Vendep’s Sakari Pihlava: AI Is Reshaping, Not Killing, SaaS
As artificial intelligence races into every corner of the software industry, a growing chorus has begun to question whether the traditional SaaS model is losing relevance. For Vendep Capital general partner Sakari Pihlava, the reality is very different. Rather than killing SaaS, he argues that AI is dramatically raising the bar for what software companies must deliver – and forcing investors to rethink how they evaluate startup potential.
From pricing models and product design to customer expectations and venture capital screening, AI is driving a fundamental reset. Founders can no longer rely on incremental improvements or generic cloud offerings. Instead, they must prove why their product deserves to exist in a world where powerful AI tools are widely available and increasingly commoditised.
AI Is a Catalyst, Not a Threat, to SaaS
According to Sakari Pihlava, the narrative that AI will wipe out SaaS is misguided. What AI is doing, he suggests, is exposing weak propositions and rewarding truly differentiated products.
In the early waves of SaaS, many startups could succeed by digitising manual processes or moving legacy on-premise tools into the cloud. Today, that baseline is no longer enough. With modern AI models and automation embedded into everyday workflows, corporate buyers expect software that is not just online, but genuinely intelligent.
For strong teams, this shift is an opportunity. AI allows SaaS founders to:
- Deliver highly personalised user experiences at scale
- Automate complex decision-making that once required human experts
- Unlock new data-driven revenue models and usage-based pricing
- Expand product scope without linearly increasing headcount
Where AI becomes a threat is for companies whose value rests only on simple interfaces or basic data processing. Those features can now be replicated quickly using off-the-shelf AI tools and APIs. For investors like Vendep Capital, this creates a clearer distinction between durable SaaS businesses and those built on shallow moats.
Raising the Bar for Founders in the AI Era
For SaaS founders, the AI wave is not just a technology shift; it is a test of strategic depth. Sakari Pihlava emphasises that investors are now looking for a far more rigorous answer to a simple question: why will this company still matter five to ten years from now?
Defensibility Beyond Generic AI
Because many startups now claim to be “AI-powered”, the label itself has lost signalling power. Venture firms increasingly probe:
- Whether the startup has access to unique or proprietary data assets
- How tightly AI capabilities are woven into the core workflow, not just added as a feature
- What prevents a competitor from replicating the same AI functionality using public models
Founders who simply integrate a popular large language model into an existing interface are unlikely to impress sophisticated investors. Those who combine domain expertise, exclusive datasets and deep integration of AI algorithms into mission-critical processes stand out.
Go-to-Market Discipline Matters More
The AI boom has not changed the fundamental economics of building a SaaS business. Metrics such as customer acquisition cost, net revenue retention and payback period remain central. Yet AI is changing how these metrics are interpreted.
Because AI can accelerate product development and experimentation, investors like Vendep Capital expect founders to iterate quickly on pricing, packaging and positioning. A strong AI-enabled SaaS startup should show evidence that it can:
- Identify a narrow, high-value segment rather than chase all users at once
- Translate AI capabilities into clear, measurable business outcomes
- Use data from early customers to refine onboarding and reduce churn
In other words, AI does not excuse weak go-to-market discipline; it amplifies weaknesses just as easily as strengths.
How VCs Are Rewriting Their Evaluation Playbook
As AI permeates SaaS, venture capital firms are quietly overhauling how they screen and back software startups. Sakari Pihlava points to several shifts in the investment mindset at firms such as Vendep Capital.
From Feature Checklists to System Thinking
Traditional SaaS evaluation often revolved around feature comparisons, user interface quality and integration breadth. Now, investors are more focused on the system-level impact of AI inside a product:
- How does the AI component improve the core unit economics of the business?
- Does automation meaningfully reduce support and implementation costs?
- Can the product learn from usage in a way that compounds value over time?
Startups that can demonstrate a feedback loop – where more customers lead to better models, which in turn attract more customers – tend to command greater interest and potentially higher valuations.
New Risks in Model and Vendor Dependence
Another key change is heightened scrutiny around AI infrastructure. Many SaaS startups rely on external providers for model hosting, vector databases or GPU resources. Venture investors now routinely ask:
- What happens if a core AI vendor changes pricing or access terms?
- Is there a technical path to swap models or providers without rewriting the product?
- How are data privacy, security and regulatory compliance handled in AI workflows?
This risk lens pushes founders to architect more resilient platforms and to think ahead about margins, not just capabilities.
The New Standard for SaaS Ambition
For Sakari Pihlava and peers in the venture ecosystem, the AI transition ultimately comes down to ambition and clarity. The most compelling SaaS founders are those who treat AI as a foundational layer rather than a marketing slogan, and who can articulate a credible path to category leadership.
As AI-native competitors emerge in every vertical, the bar will keep rising. Investors will continue to favour teams that combine strong technical execution with a sharp understanding of customer pain points and a realistic path to sustainable growth. In that environment, AI is not the end of SaaS – it is the beginning of a more demanding, and potentially more rewarding, chapter for software entrepreneurs and their backers.