This episode features Amos Winbush III, serial entrepreneur and founder/CEO of bckrs.ai, the world’s first AI-native intelligence platform for the private capital market. He shares with Jim Barrood his remarkable journey from Louisiana musician to serial tech founder, explains how his new venture brings transparency to venture investing, discusses market optimism, and offers candid advice for founders building or raising in the AI era.
Amos Winbush: Good to be here, Jim. I am the founder and CEO of backers ai.
Jim Barrood: Awesome. And tell us how you got here. Take us from high school or college. Tell us about your journey.
Amos Winbush: Journey's. Pretty unusual. I grew up in Louisiana. The youngest of three to older sisters both are in the medical field.
One's an anesthesiologist and the other is a trauma nurse. And I'm the only entrepreneur, I guess you could say. I had a pretty amazing childhood. I studied business management and administration in college. I went to LSU, met my wife there, dropped out in my 10th grade year, or sorry, my sophomore year here in college and moved to New York City at the age of 19.
All, all because I had a dream of being a singer songwriter. And I did that for many years till I launched my first company in 2007. And long story short, after a lot of bumped heads and bloody knees, I am on my fifth company now. I've sold two, three, but they didn't work too well.
And I'm on my fifth now. Actually, sold two. Two didn't work. And I'm on the fifth now.
Jim Barrood: Awesome. Yeah. We'll have to get a clip of some music performance so we can show people.
Amos Winbush: It's out there. It's in the world right now.
Jim Barrood: Okay. Tell us about bckrs, your latest venture
Amos Winbush: backers.ai backers is the very first vertical AI native intelligence infrastructure platform for the allocator to founder private capital market.
In short. We give intelligence on why investors invest their behaviors after they've invested, how they raise capital, how their portfolio is performing. We look at macro and microeconomics all the way down to how the political climate is affecting. How a private capital is deploying. Our number one customers are our LPs.
For the first time, we give the full capital stack visibility to LPs through venture capital firms, all the way down to their port codes. And we are really excited about it. We have about a little over 4,000 VC firms on our platform right now. Hundreds of thousands of individuals. Investors a hundred thousand, a little over a hundred thousand startup companies.
And we currently have close to $2 trillion of intelligence flowing through our platform. So, we've been building this company for almost two years and it's by far the best thing that I think I've ever created.
Jim Barrood: That is amazing. Yeah. How much money have you raised so far?
Amos Winbush: So we've raised a little over half a million dollars.
I've put my own money into it, so we're close to three quarters of a million that we have full in. And yeah, it's we're chugging along, man.
Jim Barrood: And you're raising again now?
Amos Winbush: We are, we're starting, we're starting a major capital raise. It'll be our series A. We haven't released the number yet, but it'll be a pretty big one.
Jim Barrood: Great. Yeah. For the lay people out there who don't understand, investing just boil that down to what you're providing now that wasn't provided before.
Amos Winbush: Yeah. So when you look at the private capital ecosystem, specifically across venture capital, it is by far the most opaque industry, I guess you could say.
Oftentimes venture capital firms are. Scored on their brand and not their performance and or their portfolio's performance. Our platform removes that opacity, brings visibility and transparency into the behavior of the capital and the investor and the invested so that at any given point anyone can go into our product and ask a copilot.
How does this company within my portfolio perform compared to a company similar to this who's not in my portfolio? So we can surface because we have access to all of this data, we can surface comparables and alternative funds that are within an LPs portfolio. If they're underperforming, we can surface.
We have a new product called RDI, which is a report discrepancy indicator that surfaces, that takes in reports and communications that will surface any omissions or inaccuracies in communications. It can determine drift or tilt in your portfolio. It can even surface hedging in your communication.
So for the first time investors across the private market has an inte will have an intelligence platform that supports not only their vision of how they want their capital to come back and support the world, I guess you could say. But also give some much needed visibility to investors who are doing the right thing and deploying capital the way that they've said they're going to deploy that capital.
Our job is just to call balls and strikes, not to call winners and losers. It's not what we do.
Jim Barrood: And does it also help entrepreneurs who are seeking capital?
Amos Winbush: Yeah. That is that is a track that we are deploying. Right now. It is specifically LP and venture capital firms. We will then move into founders and then you're talking, other sectors like private equity and hedge funds and things of that nature
Jim Barrood: and the LPs or investors will pay a subscription fee? Is that the model?
