WhoBuilt

Legendary Consumer VC Predicts The Future Of AI Products

Jun 27, 2025· 36 min· 105K views·Watch on YouTube

Speaker

Kirsten Green, co-founder and managing partner of Forerunner Ventures, discusses consumer AI products and startup building with Gary on Y Combinator’s The Main Function.

Why consumer AI is gaining traction

Green says consumer AI is arriving after the infrastructure and technology have matured. She sees ChatGPT’s rapid adoption as evidence that people welcome conversational tools, since asking a question can feel more natural than searching with keywords. She describes AI as a platform shift toward products built around ongoing relationships, rather than only attention or transactions.

Products built on memory and context

Green sees potential in AI that builds context across conversations and uses it to anticipate what might be useful later. She connects persistent memory, voice, and personalization to stronger user relationships and retention. In areas such as health, education, finance, and social life, accumulated context could make digital products more relevant over time.

Experiment with new product experiences

Green calls this a messy, creative stage: founders should try different approaches and learn from what resonates. She expects standout AI products to start from a new place rather than simply add AI to an existing category. She also says founders should explore interfaces beyond a chat bar and design experiences around the needs of specific areas, such as health or finance.

Build a product people need

Green advises founders to communicate a product’s value across channels, tailoring the message to word of mouth, TikTok, and advertising. She says marketing cannot compensate for a weak product; a real need should generate some traction before founders optimize distribution. Dollar Shave Club’s launch video helped it get early attention, but Green says the broader opportunity was the shift in men’s personal care and online product discovery.

Look for enduring needs and AI tailwinds

Green highlights personal security and proactive health as areas where people may need support amid uncertainty and gaps in healthcare. She imagines AI using personal records and information from devices such as an Oura Ring to provide more contextual health guidance. For founders, she recommends building into the direction of LLM capabilities, grounding the product in a clear need, and giving people a reason to return.

Takeaways

  • Start with a need people will return to, then choose the AI capability and interface that serve it.
  • Test multiple product experiences while the category is still taking shape, and learn from user response.
  • Use accumulated context to make personalization more useful across time, not just within a single interaction.
  • Match each channel’s message to the product’s value, and treat early novelty as a launch advantage rather than a durable strategy.
  • Build around an enduring need that benefits from AI’s progress.

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