13 Mar 2026AMI Labs $1B Seed, NScale $2B C, Anthropic Sue, Lovable & Sequoia Join
Julian Beck (Sequoia): Sell Outcomes, Not Tools
Sequoia's Julian Beck explains why services-first, human-centered companies are the most defensible bet as models improve: models excel at intelligence (codifiable, rules-based work like coding), while humans supply judgment and taste, which when fed into systems becomes tomorrow's intelligence — the same mechanism as RLHF unlocking GPT-3. He advises founders to start with outsourced tasks where budgets already exist, cites portfolio company Rillet closing books as an autopilot versus QuickBooks, and argues SaaS isn't dead — younger startups can now poach top executives and the gap between good and great talent is widening.
Stefan (Cello): Human Signal & the New Growth Infrastructure
Cello co-founder and CEO Stefan introduces the company as 'revenue growth infrastructure': an all-in-one referral platform that incentivizes passionate users and partners to recommend software, fully automated and hooked into data sources. He argues that as AI makes building products easy and legacy GTM channels drown in AI-generated noise, distribution becomes the decisive moat and human social proof is the signal that cuts through. The interview continues beyond this part of the transcript.
Cello: B2B Referrals, Authenticated Social Proof & the GTM 10 Awards
The Cello interview wraps up with the guest explaining why B2B referrals never scaled like B2C and why authenticated human social proof will be the key signal for both human buyers and AI agents. He points to CAC paybacks 5x-ing over five years, Google AI Overviews cutting search traffic by ~79%, and cold-call pickup rates halving as AI floods channels with noise. He describes Cello's growth-loop go-to-market model and its positioning for agent-to-agent commerce (e.g., agents choosing Stripe or Supabase), then promotes the second annual GTM 10 awards run with Lightspeed Venture Partners.