Amos Winbush: The model is a little bit of both. We have a model that looks at per seat. We have a data model, which is pay per usage. We haven't released any of that to the marketplace yet, but it is pretty standard that we're rolling out. Nothing, unusual.
Jim Barrood: Now since you're going to be raising. Have you been able to use your product, your own product to help you understand the landscape, investors, et cetera?
Amos Winbush: Yeah. Having backers has definitely supported our understanding of raising capital. It completely demystifies the process of raising capital.
We know. Who the right investors are. We know where they are, we know what they've deployed, and we know how the portfolio companies are performing. For the first time as a founder, the ability to have control in how we're raising capital is at our fingertips.
Jim Barrood: Awesome. Yeah. And you can also note trends.
In the marketplace as well, right? Investing trends.
Amos Winbush: Yeah. Not only trends. We know we have historical market sentiment meters in our platform. We have behavioral meters that can determine pessimism or optimism in the market even down to the specific venture capital firm and the investor.
Based on who we are as a company who we're looking to engage with at any given point, we can go into the system and say, compare these six venture funds between each other, right? And it'll spit out a report and it'll actually show me what the similarity report is in a percentage. On in that module.
The way that we look at it within backers is money is not just money, it's action. I don't care about the money, I care about the action, right? So you could give me $5 million today and not be the right investor for us, right? Or I can wait six months and get $5 million from an investor who is perfect for us.
And I think that's the difference between yesterday. Today in backers.ai allows that movement to happen.
Jim Barrood: That is amazing. Tell us how, as a serial entrepreneur, this venture has scaled. You've gotten some help from the community, from an accelerator. Tell us about that experience and what people should know.
Amos Winbush: Yeah. I think, when I was building bckrs, I would say a year before, this is like 2023, we were in New York City building the company. In 2024, we received investment from Audible, and that completely shifted our entire world. Honestly, it placed us, number one, it placed us in the net, which is the Newark entrepreneur tech ecosystem.
And we build not only in a community that supports us, but resources us with. Systems and institutions and not just capital, because I think most people think just capital but opportunities and those opportunities are vast and they include distribution channels. They include an active ear from individuals who are truly making movement.
One of our mentors and advisors for me personally, is the CEO of Audible. Bob is amazing and for what we do and how we do our, and how we run our business, Bob being the former chairman and CEO of d and b, Don and Bradstreet, for us it's it is an invaluable hour that I spend with him just picking his brain and talking it through and getting it spice.
Yeah I think, all the way down to. Plug and Play which is an investor. And that came to us through an amazing accelerator in Newark, actually, not in Newark, in Hoboken, which is an initiative from Governor Murphy. And it's I can't say enough, man. It's an amazing place to be.
Jim Barrood: That's awesome. And great to hear how we brought you in from New York, New Jersey.
Amos Winbush: You guys stole us.
Jim Barrood: Was it Audible or MVP?
Amos Winbush: No, it was Audible. It was audible directly. It was okay.
Jim Barrood: Yeah, I know Bob and
Amos Winbush: Aisha and the crew. Awesome. So it happens.
Jim Barrood: That's great to hear. And great to hear you getting mentorship from Bob.
He's one of the best leaders in the state, and is very generous with this time. So tell us about it. You say you have all this data, so what are the trends? What does raising capital look like these days? We hear a lot of negativity. But what's your assessment as far as what it looks like now, when it might get better? Any sort of thoughts on that?
Amos Winbush: I think. You go back to that whole thing around branding, right? That's the whole reason why bckrs exists, is to do away with branding and go directly into the performance of.
The ecosystem. I wake up every morning and I look at the market sentiment meter, and I look at what pessimism looks like and what the opt op optimism looks like on our side. And the meter is always on the optimistic side. We're trending 65 to 35. It is an optimistic market and pessimism is 35%.
The conversation has been constant around, are we in a bubble? And our platform says, no, we're not in a bubble, we're in a race. Specifically, are we in an AI bubble? We're not in an AI bubble. I think a bubble deter is determined by behavior, not through the amount of money that's being poured into either systems or ecosystems.
The trends that we're seeing is if you are an AI driven company, then the probability of you raising capital grows exponentially. I think if you are a company that uses AI as a wrapper versus having it be native in your technology, it's going to increasingly become more difficult for you to raise capital.
