These are examples of what a daily DESTA brief looks like. Each brief is personalized to the founder receiving it - their company, priorities, and what they are working on that week.
Mode: Execute · 4 signals · 142 sources scanned
New Vector
DESTA 9.2
Google Open-Sources Agent2Agent Protocol, LangChain and Microsoft Adopt Same Day
What Changed
Google DeepMind released Agent2Agent (A2A), an open protocol for agent-to-agent communication across platforms. Harrison Chase announced LangChain support within 4 hours. Microsoft's Semantic Kernel team merged an A2A adapter by end of day. Salesforce and SAP are listed as "design partners." The GitHub repo hit 2,400 stars overnight.
Why This Matters to You
Your multi-agent orchestration layer currently uses a proprietary message format between agents. If A2A becomes the standard (and Google + Microsoft + LangChain adoption makes that likely), customers will expect native A2A support within 90 days. The upside: your routing layer becomes more valuable, not less. Agents that can talk to each other need something to coordinate them.
Do This Week
- Assign two engineers to build an A2A adapter this sprint. Harrison Chase shipped in 4 hours. You need to ship in days, not weeks.
- DM Harrison Chase and Dustin Moskovitz (Asana has been exploring agent orchestration). Position yourself as the routing layer on top of A2A.
- Publish a blog post by Friday: "A2A makes agent orchestration more important, not less. Here is why."
Risk: If Google bundles A2A orchestration into Vertex AI, the standalone orchestration market shrinks. Watch their next Cloud Next announcement.
Challenges Thesis
DESTA 8.7
CrewAI Closes $100M Series C at $1.2B Valuation, Hires ex-Datadog VP of Sales
What Changed
CrewAI announced a $100M Series C led by Felicis Ventures, with participation from a]16z and existing investor Sequoia. Post-money valuation: $1.2B. Separately, LinkedIn shows Joao Moura hired Rachel Kim, former VP Enterprise Sales at Datadog, last week. CrewAI's headcount is now 340 (was 180 six months ago).
Why This Matters to You
CrewAI now has 8x your cash and just hired a Datadog sales leader who scaled from $200M to $1B ARR. They are coming for the same Fortune 500 accounts you are targeting for Series B metrics. The Datadog playbook is developer adoption first, enterprise sales second. You are still in phase one. They are entering phase two.
Do This Week
- Call your 3 active enterprise POCs and ask directly: "Has CrewAI reached out? What are they offering?"
- Schedule a board call with Raj to discuss accelerating your Series B timeline from Q4 to Q3. The competitive window is shrinking.
- Draft a competitive positioning doc: "Multi-provider orchestration vs. single-framework lock-in." Arm your champions.
Risk: CrewAI's burn rate at 340 people is ~$5M/month. They need to show enterprise traction fast. Their aggression could actually destabilize their existing developer community (already seeing complaints on Discord).
Confirms Thesis
DESTA 7.8
Stripe and Shopify Both Ship Agent SDKs This Week, Confirming Enterprise Agent Demand
What Changed
Stripe released an Agent Toolkit on Monday (lets AI agents process payments, create invoices, manage subscriptions). Shopify followed Wednesday with a Commerce Agent API. Both SDKs are designed for multi-agent systems where agents call other agents. Combined, they serve 4M+ businesses.
Why This Matters to You
This is category validation from two of the most respected engineering teams in tech. When Stripe and Shopify build agent interfaces, it signals that Fortune 500 companies are already asking for them. Your orchestration layer is what connects a Stripe payment agent to a Shopify inventory agent to a Salesforce CRM agent. You are the glue.
Do This Week
- Build demo integrations for both Stripe Agent Toolkit and Shopify Commerce Agent API. Ship by Monday.
- Send the Stripe + Shopify announcements to Lightspeed and Index (your target Series B leads) with the note: "This is why orchestration is the next infrastructure layer."
Risk: Stripe and Shopify could eventually build their own orchestration. For now, they are building endpoints, not routers. That gap is yours.
New Vector
DESTA 6.4
EU AI Act Article 6 Enforcement Timeline Accelerated to Q3 2026
What Changed
European Commission published updated enforcement guidance yesterday. Mandatory compliance audits for high-risk AI systems now begin Q3 2026, moved up from Q4. Siemens and Deutsche Telekom have already published audit timelines. Your customers at BMW and Bosch are in scope.
Why This Matters to You
BMW ($280K ARR) and Bosch ($195K ARR) will need audit trails for every AI agent interaction running through your platform. If you have compliance documentation and audit logging ready before they ask, you lock them in. If you do not, they may consolidate to a single vendor that does.
Do This Week
- Email your contacts at BMW (Marcus) and Bosch (Lena) to ask: "What is your internal compliance deadline? We want to be ready."
- Start an audit logging feature spec. Even a draft Notion doc shows you are ahead of this.
Risk: EU enforcement timelines have slipped before. Do not over-invest until you hear directly from Munich and Stuttgart that they are under pressure.
