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Founder Interview – Stella S.
February 9, 2026
Seed Five
San Francisco’s Big AI Reboot
Jide Adebowale
An economic analyst and writer based in New York City. Jide spent six years working as an economist for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and now writes about urban life, regional economies, and the future of work. His work blends cultural commentary with a data-driven perspective.
Many U.S. cities struggled during the pandemic, but few received the sort of apocalyptic headlines San Francisco did. Population loss. Empty offices. Collapsing transit ridership. Social disorder. The city became shorthand for urban decline. In a place historically defined by dramatic swings, the Gold Rush, the dot-com boom, the crash, and the rise of social media, the pandemic was another brutal downswing. But in pure San Francisco fashion, just as quickly as it fell, the city is finding a way back. This time, the fuel isn’t gold or semiconductors, it’s artificial intelligence, and the startups behind it.
AI has become a cliché word in cultural conversation, every company claims to be using it, every founder insists they’re AI-adjacent. Whether the technology fulfills its sweeping promises remains an open debate. What isn’t in question is the capital behind it. Tens of billions of dollars in funding have poured into AI startups over the past two years, and more than half of global AI funding goes to San Francisco, proof that San Francisco’s startup machine is firing again. For all the talk of tech’s exodus, San Francisco’s dominance in venture capital is staggering: Bay Area startups attracted roughly $55 billion in Q1 2025 alone, nearly seven times New York’s second-place $6.1 billion haul and dwarfing Austin’s $3.4 billion. When it comes to venture funding, especially in AI, there’s still only one epicenter, and it’s San Francisco.
Q1 2025 VC INVESTMENT BY REGION
San Francisco’s crown jewel in AI is undoubtedly OpenAI, more commonly known to users as ChatGPT, that helpful, if overly flattering tool that answers everything. They’re headquartered in Mission Bay, a waterfront neighborhood that feels like a laboratory district come to life. The glass-fronted offices of the most well known AI superpower sits alongside a dense cluster of startups experimenting with everything from machine learning to robotics. The air there hums with invention, a kind of “mad scientist” energy that feels chaotic yet inevitable. That’s just San Francisco, a city where ambition, experimentation, and audacity all blur into one–especially in the startup scene.
Speaking of OpenAI, the company has gone beyond investor buzz to become a cultural force, ranking as the 5th most visited website in the world as of June 2025. In the same way Facebook and Twitter once defined the conversation coming out of Silicon Valley, AI now drives the narrative. And it’s not just OpenAI, Anthropic, another San Francisco based major player in the AI space, announced a $183 billion valuation this September.
Anthropic Run-Rate Revenue Increase
In 2025 alone, Anthropic nearly tripled its valuation in roughly 6 months (Mar. to Sept.) and quintupled its run-rate revenue in roughly 8 months (Jan. to Aug.)
The startup surge snowball effect is real. San Francisco’s real estate market is showing signs of a comeback, the city’s social scene is having a moment, and tech continues to be a dominant force in shaping government decisions. Where New York thrives on finance, Los Angeles on Hollywood, and Washington on government, San Francisco feeds on startups. And at this moment, its hunger is insatiable, the whole city is feasting.
Don’t look now, but San Francisco is back. The money is flowing. Offices are filling. Some commuters are arriving in driverless cars. And the next generation of founders is hungry. The AI boom hasn’t just saved San Francisco’s startup scene, it’s put startups back at the heart of the city’s identity
AI is transformative. AI is scary. AI is an unknown commodity. Depending on whom you ask, it will either change the world for the better or destroy it. Is it any surprise, then, that San Francisco is the city leading the charge? The city at the heart of a region that’s always pushed the limits of what’s possible — the birthplace of social media, the smartphone, and the digital habits that define our lives. With San Francisco, it can only ever be down for so long.
San Francisco believes in innovation. It believes in pushing the edge. It believes in constant modernization. Is this San Francisco’s second act? Maybe, but it’s also the act that follows the previous act, that follows the one before that. A city defined by the spirals, the genius, the greed, the work ethic, the spectacle. AI will transform the world, and it will transform San Francisco. How, exactly, remains to be seen, but isn’t that the point of this city? It will transform itself in ways you can’t predict. It always does.
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