Gerald Brady

Gerald Brady is the Managing Director for Silicon Valley Bank, leading the firm's SVB Network.

Gerald's central theme was the sheer velocity of change in the innovation economy. In his words, the fastest pace he has seen in 26 years, and more profound than the internet revolution. AI sits at the heart of that shift, reshaping where capital flows and how quickly value is created.

He pointed to a striking concentration of investment: in Q1, roughly 70% of all venture funding went to just five companies, including OpenAI, Anthropic, Waymo, Databricks and Grok. The capital intensity of frontier AI development means only a handful of players can realistically compete, prompting many VCs to steer clear of categories where the largest model builders might enter, such as coding co-pilots.

Looking ahead, Gerald identified the strongest growth at the intersections of AI with cyber security, life sciences, quantum computing and aerospace/defence. Alongside revenue growth he described as unprecedented, with some companies scaling from zero to $100M in a matter of weeks.