Inside CVC by u-path
Welcome to Inside CVC —Inside CVC by U-Path is the podcast where corporate venture capital meets strategy, leadership, and systemic change. Hosted by Philipp Willigmann and Steve Schmith, the show brings senior voices from across corporate venture, startups, investment, academia, and policy to the table.
Each episode goes beyond buzzwords to explore how capital, technology, and leadership shape the future of business and society. From AI and robotics to geopolitics, board governance, and inclusive innovation, Inside CVC is designed for executives and policymakers who want to understand not just what’s happening — but what to do about it.
Inside CVC by u-path
Inside CVC | Taj Eldridge on Why Africa Is the Next Innovation Frontier
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For decades, much of the world viewed Africa through the lens of aid, extraction, or geopolitical risk. Taj Eldridge argues that perspective is rapidly becoming obsolete.
Drawing on experience spanning venture capital, private equity, climate investing, and now living and working in Nairobi, Taj explains why Africa is emerging as one of the world's most important innovation markets—not because it mirrors Silicon Valley, but because it solves problems born from necessity.
He explores:
- Why workforce may become the most overlooked investment thesis of the AI era
- Why corporate venture capital is uniquely positioned to build long-term infrastructure
- Why investors should pay as much attention to energy, water, food, and human potential as they do to artificial intelligence.
Steve, Philipp, and Taj also discuss China's growing influence across Africa, Kenya's rise as a regional innovation hub, the intersection of climate and healthcare, and what founders and investors must understand before entering emerging markets.
This episode offers a fresh perspective on global innovation—and why the next generation of transformative companies may emerge where necessity, not convenience, drives invention.
Catch up on all episodes of Inside CVC at www.u-path.com/podcast.
Welcome to inside CVC, the podcast that brings together leaders in innovation and capital investment to explore the trends shaping the business of corporate venture capital. I'm your host, Steve Schmith and together with Philipp Willigmann we're speaking with corporate investors, entrepreneurs and ecosystem builders. Driving the Future of Innovation inside CVC is brought to you by u-path Advisors helping corporations and startups unlock sustainable growth through strategic partnerships. To learn more, visit u-path.com. That's the letter u dash path dot com. And to catch up on all of our episodes, search inside CVC on your favorite podcast platform or visit u-path.com/podcast. In this episode, we sit down with Taj Eldridge. The co-founder of Include Venture Partners, joins us from Nairobi, Kenya, where he is helping bring capital to the region. We explore why the West invests at the scale of convenience while Africa operates at the scale of necessity. We ask what China's decades long investment in Africa means for Western investors and global supply chain resilience. And we look at how investments in AI and the infrastructure it relies on, including energy, are helping lift an untapped workforce. Here's our conversation with Taj Eldridge.
You're joining us from Nairobi. You know, when you when you think about that, we'd love to maybe start today's conversation with what are you seeing in Africa that investors and corporate leaders in other parts of the world, places you've lived yourself perhaps are not seeing? Yeah. Well, number one, Steve and Philip, it is great to be on the show. I really appreciate it. Uh, Philip and I go, go back and, you know, we talked about this show and I, you know, as a person who's been in venture capital and private equity, I feel like there's an opportunity to have all these sectors from corporate VC to traditional venture capital, private equity have these conversations together to move to move markets to capital. And I will say that it's interesting for me growing up in the United States, um, you know, when we looked at the continent, we looked at things from a resource standpoint, resource heavy, right? A lot of us looked at that from extraction. I think now what we're seeing is an opportunity for deployment, but also for utilization. Prior to me coming to to the continent, to Kenya, I managed a twenty five million dollars or nineteen point five million dollar portfolio around workforce for Aries Management Company, their charitable fund. And the idea was to prepare individuals for work in the climate sector prior to to this administration. So what that told me was coming from an investor's standpoint, where I put a lot of emphasis on the technology. I put a lot of emphasis on the way that the solutions work. One of the things I did not think about was the importance of workforce. So when you think about that for the continent, you're seeing a lot of that because they have a huge amount of workforce that can be put and utilized for, for things. And I think at the end of the day, what's happened in the West, we've we've focused so much on scale of convenience. I think autonomous vehicles and those type of things. Whereas in the continent of Africa, it's about the scale of necessity. We have the scale of necessity. What that equates to is an opportunity to make investments that would change the economies in the in the ecosystem. I'll look at it like investing in creating the pipelines for the future as opposed to creating technology around it. And those pipelines will be there for, for millennia, for decades, I should say. And so I think it's a longer term focus where traditional venture capital may not be the appropriate vehicle, where corporate venture capital may be a more, more attainable vehicle. Private equity may be a more beneficial vehicle for that as well. But I think that that's the key to me that I think a lot of investors in the West, where I came from in