"Turpentine VC" | Venture Capital and Investing · Erik Torenberg

E64: Chris Paik on the End of Software and the Future of AI Infrastructure

·49 min·2 clips

Paik argues software will be replaced by “a constellation of things” and distribution will matter most.

1. Turpentine VC E64 centers on Chris Paik’s views on venture capital, AI infrastructure, and the future of software. 2. Chris Paik is general partner at Pace Capital and co-founder of Thrive Capital, and Eric Torenberg presses him on firm strategy and AI frameworks. 3. The episode asks what venture is for now that capital, distribution, and AI models are changing at the same time. 4. Paik describes Thrive as his “alma mater,” says it started as a $40 million firm, and frames its edge as New York-based hunger and offense. 5. He argues investors often miss category leaders because they want to be “right and clever,” even when the market leader is the winner. 6. Paik uses Bitcoin and Matt Huang at Paradigm as an example of how obvious trades can feel insufficiently clever to smart investors. 7. He distinguishes “brand” from “reputation,” and says that over time brand tends to converge to reputation. 8. Paik says Pace is building a “temple,” not an empire, and wants to attract “world-class investors” who treat venture as a craft. 9. He says Pace uses theses to sort deals, reaches out first, and follows the motto “if there’s a deck, it’s too late.” 10. He also says the firm avoids shotgun investing and prefers being “snipers” who build conviction before other investors do. 11. Paik argues the venture market swings between “two” and “20” models, depending on whether funds are aggregating capital or staying disciplined. 12. He says mega-funds can “foie gras companies” by pushing founders from $5 million needs to $10 million checks. 13. Paik expects more money to flow into venture because LLMs, drug discovery, and private-market growth all create more financing demand. 14. He says private markets capture value that once appeared in public markets, and uses Amazon’s path from $500 million to $3 trillion as the contrast. 15. Paik names one exception to the bullish venture view: if rates rise enough that the risk-free rate beats private-market returns, LPs may rotate away. 16. He says Y Combinator is the clearest recent example of productized venture, with network effects, alumni, brand, and special economics. 17. Paik’s “end of software” essay argues that Salesforce-style monoliths will be replaced by distributed tools and that distribution will control value. 18. He says Apple is unusually well positioned because unified memory architecture and M-chip Macs can run large models locally, including a 70B model on a MacBook Pro. 19. The conversation is fast, framework-heavy, and mostly tactical, with Paik moving from fund design to AI infrastructure to distribution economics. 20. Listeners who track venture strategy, AI stacks, and fund design will get the most from it; listeners wanting a story episode probably won’t.

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