From Pilots to Platforms: Picks for ‘26

2025 was a year of unprecedented pulled-forward demand. Nearly all enterprises were tasked to define their AI strategies, and they tried everything. 2026, however, is when the rubber hits the road.

Pilots will convert or quietly disappear. With yet another wave of foundation models, we see openings for new AI-native apps to leapfrog both legacy incumbents and the first generation of AI startups. Early AI market leaders will need to keep shipping or risk churn from enterprises seeking measurable ROI.

Deal activity will remain elevated. The surge in M&A we saw in 2025 should continue into this year, fueled by geopolitics and macro dynamics, as well as sustained appetite from incumbent SaaS platforms and AI leaders. If public market valuations remain strong, 2026 could also be a fruitful year for IPOs.

And we’ll see more effective deployments from incumbent SaaS platforms. Many have now acquired or built core AI capabilities. In 2026, we expect them to exert tighter control over their data. Against this backdrop, early-stage founders should be cautious about deep dependencies on incumbents and move quickly to become the system of record themselves.

As we wrote in our AI64 Report, software development, customer support, sales & marketing, legal, and healthcare were among the earliest proving grounds for enterprise AI. This year, we’ll see adoption expand into a new frontier of end markets.

Looking ahead to 2026, a few themes we’re particularly excited to explore are:

Context as a Moat

• AI gets personal. This is the year AI connects to your data, understands you better than anyone, including yourself, and becomes a trusted advisor, coach, and assistant, helping you become the best version of yourself, personally and professionally. – Alex Bard
• Full-stack AI apps win. Whoever has the best data will have the best AI, requiring leading AI apps to own the system of record and the system of intelligence to compete and build the best AI experience. – Pat Chase
• The Lovable moment for the enterprise arrives. AI unlocks no-code productivity inside large organizations, translating messy business intent into safe, compliant, production-grade workflows that teams can build and evolve as easily as consumer software. – Meera Clark

The Collapsing Org Chart

• The Chief People Officer becomes AI. The employee lifecycle is now a software problem. From onboarding and training to enablement and offboarding, AI can orchestrate each stage end-to-end, proactively engaging employees, eliminating friction, and compounding value. – Alex Bard
• The ITSM function is rebuilt. IT AI agents take off by streamlining repetitive IT work (e.g., password resets, access grants, tickets) while dramatically improving the employee experience. – Pat Chase
• Intelligent procurement emerges. Procurement evolves from a manual, reactive function into a continuously optimized AI system that automates spend and unlocks millions in hard savings. – Urvashi Barooah
• Accounts receivable goes agentic. AI transforms AR from passive tracking to active recovery. Multi-modal agents call, email, and negotiate across channels to pursue balances and adjust terms before invoices go delinquent, accelerating cash flow. – Priscilla Russo

AI Expands its Scope of Influence

• Scientists get AI lab partners. This year, co-pilots for scientists expand from experiment planning to execution and iteration, transforming labs into continuous-learning environments where human scientists co-work with their AI lab partners. – Priscilla Russo
• Software ships itself. AI-native computer use compresses implementation timelines, reduces reliance on forward-deployed engineers, and allows enterprise applications to scale at the pace of software, not services teams. – Meera Clark

AI Seeps into More Complex Industries

• A new law firm takes shape. AI-powered legal platforms democratize access to top-tier counsel by delivering high-quality guidance with unprecedented speed and affordability. – Meera Clark
• Insurance is the next big vertical to adopt AI. Like healthcare and legal, insurance is a trillion-dollar industry built on humans processing massive volumes of unstructured data. As labor-heavy models break under margin pressure, AI agents take over claims, servicing, and sales. – Urvashi Barooah
• A new orchestration layer for the physical world emerges. As robotics, manufacturing, and physical infrastructure scale rapidly, a new software control plane is created to coordinate and optimize these fleets. – Priscilla Russo
• Healthcare AI enters the exam room. Healthcare AI expands beyond administrative automation into always-on, personalized clinical intelligence, shifting care delivery from reactive workflows to continuous, patient-specific decision-making. – Meera Clark
• AI becomes the junior accountant. The accounting workforce is shrinking while errors and restatements hit record highs. In 2026, AI takes over journal entries, reconciliations, and close, delivering near-real-time, continuously accurate financials. – Urvashi Barooah

Redpoint has been fortunate to partner with category leaders across AI Apps. In 2025 alone, we announced our investments in Anam, Attio, Augment, Finch, Giga, Legora, Liberate, Maxima, Motif, Serval, Trunk Tools, and Valerie Health.

We are incredibly excited about the value that AI apps will unlock in the next decade. Agree? We’d love to hear from you. Follow us on Twitter or find us on LinkedIn to continue the conversation.