Europe, US were missing out, is that China sees it. That's why China's here. I think the Middle East, West Asia sees it as well. And I have this theory that I call the three A's, which stands for Asia. West Asia or the Middle East and Africa. One is for technology development, one is for capital deployment and one is for actually solutions deployment. And I think that round piece will come into it. And we're seeing this idea of political blocs being created as opposed to just true globalism. And I think we're seeing not only political blocs, but economic blocs with that as well. we talk about Africa most of the time. You know, there is a a health concern. There is a poverty issue. there's a lot of things which don't work in Africa, And there's a lot of fragmentation and systems are not connecting. Is that actually kind of really the opportunity? Absolutely. And I think to preface that my experience over the last decade and a half or twenty years actually has been in the climate, space, sustainability, energy, and the like. And I think that what's happening in the continent of Africa is an opportunity to look at that for other markets. I think Southeast Asia, there's a lot of similarities there. And I think within the continent of Africa, even though there are fifty four countries, when we mentioned Africa, I think when we start talking about the opportunities for market, there's only a few South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria and the top, the top of Egypt. When we start thinking about the deployment of capital, when it comes to the work that we do in venture capital as well. And I do think those markets are going to be the markets that we'll see when we talk about from a climate or sustainability standpoint, which is which I am in, I think that you're seeing a lot more in the whole of East Africa, whether you're looking at electric vehicles in Rwanda, which is totally changing a lot of the things they're doing in their partnerships with with Volkswagen and others. When you think about hydropower with Ethiopia and Addis Ababa and the thing they're looking at there. And when you're looking at Kenya, you're thinking about it from a standpoint of grid utilizations and emissions. As a matter of fact, the state of California and Kenya has a partnership that started in twenty twenty five around emissions reduction, looking at ways to to not only electrify their their bikes, what they call bodas, but also the, the vehicles that they call matatus, that a large amount of the population comes and goes into. And I think with anything that you're talking about, that the technology of electric vehicles, all those things, what excites me is the infrastructure behind it, the infrastructure to charge the Charged infrastructure for grid utilization and management. And so I think about, you know, Philip, when we talk about that, you know, the idea of you see poverty, you see the makings of what we call the global South, right? When I go back to Texas, I sometimes see a bit of the global south and the global north. I see a bit of the cities in the South that need that are almost worse off than parts of Nairobi when it comes to health, health, access, when it comes to infrastructure and the like. So I think that when we're looking at the ideas of it, I think one of the benefits and the reason I came to the to this country is we could either be flyover investors and do it from a standpoint of research and bringing that data, or it could be boots on the ground and, and, and really understand the needs of the regions in order to make returns. You've mentioned Kenya a lot in this conversation Could you give us a view of what Kenya offers today, um, that perhaps our audience might not be aware of? Give them some context. Absolutely. I think Kenya has a really great opportunity as of late. They've raised a significant amount of venture capital for a lot of their startup community that's been there. I think Kenya is one of the countries in the region that's very tech focused. When you think about the population, and it reminds me of Southeast Asia, and some years ago when I invested in a company that did mobile advertising, back when we all had BlackBerrys and the like, one of the regions that we focused on was Southeast Asia and Vietnam. And what interests me is that there there jump from traditional landlines to mobile and digital was very quick because they didn't have that much infrastructure in the digital, in the landlines. And so I think the same thing is happening within Kenya. You're having this amalgamation of the people who are hungry, the Gen Z population here who understand the benefit of technology. You're having a lot of emphasis of focus of expats coming here, not like myself, who may come from a standpoint of things that are working with Unep. Like what got me here was the United Nations Environmental Programme and the work they were doing. But I think what's happening in Kenya is this amalgamation of policy that's been moving forward, whether it's focusing on blockchain and cryptocurrency and energy needs. And I think those are the things that we're seeing a lot, lot more of. And I think there's a bit of stability here versus what you might see in other nations. I think a lot of investors may have looked at Nigeria as a light and seeing the sheer size and population of that country. But the reality of it is, is there there are still barriers to the work that a lot of people do here, whether it's governmental barriers, whether it's infrastructure. We've seen the flooding in Nairobi as well. But again, for me, being an investor in the last twenty years, I see that as opportunity. And there's no reason it's no surprise that a lot of multinationals are moving to Kenya into a place called Tattoo City that is their own special economic zone, similar to Macau and Hong Kong. And so I think those things combined are what's getting me excited about it, specifically in the climate space. And I think I think right now we have a lot of AI heavy. Um, there's