Jim Barrood: Has it been 65? For, for some time? Or has it been what, what's it been trending?
Amos Winbush: Because there's, it's been 65, 35 since we've been tracking it, when we released the product internally on our side for the last month and a half, it's been 65, 35. I've also been looking at H1, which is the first six months of 2025.
We've seen capital not slow down. The largest, the tier one firms have raised over 70% of the capital that's been deployed, right? They're deploying that capital into AI driven companies. What we have seen. Is the clear shift in size deployment in capital for seed firms and series A firms, right?
Series A firms are raising $90 million in capital. A hundred million dollars in capital. You're seeing seed firms raise 25 to $30 million, and these are AI driven companies where five years. Before, three years before that was not even a thing. Those are late stage capital deployments. We're in a race for sure, an AI race.
We're not in a bubble. AI is not going anywhere. I also believe that how AI has been used up until this point isn't how AI will be used across the next 10, 15, 20 years.
Jim Barrood: This has been a great conversation. Let's talk about quick tips for entrepreneurs. What would you, what advice would you give entrepreneurs who are looking to start a FinTech or AI venture?
Amos Winbush: Yeah, that's a really great question. What advice I would give, I would, number one say create something that fills a gap in the marketplace. Nobody wants just another piece of crap, honestly, and you are calling in it AI. So I think looking at your space. Whatever industry you're in and creating a company that is AI native that fills a void that people want to use.
And I think what AI has uprooted the GTM, the go to market drought that you needed to hire somebody to help you with. Now you can just go to perplexity or Gemini or chatGPT. Or, for any of these platforms ask it to give you a go-to-market strategy and then you follow that.
So that's the one thing that I would say is look at your industry, create something that feels that, and then execute on it.
Jim Barrood: Got it. One more. What about entrepreneurs raising money? Obviously this is your focus area now.
Amos Winbush: I think entrepreneurs who are raising money right now it's a really good time for them.
VCs are having a difficult time deploying capital because entrepreneurs aren't wanting to raise capital. If you are an entrepreneur and you have a product and you are, you have some customers getting some feedback, you are looking to raise capital, go raise capital. But understand who you're raising the capital from.
Don't go in a wild goose chase like, do the research. And raise the smartest capital that you possibly can until backers AI rolls out a product. Specifically for founders, which you know. I think we're going to do in the next couple of weeks, so
Jim Barrood: Really Oh, that's great to know.
Okay, wonderful. Alright, now we go to some lightning questions. Yep. Amy, what's one belief you had early on, and I know you're a serial entrepreneur?
Amos Winbush: Yep.
Jim Barrood: What's one belief that's totally changed
Amos Winbush: Solo entrepreneurs means that you are a failure. That's completely changed. I honestly believe that the next billion dollar company in the next five years will be run by a solo entrepreneur.
It will be AI native, it will be AI driven, but nevertheless.
Jim Barrood: Okay. Got it. What's what TV or movie character most resembles your founder style?
Amos Winbush: I would say none.
No? I'm a big history book, so I like watching history stuff all the time, like Titans, wall Street, Titans, all that stuff. So I would say
Jim Barrood: none. Okay. And what's your favorite productivity app or tool?
Amos Winbush: Oh, that's a good question. Notion is top of list right now, and every AI transcriber in the world is especially Google's transcriber.
It's it's really good because once you hit over 40, your brain starts to. Starts to tilt. Yeah, my job is like to go through the transcripts to understand what was said, what are the deliverables? But no, yeah, AI transcribers, notions.
Jim Barrood: Got it. All right. Finally, we end our conversation typically with a poem or a saying Yep.
Quote, that's meaningful to you. What do you got?
Amos Winbush: I would say the saying that I have is from a book called Healing the Masculine Soul by Gordon. And the sentence is, A man's healing begins when he stops trying to prove he's a man and starts being one. And for me it talks to false identity and the need for outside validation.
And it touches on the definition of creativity and it helps me reorganize my center. Around my purpose. So yeah, that's the one thing that I go back to all the time.
Jim Barrood: That's great. Thanks for sharing that, Amos, this has been great. Good luck. We look forward to seeing your success. Thanks for joining us.
I hope you enjoyed the show. Please like it, leave a review and subscribe. See you soon.
