About
Aaref Hilaly is a former repeat founder-CEO who co-founded and scaled Clearwell Systems from $0 to $100M ARR before its acquisition, then became a venture investor focused on AI-native companies at Sequoia and now Bain Capital Ventures. He has a distinctive thesis that the future of AI involves armies of AI agents working for every person, with humans acting as the CEO of their agent army, and believes early-stage AI startups should focus on speed of iteration rather than technical moats. Aaref Hilaly is a former repeat founder-CEO who co-founded and scaled Clearwell Systems from $0 to $100M ARR before its acquisition, then became a venture investor focused on AI-native companies at Sequoia and now Bain Capital Ventures. He has a distinctive thesis that the future of AI involves armies of AI agents working for every person, with humans acting as the CEO of their agent army, and believes early-stage AI startups should focus on speed of iteration rather than technical moats.
