tech
January 12, 2026
The Boring Businesses That Will Dominate the AI Era
They’re not the companies with the best models—they’re the ones that own what AI has to flow through.
TL;DR
- AI agents evaluate economic value and switch providers instantly, making infrastructure the new competitive edge.
- Five archetypes of AI infrastructure are emerging: knowledge compounders, workflow commons, reality's gatekeepers, marketplaces, and vertical transformations.
- Knowledge compounders leverage unique, continuously improving datasets generated through user interactions.
- Workflow commons provide shareable templates for AI agent coordination, capturing institutional knowledge.
- Reality's gatekeepers act as trusted toll booths in regulated areas, managing real-world consequences.
- Marketplaces facilitate high-speed trading floors for AI services, optimizing routing and execution.
- Vertical transformation involves building AI to handle entire industry workflows end-to-end at a lower cost.
- Each archetype compounds value through usage, offering a harder-to-copy advantage than AI models alone.
- Companies are building moats not on models or interfaces, but on infrastructure that takes the longest to rebuild.
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