a lot of conversation around AI, a lot of investment in AI. And I say the same thing. I said, you know, five years ago about blockchain and cryptocurrency. You can't have that. You can't have AI without energy. And I think that's what's important and what's happening within Kenya as well. Taj, if I'm looking at country risk reports, a lot of the African countries are come in at the very, very top governance and risk regulatory unpredictability, friction of doing business across different African markets. Is that a legitimate, legitimate concern isn't it very, very risky to do business in Africa? Yeah, And I think, that's a great thing, And one of the things as investors, we often say is that it's not about how much risk is involved, it's about how we manage that risk and understand that risk. I think that there's risk when you think about the fifty four countries within the continent of Africa, but when you start thinking about the micro markets, the micro countries, we start to think about the big four of Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Egypt. Then your your wrist becomes a little bit more manageable to a degree. I think also to what time has told us, whether it's in America ourselves, that risk shifts. The situation is happening with America from a policy standpoint has caused risk within different markets that we've seen that even currently within the situation in the skirmish in Iran. But I think that that risk provides that opportunity. And I think that some of the times now you're seeing more focus and more funding coming from the East. That's reducing some of that risk that might be from an infrastructure standpoint. So I think of risk within the continent of those markets are political, of course, geopolitical infrastructure wise, uh, ease of doing business and the like. And I also think that there is a way for investors to look at investing in the space that might be different from what they're used to. What I mean by that is that Africa. Similar to West Asia, the Middle East is very relationship driven. We may have a situation where it's different from the way we may do business in California, that we do business in, say, Riyadh, or we may do business in Abu Dhabi, or we might do business here in Nairobi, Cape Town, Johannesburg or Lagos. And so I think that those risks are noted, but they're manageable. And what those risks becomes an abundance of opportunity. So you probably have seen a lot of venture backed companies fail. if you think about you moving over to Africa and putting your effort there, what kind of like areas would you highlight for a founder or for somebody who's investing where they may have to take a closer look? Absolutely. You know, when, you know, the audience may not realize, but prior to me doing the work I'm doing around here in the continent, I founded a fund of funds where we invested in other venture funds. The reason that's important in relationship to founders is because I look at this, I look at them as the same, and the same idea I would give to fund managers is what I would give to founders. I used to say for fund managers, I would want them to concentrate on the four C's. That's access to capital, which is the easiest thing that we do, but also access to connections, access to come to to companies and access to customers rather and access to culture. So capital connections, customers and culture. Very important as you think about deploying your technology. So the same thing happens alongside with with startups and founders in the region. They have to have, of course, the access to capital from their investors. But when you come to a market like Africa, you must have access to culture, understanding the culture that you're going to deploy into. You must have access to the customers that you're looking at, understanding that there needs to be boots on the ground. And then further, there may need to have an opportunity around those connections to make that make that that risk that we talked about a little bit less, a little bit more frictionless. One of the things I'm seeing a lot more of, and I'm loving this, is the idea of a number of venture studios that are popping up in the region beyond just traditional venture. And I think the benefit of that is to ensure that not only that these founders have the idea of market sizing and understanding the market that they want into within the continent, but also market readiness, understanding that their solution will be ready for the population that they want to deploy in. And so I think when I think about founders, whether they're thinking about coming to the Middle East or Africa, it's the same. They have to understand how the culture fits within their solutions. You need to tweak it or realize it. One perfect example is Uber. And I think Uber has done a lot of great work. They've seen, you know, when it comes to not only ride hailing, but also the product of food delivery, where they're competing with things like Glovo here and some of the different areas and some, some of the Middle East as well. Um, and so I think that that's one of the things that founders have to understand is that really having either those partnerships that are there on the ground as the markets that we get ready to enter into, or having a really good understanding and partnership and people on the ground is going to help them really deploy their solution for the region and understand the region is ready for that solution as well. That sort of leads to another question in, in a world where a lot of investment is going towards AI right now, do you think global capital is becoming too concentrated in that AI, digital intelligence and and less focused on what you've described as innovations that are that are helping people every day? Well, I think that, you know, I'm old enough to remember before we had internet, before the World Wide Web was, was so common. And I, and I remember, um, I remember this idea of the conversation around bricks versus clicks. If those in the