entrepreneurship

Y Combinator, a startup incubator, released a report on the direction of cryptocurrency startups, focusing on stablecoins, asset tokenization, and AI Agents. The report states that over the past year, cryptocurrency applications have been led by institutions rather than consumers for the first time, with the main driving force shifting from speculation to actual financial needs such as hedging oil price risks and cross-border capital transfers for businesses.The report predicts that stablecoins, as well as assets like stocks, debts, commodities, and property rights, will be further tokenized. New types of assets, such as equity in startups and small securities valued under $10,000, will also be issued via blockchain, promoting financial services like trading, lending, and derivatives. AI Agents will become one of the main participants in financial activities.In the next six months, the report focuses on using blockchain to finance the AI industry, new types of dollar stablecoins and non-dollar stablecoins targeting niche markets, new banks based on stablecoins, tokenization of real-world assets, new trading platforms and trading interfaces, as well as AI Agent trading and related API infrastructure. The text mentions that blockchain technology and stablecoins may pose a threat to traditional stock exchanges and banking systems.

a16z crypto partner Ali Yahya posted on X that he has decided to leave a16z, move to San Francisco, and start a company. He stated that he has been with the company for nearly 10 years, and when he met Chris Dixon, Ben Horowitz, and Marc Andreessen in 2017, he was an engineer at Google Brain working on robotics research, with a strong interest in open source but no knowledge of investing.Ali Yahya mentioned that at that time, Chris Dixon had already laid the groundwork for a16z in the early crypto space by investing in companies like Coinbase, but the company's crypto team consisted of only Chris Dixon, and he hoped to expand the team. Chris Dixon invited him to leave Google to help build the company's crypto business. He expressed that forming the team together and supporting founders' work has been the most meaningful experience of his life, and he thanked Chris, Ben, Marc, and the team.Regarding his entrepreneurial direction, Ali Yahya stated that he is still in the early stages and is most focused on infrastructure that can support an open software ecosystem. He made two observations: current AI is mostly a technology for individual use, but in the future, it will shift towards collaboration among multiple people and multiple intelligent agents, potentially leading to large-scale open networks; the cost of software development has significantly decreased, allowing for on-demand generation and disposal after single use, which will change the software stack and may give rise to new operating systems mediated by AI and an AI-native developer ecosystem. He invited those working in related fields, especially those in the Bay Area, to communicate with him.

a16z related project speedrun launches Alpha Fellowship, with the application deadline on October 11. This program is aimed at highly technical students, dropouts, and recent graduates, supporting builders in the earliest stages. The program takes place in San Francisco and is operated by the speedrun team in collaboration with EO Ventures.The founder track can receive up to $250,000 in investment, over $1 million in partner credits (AWS, GCP, Azure, OpenAI, Anthropic, Cursor, etc.), speedrun automatic final interview (up to $1 million investment), office hours, co-working space, and an 8-week in-person experience (from January 11 to March 5). The talent track offers a 4-week in-person experience (from February 8 to March 5), introducing portfolio companies, office hours, fireside chats, and co-working space.Speakers and mentors include a16z co-founder Marc Andreessen, Substack founder Chris Best, a16z general partner Andrew Chen, EO Ventures founding general partner Roland Fryer, among others. The investment terms are $150,000 for 5% SAFE plus a $100,000 follow-on investment within 18 months. This program is limited to software engineers, requiring authorization for full-time work in the U.S.; students may apply but must commit to full-time participation.

According to a report by the Financial Associated Press, the General Office of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has issued the "Entrepreneurship Support Plan for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in Artificial Intelligence (2026-2028)." Over three years, it aims to cultivate a large number of innovative and dynamic artificial intelligence startups with significant growth potential in key areas such as industry applications, data services, and intelligent computing power. More than 10,000 new technology and innovation-oriented small and medium-sized enterprises will be nurtured, with over 2,000 "specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative" small giant enterprises emerging, along with a number of gazelle and unicorn companies.Focusing on the field of artificial intelligence, the plan will establish 10 high-standard technology enterprise incubators and 10 national public service demonstration platforms (bases) for small and medium-sized enterprises. It will also cultivate 10 national-level characteristic industrial clusters for small and medium-sized enterprises. The entrepreneurial and innovative vitality of small and medium-sized enterprises in artificial intelligence will continue to surge, and a preliminary pattern of high-quality development for small and medium-sized enterprises empowered by artificial intelligence will take shape.

At a closed-door sharing session held in Hong Kong, Binance founder CZ responded to questions about entrepreneurship among university students, emphasizing that there is no need to rush into starting a business. He suggested that young people should first work at a good large company for a few years, stating, "Two years should be the minimum," with 2 to 5 years being ideal. He cited his own four years at Bloomberg as an example, noting that the complete management system of a large company is something that university students cannot experience immediately upon graduation, which will be very helpful for future entrepreneurship.CZ believes that young people must focus on cultivating "a specialized skill." He stated that this is a world of global competition, "If you broadly say programming, there are millions of programmers worldwide, and it is impossible to be twice as good as everyone else. However, if you can become the best 1% or even 0.1% in the world, the returns you receive may be several times, dozens of times, or even hundreds of times more than others. The treatment of the first place and the second place will be very different."

According to Cointelegraph, Cathie Wood of Ark Invest stated that AI is likely to trigger an entrepreneurial explosion, and she encourages recent graduates to use AI as their sole employee to start their own companies.

MEXC Chief Strategy Officer Cecilia Hsueh posted on X that July 30 is her last day at MEXC. She stated that this does not mean leaving the crypto industry; the simple narratives have ended, and many no longer believe in crypto, which instead signifies that speculators are exiting, and some larger opportunities are forming. Blockchain is more meaningful than ever in solving real problems. She mentioned that she will return to an entrepreneurial mode next.According to RootData, Cecilia Hsueh previously served as CEO of Phemex and co-founder and CEO of Morph, and will take on the role of Chief Strategy Officer at MEXC in June 2025.

ABCDE co-founder Du Jun stated on platform X that he is returning to entrepreneurship and plans to launch an institutional trading platform in the second quarter.