Want to know where VCs are investing next? Be in the room at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025

TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 will feature a key session on October 27th where prominent venture capitalists Nina Achadjian (Index Ventures), Jerry Chen (Greylock), and Viviana Faga (Felicis) will detail their 2026 investment priorities. This session is poised to offer critical insights into the future direction of smart money, specifically highlighting emerging opportunities across AI, data, cloud, and robotics, with a focus on automating underserved industries and scaling product-driven enterprise solutions.

Analysis

This article provides a forward-looking signal on the investment priorities of influential venture capital firms Index Ventures, Greylock, and Felicis for 2026. The key takeaway for investors is the continued, focused interest in AI, data, cloud infrastructure, and robotics. A more nuanced theme emerging is the targeting of automation solutions for 'forgotten' or underserved industries, suggesting a strategic pivot towards vertical SaaS and enterprise software that replaces legacy, non-digital processes. The session highlights the specific criteria these VCs use, such as founder-customer empathy, strong product sense, and scalable go-to-market strategies, offering a qualitative filter for assessing early-stage opportunities. While the immediate market impact is low (score of 0.25), the discussion serves as a leading indicator of future capital flows in private markets, which can eventually influence public market valuations and M&A trends. The mention of Salesforce (CRM) is historical and carries a neutral sentiment (0.0), having no bearing on the company's current fundamentals.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Monitor the specific 2026 investment theses revealed at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference, as they will signal future capital allocation trends in the private technology markets, particularly in AI, data, and vertical SaaS.
• Public market investors should use these VC priorities as a thematic overlay, screening for companies that lead in the automation of legacy industries, as this is highlighted as a key growth vector.
• Track the early-stage companies funded by Index Ventures, Greylock, and Felicis post-conference to identify potential future market leaders and disruptors to publicly traded incumbents.
• The mention of Salesforce (CRM) is not a material catalyst, and no portfolio action is warranted based on this information alone.