VCs are scrambling to snap up the post-2005 generation: how can the old guard keep their jobs?

Veteran entrepreneurs, the post-2005 generation is stepping into the arena and taking your jobs.

Recently, VCs have been intensively investing in the post-2000 generation, and even the post-2005 generation.

On October 5 this year, US AI startup Ghost announced the completion of a $11 million seed round of financing. Its CEO Zain Javaid is only 19 years old, and the other co-founders are only between 19 and 24 years old.

The product they developed is a personal computer dedicated to running AI Agents, priced at $3,499. Shortly after the product was unveiled, capital has poured in tens of millions of dollars.

Another AI company Aaru is even more extreme.

Founded by a group of teenagers, the company tries to use AI to simulate real human beings to replace part of traditional market research work. At the end of 2025, the company completed its Series A financing, with some investors taking stakes at a $1 billion valuation.

In China, similar stories are also unfolding.

Huang Yi, the founder of RoboParty, was born in 2004 and started his business at the age of 21. The company completed 5 rounds of financing within one year, with total financing exceeding $100 million.

There is a harsh question: 10 years ago, post-1990s entrepreneurs were synonymous with youth. But 10 years ago, the post-2005 generation were only teenagers, not even graduating from primary school.

Ten years later, the post-1990s generation have not grown old, but the "primary school kids" back then have stepped onto the stage to compete with them for jobs.

The post-1980s and post-1970s generations are probably more anxious: the post-2005 generation, who are of their sons' age, have come out to compete on the same stage with them.

In the past, capital was superstitious about top universities, large enterprises, and serial entrepreneurs. Now, in the era of AI entrepreneurship, VCs increasingly believe in "child prodigies".

Veterans need to work hard — it seems that this is an era that is not friendly to veterans. But is that really the case?

- 01 - When it comes to making innovations, young people are the most capable

To be clear, the author never opposes investing in young people.

On the contrary, I believe that disruptive innovation often relies heavily on young people.

Because young people have a rare trait: they lack awe of the old world.

A person who has worked in a certain industry for 20 years often knows why a certain thing cannot be done; while a 20-year-old, fearless due to ignorance, will just get started and do it first.

Sometimes great innovations come into being in this way. In the history of science, there are no few examples of young people creating disruptive achievements.

In 1905, 26-year-old Albert Einstein put forward the special theory of relativity.

In 1925, 23-year-old Werner Heisenberg made a key breakthrough in quantum mechanics and proposed the basic framework of matrix mechanics.

The same goes for the history of tech entrepreneurship.

In 1976, 21-year-old Steve Jobs co-founded Apple. At that time, personal computers were still far away from the daily life of ordinary people.

These people have one thing in common: they did not completely follow the standard answers of the existing industry.

Why are young people prone to stand out in certain disruptive innovations?

In my opinion, there are three main reasons.

First, they have less path dependence.

Industry experience is a kind of wealth, but it may also be a kind of shackle.

Second, they are more sensitive to new technologies.

The post-2005 generation today have been exposed to AI programming tools, large models and various automated products since their school days. For some young entrepreneurs, these are not new tools they learned later, but familiar working methods.

Many traditional teams are still thinking about how to integrate AI into their old businesses, while some young people may start directly from AI and redesign the entire product.

Third, the personal cost of trial and error is relatively low.

For some young entrepreneurs who have not yet taken on heavy family and financial responsibilities, if they fail once, they still have time to start over.

They may be more willing to bet on uncertain directions.

Of course, youth also has its shortcomings.

Being good at disruptive innovation does not mean being suitable for running all kinds of enterprises; having innovation potential does not mean having the complete ability to run a company.

A 20-year-old person can develop world-changing technologies, but may not necessarily know how to manage a team of hundreds of people.

He may be very good at creating products, but he still needs to learn how to build an organization, control cash flow, and handle customer relationships.

It can only be said that each age group has its own most suitable things to do. Innovation is just the thing that suits young people best.

- 02 - The golden age for making real money: 45 years old

If being in your 20s is the best age for entrepreneurship and innovation, a piece of data may make many VCs feel awkward.

Researchers from institutions such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the United States once analyzed the data of American entrepreneurial enterprises.

The results show that among the top 0.1% of fast-growing start-ups, the average age of the founders when they started their businesses is 45.

It is neither 25 nor 30, but 45.

This study also found that accumulated work experience in a specific industry has a strong correlation with entrepreneurial success performance.

It should be noted that this study uses historical corporate data from the United States, which cannot directly represent today's Chinese AI investment market. But it is enough to remind us that the frequent media coverage of young prodigies does not mean that young prodigies are all of successful entrepreneurs.

According to Pencil News, a very well-known domestic CVC has an average age of 53 for its invested entrepreneurs.

Then look at those companies that have truly changed the industry.

In 1987, Ren Zhengfei, 43, founded Huawei.

He did not succeed by relying on a story of a young prodigy, but gradually built up his capabilities in technology R&D, organizational management and global operation in the long-term market competition.

In 2010, 40-year-old Lei Jun founded Xiaomi.

At that time, Lei Jun had worked at Kingsoft for many years and founded Joyo.com, accumulating experience in the Internet, software and investment fields.

These experiences did not prevent him from entering the smartphone industry, but became an important resource for him to start his business again.

