TechCrunch Disrupt 2026: Blackstone’s Jas Khaira on building the next generation of AI giants
TechCrunch TechCrunch Events
Blackstone’s Jas Khaira is set to talk AI funding at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026. The twist: in AI, raising more cash doesn’t automatically mean building a better company.
Based on reporting by TechCrunch, TechCrunch Events — read the original for the full story.
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AI startups can hit growth numbers that would have sounded absurd not long ago. But the money needed to keep that pace going is getting just as extreme, and founders often have to make financing calls before they know if the early spike is real or just a hot start.
That tension is the point of Jas Khaira’s session at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026. Khaira, Blackstone’s global head of N1, will speak on the Builders Stage in a talk called “Building the Next Generation of AI Giants.” The focus is simple enough: what Blackstone looks for when it backs companies in AI, how founders should think about capital as they scale, and why fast traction is not the same thing as staying power.
The source material makes clear why the financing question has become so central. AI companies do not just spend on product and sales. As they grow, they may also need serious money for compute, data centers, and other infrastructure. Blackstone’s recent investment in Indian AI infrastructure company Neysa shows the scale: Blackstone and co-investors agreed to put in up to $600 million in primary equity, while Neysa planned to raise another $600 million in debt financing.
And that is only one side of the story. In July, Anthropic launched Ode with Anthropic, an AI implementation company backed through a $1.5 billion joint venture with Blackstone, Hellman & Friedman, Goldman Sachs and others. Those deals put Blackstone close to the big decisions now shaping AI: where capital actually belongs, which bets are worth making, and which businesses can last once the first wave of excitement fades.
Khaira’s own résumé fits the job. He joined Blackstone in 2004 and now runs Blackstone N1 and Blackstone Growth, while also serving as head of tactical opportunities Americas. He also sits on several investment committees and founded Blackstone N1, the firm’s platform for growth, hybrid, and perpetual private equity investing across the AI ecosystem and other high-growth companies. The session is one of more than 200 across six industry stages, roundtables and breakouts at Disrupt, which runs October 13–15 at Moscone West in San Francisco.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
This is the part of AI that keeps getting dressed up as strategy and is really just arithmetic. If building the model means building the compute, the data centers, and the balance sheet, then the winners will be the firms that can survive the bill, not the loudest demos. Blackstone knows that, which is why its view of AI looks less like hype and more like a tab.
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