I made a bet last week that most people would call insane.
Not a financial bet—a philosophical bet on the future of capitalism. A bet on where power is going next.
My friend Sam and I were leaving a coffee shop in Encinitas, talking—as we always do—about AI, markets, and the speed of change. He said something casual, something most rational people would agree with:
“We’re still at least 10 years away from a one-person billion-dollar company.”
I didn’t flinch.
I didn’t laugh.
I didn’t hesitate.
I looked him dead in the eye and said:
“You’re wrong. It’s going to happen by 2026. And I’m going to build it.”
He thought I was trolling him. Clickbait-flexing. Playing founder theater.
I wasn’t.
I’m not saying this for hype. I’m not saying it because it sounds good. I’m saying it because once you really understand what’s happening with AI, this stops sounding outrageous—and starts sounding mathematically inevitable.
The Definition Shift
A lot of people misunderstand the claim.
A One-Person Billion Dollar Company isn’t just a company with one founder.
It’s a company that:
Has zero employees
Has no operational overhead
Writes its own code
Builds and ships products on its own
Acquires and serves customers automatically
Evolves strategy through self-learning
Scales without hiring
Builds economic leverage from compute—not labor
This is not a fantasy.
The tools already exist. The workflows already exist.
We’re just early enough that most people still think AI is about writing blog posts and silly images.
Meanwhile—reality:
Midjourney did $100M+ in revenue with ~10 employees
Perplexity is competing with Google with a team smaller than most YouTube channels
Entire SaaS companies are now built by one person + AI agents in a weekend
OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic are releasing autonomous agent frameworks that can operate across the web without humans
So let me be very clear:
This isn’t about productivity anymore.
This is about autonomy.
Autonomy changes everything.
The Shift: Capital → Code → Compute
Here’s the pattern no one wants to look at straight:
Every major leap in economic history follows the same arc:
EraLeverage SourceAgriculturalMuscleIndustrialMachinesInformation AgeCodeAI AgeAutonomous Compute
In 2023, AI helped humans produce faster.
In 2024, AI started building software faster than humans.
In 2025, AI started running business systems faster than humans.
In 2026?
AI will run companies.
And by 2027?
AI will own equity.
If you’re reading this thinking “that sounds extreme,” ask yourself: is it really more extreme than Uber replacing taxis? Airbnb replacing hotels? TikTok replacing Hollywood? Bitcoin replacing central banks?
Disruption used to attack industries.
AI attacks the concept of labor itself.
So Why a Zero-Person Company?
Because it’s the endgame of capitalism.
Capitalism has always rewarded:
Efficiency
Automation
Margins
Leverage
A zero-person company is just perfect capitalism—where code replaces labor and constraints dissolve.
Most people think this means dystopia. Layoffs. Collapse. Useless humans.
I don’t.
I think this means creative capitalism, where founders become architects—not operators. Where your primary job is orchestration—not labor. Where wealth becomes decision leverage—not hours worked.
The company of the future isn’t a legal entity. It’s a living intelligence loop:
data → model → deployment → revenue → retrain → scale
No meetings.
No HR.
No “circle back next week.”
No dead weeks.
No morale issues.
No turnover.
No chaos.
Just evolution through compute.
The Real Risk (No One Wants to Admit)
Here’s where the ethical tension comes in:
If I don’t build this—someone else will.
If we don’t explore this frontier—the wrong people will.
Power is migrating. And like energy, power never disappears—it only transfers.
From governments → to corporations → to platforms → to AIs.
That’s the curve.
And there are only three kinds of people in this new economy:
TypeFateThe PassiveGet automatedThe EmotionalGet outragedThe BuildersGet leverage
Only one of those groups survives with sovereignty.
So yes—I made the bet.
Yes—I said it out loud.
And yes—I’m building aggressively.
Not because I worship AI.
But because I refuse to hand my family’s future over to someone else’s system.
Building is not a career anymore.
It’s a form of self-defense.