audience can remember where there was a whole debate on whether you have the bricks, the physical representation of a store or the clicks to online representation of the store, where Amazon really kind of came in and, and lived in that arena and the internet became less of a question of that to more of a tool. It was a tool that utilized, I think AI is the same. I think AI is not necessarily just a solution. It's a tool to complement other solutions that are being built. And I think that when you start thinking about these technologies that may focus on the human capital aspect of it, or say, energy, AI is even important in that space as well. And so I don't see AI as something I do. I am concerned about overpricing, overpricing of assets around AI and over utilization of it. But but I do think that it is important to, to, to think about that. There's artificial intelligence, what AI is focusing on. And then there's physical intelligence. There's access to energy, water, food, and climate resilience. And all those things can also use AI as a tool to find solutions there. And so I think that AI is, is not something that we should ignore as we're talking about coming into markets like the continent of Africa, but rather we should think about how do we utilize AI more effectively and how the companies are utilizing that, whether they're in agriculture, energy and the like. Taj, you described, the access ventures need, And also the culture. there's a lot of conversation about, capital in Europe, corporates are not partnering enough with startups specifically in deep tech and energy. there's not enough access. The market is also not large enough to spend across Europe, would you say, Africa has an opportunity to really leapfrog. Absolutely. It's similar to, to how I went to, I went to grad school in China. Hong Kong, specifically Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in the early two thousand. And I see this similar thing there. I see where where you had an opportunity back then, as you said, the ascension of what China's policy was focusing on. And I think it's the same thing here within the continent. And again, I keep prefacing to say that it's not all fifty four countries that are that are fit into this model, but it's a few regional markets in this space that we'll see this growth in. And I do think it's an opportunity to where a lot of the friction that we may see in the West, um, and a lot of capital coming together. I do see a lot of that, what I call collaborative capital, where it comes from. Cvcs here on the ground, such as Mastercard Foundation, that's been investing tremendously in the space, even in Kenya, focusing on fintech to to Rockefeller Foundation and others where it's been this this partnership between the private venture capital, private equity and corporates. I think the only misstep that we're seeing is that from a startup standpoint, we're seeing a lot of that shift fall post seed. So you'll see a huge amount of funds preceding seed level, but you won't see that shift to get those founders from seed to series A and beyond, where then you have the private equity and the infrastructure plays with it as well. And so again, we're seeing the rise of these venture studios that will help this ascension for those for those those companies in this space, you're seeing a lot of corporates come down a little bit lower market, as we've been seeing over the last couple of years, participate in some types of partnerships. As I mentioned, I was the accelerator director and one of the fund managers at the University of California. And there we did a lot of tech transfer as well. So I do see a lot of that happening into the region also, where you might see instead of pure entrepreneurship or commercialization, commercialization of technologies, you might see tech transfer being exhibited from some of these, some of these venture studios, some of the start, some of the startups that are here, foundations that are in the region as well. So we briefly mentioned China. they have increased their investment over the last decades, building strong relationships, you know, building infrastructure, having strong agreements with multiple countries in Africa. Um, and we in the West largely passed on it. Um, Russia has done similar, uh, in more selected spaces. But from your view, does that create a structural disadvantage for us? Specifically also for Western investors entering now? And what does it mean from a supply chain perspective when it comes to resilience, access to critical materials, and which powers are ultimately shaping the future of Africa? Yeah, yeah. it goes back to what I said previously in our conversation about the building of blocks. No longer are do we see this idea of true globalization, but we're seeing this idea of political, economic and other blocks. And I do think, yes, China has played the game very well. They understood that they have a need, but also the countries in the region have a need. And they decided to focus on this idea of bridge partnerships. The Belt and Road Initiative, I think, is one of the greatest things that they've done as of late to focus on this space. And unfortunately, I do think that if you're focusing just on the West and you're looking at it from a Western lens, that we may have missed the mark on what China is doing within the region and Russia also. But I think if we're looking at it from a standpoint of the need, because, look, I mean, even with the US, our federal government and the US most recent visit to China, there was still this overture that a partnership is still needed. China and Russia are not going going straight alone. They're still understanding that there's a need for collaboration. So if they need that from a, from a, from a governmental standpoint, I think the investors may be able to play on that as well. And I think there should be a lot more collaboration between China, China, Chinese backed companies, Chinese backed funds and opportunities. And the West. Here in Kenya, you