Today, serious trading runs on systems. Decisions are written in code. Orders are triggered automatically.

Phoebe Gates is co-leading Phia, an AI shopping assistant pitched as a smarter way to browse and buy online, as the startup raises fresh funding.

A year later? Still sitting there as a POC. Eighteen months later, someone finally says what everyone’s thinking—why hasn’t this scaled? Here’s what nobody wants to say out loud: AI wasn’t the issue.

As firms increasingly incentivize employees to build and oversee complex teams of agents—for example, by measuring and ...