The Hard Part Isn’t Building AI—It’s Getting Paid

AI investment is booming, but that doesn’t mean the bar is getting any easier.

Emily Fontaine, Global Head of Venture Capital at IBM talks with Beyond Innovation’s Michael Bancroft about how they decide which companies to back out of the hundreds they evaluate each year.

She explains why having the right team isn’t enough on its own, how strategic alignment plays into every decision they make, and what they’re seeing across the market as enterprise adoption picks up. The conversation also touches on the shift toward more targeted AI models, the importance of handling unstructured data, and why moving from a pilot to a signed contract is still the biggest hurdle for most startups.