see a huge amount of that investment coming from areas of real estate, areas of infrastructure bill that would allow them to focus on, as we mentioned, the rare earths in this space. But I think also in Africa, what they're realizing is that the power is no longer just in the resources of what's in the ground, but the powers in the resources that are that is above ground. One of the reasons that I am really, really, uh, forward on Kenya is again, the sheer amount of, of focus on entrepreneurship and what's deemed here as the hustle culture in San Francisco. We gave that an award. We talked about the hustle culture as one of the ways that we looked at founders that are ready for this space. Even the president of this country of Kenya has talked came to office saying he's the hustlers president, or he understands the hustlers that are there. So when you combine that alongside of the access to technology and the aptitude towards technology, I think is a great opportunity. And I think, again, to your point about China and Russia, they see that, but they also have understand the aspect of history of how can we enter into these relationships with these countries in the continent of Africa and doing it differently than how Portugal did it, how Britain did it, and even how the US did it as of late with a lot of aid and the like. And so I think that that's one of the things that we're going to on the West may be missing out on unless we have this true partnership that we can see. Lastly, I would say this, you know, in California and China has a huge strategic partnership that in the years went beyond just the the political federal level. When I was at the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator as a senior director of investment, we did a lot of partnership with Chengdu, China, and Sichuan Province, where we focused on a different type of investments in environmentalism, different types of investments in climate tech. And that was during a time where there were still some tensions federally from our government in China. And so I started seeing I think we're going to see a lot more of that, where you're going to have investors, um, maybe not necessarily on the corporate side because of, you know, things on that end, but more private investors, uh, having some type of partnership or relationship with funds in China as it comes to, to the continent. Do you think that applies to something like disability? Right. I think it's pretty common knowledge or that that healthcare across Africa is a challenge. There are global organizations just focused on bringing better medicine, better healthcare across the opportunity. But conversations we've had here on this show sort of put investment in disability as more of a niche area. I'll be very transparent with the audience here. You know, in twenty eighteen, I was diagnosed with a kidney disease. Um, that that was that happened from emissions that came up where I lived in Texas. I was born in Texas. And, um, we discovered at the time when I got diagnosed was that a large majority of the illness that I had came from the emissions that happened there and some of the chemicals in our water system that was there. I started to say that, that, that gave me this, this ability to talk about the impact of climate today as opposed to how we've talked about it in years to come. And this is in the United States. And I think that there's a similarity within the continent of Africa to where, you know, Covid changed a lot of things for a lot of investors and me included. But Covid changed for me was the aspect of it didn't matter how much return I made and what app or technology at the end of the day was Uber important is health. And so I think that a lot of technologies in this space will start seeing and seeing it. Now, how that relates to disability. I think you have the the health impacts that creates these disabilities, whether those are physical disabilities. And then you have the people who are born with disabilities that are such an untapped market that we may not see. I'll also be very transparent with the audience and said, I was born blind in my right eye. And, you know, I think about people with my like myself who have visual disabilities, where technology has been great. A lot of the glasses that I wear are are audio glasses or glasses that have cameras or what they like. And those things help me tremendously as of late. And I think about that. That's a technology that's not necessarily just for people with disabilities, it's for a wider market, but people with disabilities like myself can benefit from that. When you think about autonomous vehicles, I rarely drive at night because of the vision. But when you think about things like autonomous vehicles, which again, it's made for the mass market but can benefit people with disabilities even more. So even the elderly. I think that's the future of, of disability and disability tech. And the way we have to look at it from an investor standpoint, but also a standpoint of deployment. And again, there are technologies that are going to be focused on people with other types of disabilities just for them. And I think that that's a space that we're seeing a lot of funds happen in this space that are coming. There may be this idea of niche type of funds and investment, but if you think about from a global lens and you put it in in the aspect of the continent of Africa, I think that's the way we're going to see it, where there's going to be technologies and there's going to have to be people there. Again, the diversity of thought people there who can see that this can relate to this population that's untapped as well. When I was speaking in Taipei as of late for Apec's conference around this around diversity, there are different definition. Diversity was people with disabilities, and they were preparing for those people with disabilities to enter the workforce around climate. So I think again, the idea of creating technologies for people with disabilities allows for this