Written by Anik Bose, General Partner at BGV and Emmanuel Benhamou, Managing Director of EAIGG
We’re living in a paradoxical era. AI is rapidly expanding in influence and reach, yet the world surrounding it is becoming increasingly fragmented. Innovation is global, but capital, regulation, and go-to-market expertise remain concentrated. For startup founders, this implies a landscape teeming with opportunity, but also fraught with traps. At BGV, we believe the future belongs to enterprise AI startups that think—and build—cross-border from day one.
With offices in Silicon Valley, Paris, Tel Aviv, Bangalore, and Japan, and a portfolio of over 50 global companies, BGV has developed a model tailored to this new reality. Here’s why cross-border AI ventures are not just an edge case—they’re the next dominant wave in enterprise software.
Talent Is Global. Market Isn’t. That’s the Opportunity.
AI talent is no longer confined to one location. The minds behind today’s most transformative models have been trained in India, Israel, France, and beyond. Top-tier technical talent is found everywhere, but the market is not. The U.S. remains the largest enterprise market for AI (outside China), resulting in a persistent and significant imbalance. Precedence Research estimates the U.S. AI market at $ 173.6 Bn in 2025, projecting to reach $ 851.5 Bn by 2034, growing at a compounded growth rate of 19.3%.
This gap presents a massive opportunity for capital-efficient founders: access global talent at dramatically lower cost while scaling into the US market. A world-class AI engineer might cost $500K in Silicon Valley—but just a fraction of that in Bangalore or Paris. For startups building at the application layer—where product design, distribution, and data matter more than raw compute—this is a strategic advantage that can’t be ignored.
The Application Layer: Resilient, Scalable, and Under the Radar
While geopolitical tensions escalate around chips and infrastructure, application-layer AI quietly flourishes. It is software—non-tariff, borderless, and adaptable. It can plug into global ecosystems using open protocols and interoperate across cloud platforms.
We call this the AI paradox:
- Talent is global.
- The market is concentrated, with the US and China comprising 70% of the global market.
- The most resilient innovation happens at the edge, closest to users, where AI meets specific industry needs.
Cross-border enterprise AI startups, operating in this application layer, can build faster, cheaper, and with more resilience than ever before. And in today’s fragmented world, agility and resilience are a competitive moat.
Why Founders Fail—and How to Avoid It
We have spent over a decade assisting international founders in scaling their businesses in the U.S. What we have learned is that the difference between success and failure often comes down to avoidable mistakes:
The five most common missteps:
- Delaying U.S. market entry too long
- Hiring weak GTM leaders without local credibility
- Underinvesting in regional sales and marketing
- Lacking local customer references
- Assuming product-market fit translates across borders
To counter these pitfalls, we’ve developed a playbook rooted in experience:
- Adapt product and pricing for each market
- Build inclusive, distributed teams with unified cultures
- Structure cross-border VC syndicates with aligned incentives and culture
- Design compliance and tax strategies early
- Drive toward category leadership, not just participation
Cross-border success isn’t accidental. It’s operational. It’s systematic. It has to be part of the company culture. And with the right playbook, it’s repeatable.
BGV: Purpose-Built for Enterprise 5.0
We don’t just invest in cross-border companies; we’ve built our platform to scale them. With over $500 million in AUM and more than 20 exits along with 12 IPOs under our belt, BGV serves as a long-term partner from seed to scale.
But what truly sets us apart is our commitment to Enterprise 5.0—a new era of enterprise software that is AI-native, human-centric, and built to last. This isn’t about automation for automation’s sake. It’s about blending intelligence with empathy, data with context, and algorithms with purpose.
To help founders thrive in this next wave, we co-developed the AI Native Startup Playbook with the Ethical AI Governance Group, a non-profit ecosystem of over 5,000+ AI practitioners. This isn’t theory—it’s a tactical blueprint for building enduring AI startups.
It covers:
- How to identify and validate the right AI use cases
- Building a value proposition around measurable ROI
- Managing infrastructure costs with surgical precision
- Overcoming trust and adoption barriers
- Pricing for complexity without confusing the customer
- Embedding governance and compliance from day one
It also introduces a new operating model: lean teams augmented by AI, capable of generating $1M–$2M in revenue per employee. That’s not a pipe dream—we’re seeing it in our portfolio today.
For Founders and LPs Alike: The Future Is Cross-Border
For founders, the message is clear: if you’re building enterprise AI, you can’t afford to think in silos. The most successful companies of this decade will be born global, hiring talent where it’s best, deploying capital where it’s most efficient, and selling software wherever the need is greatest – for AI, it is the US.
For LPs, this isn’t just a diversification strategy—it’s where outsized returns are found. Cross-border enterprise AI startups combine the scaling potential of Silicon Valley with the capital efficiency of emerging markets. That’s not just sound economics—it’s also innovative portfolio construction.
At BGV, we’re not betting on borders—we’re betting on bold, globally-minded founders who are ready to reshape enterprise software at the intersection of intelligence and empathy.
If that’s you, we’d love to share our AI Native Startup Playbook—a tactical blueprint for scaling AI startups across borders. For a limited time, founders can gain free access by completing a short survey here.
Let’s build.
