The AI Agent Boom: Dot-Com 2.0 for White-Collar Work

In the dot-com era, services that were once tied to legacy software, custom builds, or physical infrastructure became scalable online. Marketplaces like Amazon replaced brick-and-mortar, Salesforce digitized CRM, and communities that lived on message boards scaled into global networks. The internet democratized access to value creation.

We are now entering a similar moment with AI agents. Only this time, the shift is unfolding inside white-collar expertise.

Why AI Agents Resemble the Dot-Com Boom

AI agents go far beyond chatbots. They are autonomous workflows that package domain knowledge into repeatable systems. Imagine turning the skillset of a lawyer, analyst, or consultant into software that runs around the clock and scales at almost zero cost.

In conversations with founders like Lawrence K., a Marine veteran building an agentic platform of his own, the pattern is clear. He spent two decades inside the veterans’ disability claims process and saw firsthand how confusing, costly, and time-consuming it is for vets to secure what they are owed. His concept reimagines the process as a guided, AI-driven experience that removes lawyers taking 20–30% of back pay and replaces multi-hour office visits with a voice-driven system that vets can use from home.

This is exactly what happened in the SaaS boom: domain experts and technologists identified inefficient services and moved them into scalable platforms. The only difference is that today, the “platform” is an AI agent.

The Market is Confirming the Shift

• Robert F. Smith, CEO of Vista Equity Partners, recently described agentic AI as “like electricity”, a shift that will transform enterprise software. Vista has already built an “Agentic AI Factory” to deploy agents across its portfolio (Economist Impact).

• Morgan Stanley projects AI could add $13 to $16 trillion in value to the S&P 500, with nearly half of that growth tied to autonomous, agent-driven systems (Business Insider).

• Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, has warned that AI may eliminate up to 50% of entry-level white-collar jobs in the next five years, with unemployment potentially rising to 10–20% (Axios, New York Post).

• The Economist calls this the “AI glass floor”. Entry-level roles may not vanish overnight, but barriers to entering classic professional careers are rising as agents absorb the very work those roles were designed for (Economist Impact).

The signal is clear. The same way dot-com reshaped distribution, agentic AI is reshaping delivery of expertise.

Why Ground-Level Builders Are Best Positioned

In our earlier piece, “Why AI and Modern Development Are Creating Opportunities VCs Missed”, we explained how modern tools have changed the economics of software development. Historically, building for a $50M market was irrational because development costs started at $200K–$500K. That model only worked for billion-dollar markets and VC funding.

Today, with AI-accelerated coding and modular infrastructure, development costs have fallen by 90%. A $20K build can now profitably serve a $50M market. For a founder with domain expertise, that math changes everything.

This is why ground-level builders with niche knowledge are in the strongest position. They know the workflows, they feel the inefficiencies, and they can now package that knowledge into products that were previously impossible to deliver.

What is Driving the AI Agent Boom

Economic Scale
Once deployed, agents operate at zero marginal cost per additional user. This mirrors the economics of early SaaS, where recurring revenue could be scaled without adding proportional headcount.

Productivity Shift
McKinsey estimates generative AI could add $2.6 to $4.4 trillion annually across business functions such as software, sales, R&D, and customer operations.

Structural Displacement
Entry-level roles in law, consulting, and finance are already seeing tasks like drafting, analysis, and filing move to AI. The Economist notes that the career ladder itself is being eroded as junior pathways vanish.

Urgency and Speed
First-mover advantage matters. Vista is already deploying agent factories. Startups are launching agents and facing copycats within weeks. The race is not theoretical, it is happening in real time.

What This Means for Founders and Experts

If you are a domain expert in a niche field, this is the moment to act. The opportunity is not reserved for large tech firms. It is open to anyone who can translate specialized knowledge into workflows that are efficient, emotionally intelligent, and user-centric.

Lawrence’s Vet Claim DIY illustrates this well. The system is not just a form filler. It is designed around veterans’ needs, using voice interaction, logic specific to military service, and empathetic UX. That combination of expertise, workflow, and design is what makes an AI agent valuable.

Why We Are Bullish on Ground-Level Entrepreneurs

What’s Next

For founders: Identify the workflows in your industry that can be codified as an agent. These often hide in repetitive, high-friction processes.

For domain experts: Partner with builders who understand how to package your expertise into workflows with empathy and usability.

For investors and operators: Recognize that defensibility is moving beyond network effects. It now sits in workflow design, emotional intelligence in UX, and domain-specific execution.

We are not speculating about a distant future. The shift is underway, and it is moving fast. Ground-level experts who move now have the best chance of shaping the next generation of scalable, real-world AI.