untapped workforce to be included, and this untapped intellectual opportunities to be included. I think from a macro level of investment, you're going to see a lot more efficacy of technologies that can benefit people with disabilities. And I think from a healthcare standpoint, you know, the Ebola outbreak here in the region has been one of the things as of late. There's been a lot of conversations around with the US deciding to house a number of Americans in in Kenya before they come to the US. But also when I left the US in California, we had the outbreak of the hantavirus. And so I think that, again, Covid changed a lot of things. It changed a lot of ways that investors think about things. And even myself, when I start thinking about climate sustainability, health care, health, the health of humans is top of mind. When I start thinking about deployment and capital and how those things relate. as we as we can come to the end. I want to bring us back to corporate venture capital. and specifically operators who have a longer time horizon and a strategic mandate than a pure financial investor. Does that actually make cvcs better suited for traditional ventures? And kind of when it comes to infrastructure investments and energy related investments, specifically when it comes to system level investing in Africa. Absolutely. I think that I think that traditional VC is impatient. We have impatient capital. And again, each asset class has the the things that define that asset class. And I think, as you mentioned, corporate VC is more of a patient capital focus and infrastructure focus. It's one of the reasons when I was a fund of funds, I also said that the traditional venture capital model may not be the best asset class for investing in climate. It might need to be a hybrid. I'm a former banker with a university with the Union Bank of Switzerland. So one of the things I've always said is credit needs to play a role in the deployment of capital for for technologies in this space. But, but I think that corporates allow for Allow corporate VC allow for strategic positioning in the region, and they also allow for the level set of technologies that, again, private capital that VC can come in and exacerbate a scale up a small portion of that on a different portion of that. But I think Cvcs are really very well positioned in this space. And I think in the beginning of the podcast, we talked about those such as Mastercard Foundation that's heavily involved in the region and others nor skin that's here also. And so I think that we're seeing a lot more of those opportunities that Cvcs can come into play also. Um, and again, as a, as a fund of funds, a lot of our investment came from Cvcs. As an example, Microsoft was one of our LPs, but even Microsoft, we're seeing a lot more focus here when it comes to data centers, the modular data centers that can be in the region, special economic zones, specifically in Kenya that's being created in an area called Tattoo City that I think you're going to hear a lot more about when it comes to the idea of data sovereignty and everything else in that in. And so I think that the long term horizons of cvcs, the partnerships that they can play, the way they can benefit from it, is very abundant opportunity for a continent like Africa and those different markets. And why you see them have a little bit more success than your traditional VCs in this space. why don't we close with maybe a scenario if you've had five minutes with a corporate board or a CVC investment committee, what would you tell them about building companies in a world that is shaped by AI, climate pressure, workforce constraints, Africa's underused human potential? What would you advise them? What would you say to them? I think the first thing I would say is that stop trying to export your current solutions. This is the time to be creative. This is the time to be innovative. We want to invest in the resiliency of systems that will support a billion people. That's just in the continent of Africa. I think that when we start talking about numbers and we start talking about the idea of solutions change and systems change. That is where the real innovation occurs. That is where the real return occurs occurs. The thing that really surprised me from a standpoint of the investment is that the importance of workforce. I met I was one of those folks who never really thought about workforce as I made investments in technology. I think the same for for corporate boards. They would understand that workforce is extremely important, even in the age of AI, because I think that, again, even though AI creates these opportunities for us to, to reduce a lot of the repetitive nature of opportunities, a lot of jobs will be changed. And, you know, you hear this conversation about jobs being lost or impacted with, with, with AI. I look at it as jobs being changed and human capacity, intellectual knowledge and operations will be changed with the benefit of AI. And so I think that now we're in a space where technology has reached this point to where we can create things. And it's, you know, from the eighties. This is so unimaginable. But right now, for me, the investment is on decentralized essential resources. Energy, food and and and human potential. Those are the areas where you get the greatest return. Those are the areas where we're going to see the battle of whether those are political battles, whether those are some of the like we might be seeing in the Middle East because of the importing of food, import of resources and water. And I think for corporates, that's the new playing field of innovation, is innovating those, those systems around the human potential, around food, around energy that will drive everything, including AI.
That's all for this week's episode of Inside CVC. As always, thanks for joining us. You can find all of our episodes wherever you find your podcast, or visit u-path.com/podcast That's the letter u dash path dot com forward slash podcast. We'll see you next time.