Toby Obstbaum

At the start of the year, “2025: The Year of Agents” sounded like headline bait. Eight months in, it feels like an understatement. Sam Altman said agents would “join the workforce” in 2025. Satya Nadella expects them to replace segments of knowledge work. Marc Benioff wants Salesforce to be the “#1 provider of digital labour.” That’s not future tense anymore - today, agents are moving tickets, shipping code, and digesting documents.

Last November, we laid out a vision for AI-native services: businesses rebuilt from the ground up to combine the margins of software with the resilience and depth of services markets. Since then, we have taken dozens of first meetings, explored more than 15 verticals, backed our first deals, and sharpened our thesis along the way.

At OpenOcean, we’ve long believed in automation software’s potential. It’s been a core theme in our investment focus for years, giving us early and continued exposure to exciting developments in the field.