans
Energy independent data centers with solar and repurposed batteries.