Horizon Scan
Apple posted 8 ML infrastructure roles last week focused on "multi-model routing" and "agent orchestration" in Cupertino. No public product yet. Could surface at WWDC in June. If Apple ships native agent orchestration in iOS 20, it changes the consumer market entirely.
Three YC W26 companies (Traceloop, AgentOps, Langtrace) are building agent observability tools. Your platform currently has no built-in tracing. Expect customers to start asking within 60 days. Consider a partnership or acqui-hire before they get traction.
Mode: Execute · 3 signals · 108 sources scanned
New Vector
DESTA 9.1
Plaid Loses VP of Product Lisa Wang and 2 Senior Engineers From Connect Team
What Changed
Lisa Wang, Plaid's VP of Product since 2022, changed her LinkedIn status to "open to opportunities" on Monday. Two senior engineers from Plaid's Connect team (their core bank-linking product) updated their profiles on Wednesday. Plaid's API v3, which Zach Perret previewed at Fintech Devcon in November, was supposed to launch in March. The docs page still says "Coming Soon" with no date.
Why This Matters to You
Plaid Connect is the product you compete against most directly. Lisa Wang was the exec sponsor for their enterprise rollout, and the two engineers were building the real-time balance features that overlap with your roadmap. You are 5 weeks from launching your own v2. Their delay gives you a 2-3 month window where you are the only one shipping real-time account data to enterprise clients. Mercury, Brex, and Ramp (all Plaid customers) have all taken calls with you in the last quarter.
Do This Week
- Reach out to your contacts at Mercury (Immad Akhund's team), Brex, and Ramp this week. Not next week. The window is now.
- Send Lisa Wang an InMail. She knows the enterprise fintech buyer better than almost anyone. Even a coffee meeting is worth it.
- Accelerate your v2 launch by 1 week. Talk to Priya about what can be cut to hit Feb 28 instead of March 7.
Risk: These departures could be unrelated. Plaid may have internal replacements queued. But the v3 silence is real and corroborates the talent drain.
Challenges Thesis
DESTA 8.0
Stripe Launches "Stripe Financial Connections" With Real-Time Balance Data
What Changed
Stripe expanded Financial Connections yesterday to include real-time balance checks, transaction history, and account ownership verification. Patrick Collison tweeted it as "the beginning of embedded banking infrastructure." Pricing: 0.1% of transaction value, capped at $1.50 per connection. They are bundling it free for Stripe Billing customers in the first year.
Why This Matters to You
Stripe just entered your core market with a loss-leader pricing strategy. The free bundling for Billing customers means 100K+ businesses get account data for free. You cannot compete on price against Stripe's balance sheet. But Stripe's version is shallow: it only works within the Stripe ecosystem. Your advantage is multi-platform coverage and deeper data (transaction categorization, cash flow forecasting, fraud signals) that Stripe does not offer.
Do This Week
- Test Stripe Financial Connections today. Document exactly where it falls short vs. your product. Build a comparison page by Friday.
- Call your 5 largest accounts and ask: "Have you seen Stripe's announcement? Here is what it does and does not do."
- Reposition your pitch: lead with "works everywhere, not just Stripe" and "transaction intelligence, not just raw data."
Risk: Stripe could deepen Financial Connections over time. But their DNA is payments, not data intelligence. You have a 12-18 month head start on the analytics layer.
Confirms Thesis
DESTA 7.2
a16z Publishes "State of Fintech 2026" Report, Names Account Data Infrastructure as Top Emerging Category
What Changed
Angela Strange at a16z published their annual State of Fintech report yesterday. For the first time, "account data infrastructure" appears as a standalone category (previously grouped under "banking-as-a-service"). The report names Plaid, MX, Finicity, and "3-4 emerging startups" as the competitive set. Your company is not named but the description matches your product exactly.
Why This Matters to You
This is the best signal for your fundraise. a16z naming your category means every fintech-focused VC fund will read this report and start looking for companies in the space. Angela Strange's fund has $500M to deploy in fintech. You should be in her deal flow by end of month.
Do This Week
- Email Angela Strange's office with a one-line intro and the report reference: "You described our company in your report. Here is what we built."
- Send the report to your existing investors (Ribbit, QED) and ask them to make a warm intro to a16z.
- Update your deck with the a16z market sizing data. This is more credible than your own TAM estimate.
Risk: a16z may have already identified their preferred company in the category. Move fast. The window between report publication and term sheet is usually 60-90 days.
Horizon Scan
Shopify quietly acquired Pebble, a small financial data analytics startup in Toronto, last week. No press release. Found via an Ontario corporate filing. Tobi Lutke has been publicly interested in embedded finance. This could signal Shopify building its own account data layer for Shopify Balance.
CFPB published a draft rule on open banking data portability that would require banks to support standardized APIs by Q1 2027. If finalized, this eliminates screen scraping entirely, which kills Plaid's original moat but benefits API-native companies like yours.