There is a more typical case of Morris Chang.

In 1987, 55-year-old Morris Chang founded TSMC.

He was not a novice who had just discovered semiconductors, but a veteran who had worked in the industry for many years.

He saw a huge industrial opportunity: why do chip design companies have to build their own factories?

Thus, the professional wafer foundry model was born.

Young people are good at breaking old rules, but Morris Chang proved one thing: people who truly understand the old rules may also be the most capable of redesigning the rules.

This is the different advantages that entrepreneurs of different ages may have.

People in their 20s may be good at challenging the impossible.

People between 30 and 50 years old often have more opportunities to accumulate industry knowledge, team management capabilities, industrial connections and business judgment, and are suitable for finding opportunities in a complex industrial system.

Experience, industry accumulation and long-term judgment are still important advantages of middle-aged and silver-haired entrepreneurs

For example, in fields such as enterprise services, advanced manufacturing, semiconductors, and healthcare, many business problems are not only technical problems, but also problems of organization, supply chain, regulation, customer trust and long-term delivery.

- 03 - The golden track after the age of 60

There is another easily overlooked relationship between age and entrepreneurship. Many entrepreneurial directions are most suitable for people over 60 years old, such as the silver economy and agriculture.

As a person grows older, it not only means changes in physical strength and time, but also means that he begins to understand the needs he could not understand at all when he was young.

Take the silver economy as an example.

A 25-year-old person can certainly develop elderly care robots, age-friendly software, and elderly health products.

But a 65-year-old person may have a more direct understanding of the life pain points of the elderly.

He knows why the elderly are unwilling to use a certain product, why they worry about complex operations, and why they lack trust in unfamiliar services.

These needs cannot necessarily be understood just by doing ten market surveys.

AARP, the American Association of Retired Persons, is a thought-provoking case.

In 1958, Ethel Percy Andrus, a retired educator in her 70s, founded AARP to promote the improvement of medical security, life services and social rights for the elderly.

This is not a typical venture capital-backed startup, but it well illustrates a truth: a person's life experience itself can become a unique resource for discovering market demands.

There is also Chu Shijian, who is familiar to Chinese people.

In 2002, 74-year-old Chu Shijian started his business again, went into the mountains to grow oranges.

Others thought he had reached the age to enjoy his old age in peace, but he brought his years of accumulated production management experience back to agriculture.

Later, Chu's oranges became a well-known brand.

These two cases show that elderly people do not necessarily have to only look for opportunities related to elderly care. Long-term accumulated industry experience, organizational capabilities and understanding of specific groups of people can all become entrepreneurial advantages.

The wealth of young people may be that they have not formed path dependence; the wealth of the elderly may be the judgment accumulated over decades.

We should not make everyone believe that entrepreneurship must be done as early as possible just because young people are good at new technologies.

We should not even turn the entrepreneurial age into an invisible recruitment condition: people over 40 lose their qualification for innovation, and people over 60 should quit the game.

That is not respecting innovation, but a misunderstanding of innovation.

Of course, these age advantages are not iron laws.

Some people have mature business judgment at the age of 25, and some people can still take risks in the most cutting-edge technical fields at the age of 60.

What matters is not age itself, but what it has accumulated for a person and what it has restricted.

- 04 - Conclusion: Both veteran and middle-aged entrepreneurs have value

At the end of the day, the author's biggest concern about this boom of young entrepreneurs' financing is not the post-2005 generation.

It is a happy thing for young people to get financial support.

Especially in the era of rapid changes in AI technology, capital should be more willing to support entrepreneurs who have no traditional background but truly have technical and product capabilities.

What I am really worried about is a common problem in the capital market: people always like to find a label that can replace independent judgment.

A few years ago, investors were keen to look for senior executives from large enterprises.

Because they have management experience, technical teams and industry resources, and seem to have a higher probability of success.

Later, serial entrepreneurs became highly sought after.

Then, top university laboratories, large model backgrounds, and top scientists became the key words in financing stories.

Now, some post-2005 entrepreneurs have attracted attention, and age has also begun to become a star label.

These labels are not completely worthless.

A large enterprise background may mean mature organizational experience, a scientist background may mean technical capabilities, and being young may mean being more sensitive to new technologies.

But labels can only provide clues, not replace evidence.

The question that investors need to ask should never be just: Is this entrepreneur young enough?

Instead, they should ask:

What problems has he discovered that others have not?

Does he have capabilities that are difficult for others to replicate?

Can he truly deliver the product to customers?

Can his shortcomings be made up for by the team?

Without the auras of age, top universities and large enterprises, is this company still worth investing in?

This last question is particularly important.

Because the real value of an enterprise should not be built on the founder's ID card.

A 19-year-old entrepreneur can definitely build a great company.

A 45-year-old entrepreneur can do the same.

A 65-year-old entrepreneur also has the same opportunity.

What determines whether they can succeed is whether their capabilities match the business opportunities, not which generation they belong to.

If today's VCs think that only young people represent the future just because the post-2005 generation has started to raise financing, the mistakes they make are no different from the past when they only trusted senior executives from large enterprises.

It is just jumping from one prejudice to another.

This article does not constitute any investment advice.

This article is from the WeChat official account "Pencil News" (ID: pencilnews), written by Pencil News, authorized for release by 36Kr.