How YC Startup Raised $5.3M by Simulating 1,000 VCs - James He at Artificial Societies

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In this episode, James He, founder of YC-backed Artificial Societies, reveals how they built AI that predicts human behavior with 81% accuracy - 20% better than GPT-4o, Claude Sonnet 3.7, Gemini 2.5 Pro and Human Experts. They raised $5.3M seed-round by Point72 Ventures, Kindred Capital, and Y Combinator after using their own tool to simulate 1,000 VCs.

What you'll learn:
- How AI personas with network effects beat individual LLMs
- The "pre-experimentation" framework that reduces startup risk to zero
- Why most startups die by "suicide," not competition
- How to build a $5.3M company with 3 people
- The psychology behind co-founder relationships that actually work

📊 Key Stats:
- 81% accuracy in predicting viral content vs 61% for traditional AI
- 1.5M AI personas built from real people's profiles
- Results delivered in 1-2 minutes vs months of traditional testing
- YC Winter 2025 batch company

🎯 Perfect for:
- Startup founders navigating the "idea maze"
- AI researchers interested in collective intelligence
- Anyone building products that need human validation
- Entrepreneurs looking for unconventional fundraising strategies