Written by: David Nage, Venture Capital PM ARCA
Compiled by: Shaofaye123, Foresight News
Nvidia CEO said: "The era of AI Agentics has arrived," and called this emerging field a "trillion-dollar business opportunity."
Before Huang Renxun made the above remarks, user interest in the fourth quarter of 2024 turned to Web3 AI agents, which gradually developed using the infrastructure and provided frameworks of Web3 and AI.
On January 2, the market value of various Web3 AI agents achieved a significant breakthrough: Ai16zDAO reached a market value of US$2.6 billion through Eliza's framework, and Virtuals reached a market value of US$5 billion through GAME. Four days later, ARC reached $450 million and Zerebro reached $783 million through frameworks such as RIG and Zerepy, respectively. On January 12, the total market value of Solana agents among the 1,210 agents of the Cookie framework reached $7.5 billion, and Base reached $5.5 billion; the total market value has exceeded $13 billion.
Considering the trillion-dollar business opportunities and the growth of the field to date, what level can the market value of Web3 AI agents reach in the future? At the same time, the market share of traditional AI companies (such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, etc.) also needs to be taken into account to analyze the share that Web3 AI agents may occupy and the development time.
It took 35 years since the birth of email for 1 billion people to have email addresses. Since its launch in November 2022, ChatGPT has now reached nearly 200 million monthly active users (MAU). You can refer to the following technology adoption curve:
There are currently about 4.8 billion unique email addresses in the world, and ChatGPT users account for about 4.2%, even though its growth rate was slowed down in the early stages due to language limitations and computing resources.
Based on the current rate of approximately 14 million new users per month, if the growth is doubled (thanks to wider access, competition-driven factors, etc.), that is, to 28.6 million new users per month, the total number of new users in the next 24 months will reach:
28.6 million × 24 months ≈ 686M
Combined with the existing 200 million users, the total number of ChatGPT users is expected to be close to 886 million by 2026.
Assume that by 2026:
Paying users: 886 M × 0.10 (conversion rate) = 88.6 million paying users
Monthly revenue: 88.6 million × 20 = $1.77 billion / month
Annual revenue: 1.77 billion × 12 = $21.24 billion / year
If a 5x price-to-sales ratio (P/S Ratio) is used to calculate the market value and a premium multiple is used as a reference, this will make ChatGPT's market value reach about $100 billion (the latest round of private market valuation is $157 billion). Huang Renxun said that AI agents may be a trillion-dollar business opportunity. Assuming ChatGPT captures 15% of this total market size, this still leaves $850 billion in market space waiting to be captured.
Then the question is: how much market share can Web3 AI agents capture?
We can apply the "Bitcoin to Gold Ratio" to the AI agent market. Currently, Bitcoin's market cap accounts for approximately 10.9% of the total gold market cap. If Web3 AI agents can capture a market share similar to the Bitcoin / Gold Ratio:
$850 billion × 10.9% = $92.65 billion (the potential size of the Web3 AI agent market).
However, there are some factors that may indicate that the market share of Web3 AI agents may be higher:
Advantages of Web3 Agents:
Decentralized infrastructure: The infrastructure of decentralized networks already exists and can be directly utilized.
Token incentive mechanism: Promote user and developer participation through tokenized reward mechanism.
Smart contract automation: Efficient automation operations are achieved through smart contracts.
Built-in payment function: The payment function in the Web3 ecosystem has been seamlessly integrated and can be used directly.
Data sovereignty and ownership: Users can truly own and control their own data.
Unique Capabilities of Web3 Agents:
Tokenized Ownership of Agents: Allows users to hold ownership of agents through tokens.
DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) Integration: Seamless integration with DAO to achieve community-driven management and decision-making.
Composability with DeFi: Web3 agents can seamlessly connect with decentralized financial applications to expand their functionality and value.
Given these unique advantages of Web3 AI agents, their market share may be higher than the ratio of Bitcoin to gold. If we assume the following three scenarios:
Low estimate: 10.9% (Bitcoin/gold ratio) = $92.65 billion
Medium estimate: 20% = $170 billion
High estimate: 30% = $255 billion
The potential of the Web3 agent market may be far more than this, especially if these advantages are further explored and fully utilized.
The rise of web3 AI agents represents the intersection of two transformative technologies.
ChatGPT has reached 200 million monthly active users in just two years, and this rapid growth curve provides an important reference benchmark for the accelerated adoption of AI technology. Taking the 10.9% of the "Bitcoin to Gold Market Cap Ratio" as a conservative baseline and applying it to the estimated $850 billion AI agent market opportunity (excluding ChatGPT's share), Web3 AI agents could have a market size of $92.65 billion. Given web3's inherent advantages, such as decentralized infrastructure, token-based incentives, smart contract automation, and built-in payment systems, its market share could be higher. 20% market share is a reasonable expectation, which would support a market size of $170 billion.
In addition, Web3 agents' unique capabilities in tokenized agent ownership, DAO integration, and composability with DeFi enable them to fully leverage the rapid adoption trajectory of AI technology and the existing infrastructure of blockchain technology. Therefore, this area has the potential to be one of the biggest beneficiaries of the intersection of AI and blockchain technologies.
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