We went to one of tech's most exclusive conferences, where Prince Harry and Kamala Harris mingled

• The Upfront Summit is a glitzy annual invite-only conference hosted by Upfront Ventures.
• Investors expressed unease about the state of the tech market, which is dominated by AI mega-rounds.
• Former Vice-President Kamala Harris held an hourlong private meeting at the conference focused on AI.

What do Prince Harry, Kamala Harris, Bill Gurley, and Serena Williams have in common? Aside from all being famous, they were at this year's Upfront Summit, the glitzy annual invite-only conference hosted by Upfront Ventures that aspires to be nothing like most of the stodgy events dotting the conference circuit.

The summit is held at a unique location yearly, such as the Rose Bowl, Malibu Farm, or the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures. This year's event was at the Intuit Dome, the new arena in Inglewood, CA, that is home to the NBA Clippers. There was pickup basketball at lunch, two illuminated hoops on the stage, and booming speaker introductions by the Clippers' public address announcer.

Though the theme was ostensibly basketball, the more overriding one onstage and in conversations at couches and tables on the outskirts of the area was the uneasy duality of the current tech market. On the one hand, venture investors are enamored of generative AI, which many see as a once-in-a-generation moneymaking bonanza bigger than the mobile phone. Megafunds like Andreessen Horowitz and General Catalyst keep raising billions more to pile into the biggest AI startups.

"This is a unique moment," said Bill Gurley, general partner at Benchmark who backed startups like Uber and Zillow, in an interview on stage. "AI is the exact event every founder and [general partner] dreams of."

On the other hand, most VCs have been unable to return much capital to their limited partners because the IPO market has been slow to recover, and the M&A market has been quiet. Many startups have been going out of business as capital runs dry. There is also widespread concern those megafunds could be bad for the industry.

"I am a short-term pessimist and a long-term optimist," said Pat Grady, partner at Sequoia Capital, in an on-stage interview. "I think we're going to have a culling of the herd because people got away from the original spirit of venture capital, which is helping founders build legendary companies, and they got into the asset management business."

General partners in a less enviable position than Grady pony up thousands of dollars to attend Upfront, and they are not paying for the food (which is always excellent) or the speakers (mostly top-caliber). Their return on investment is meeting the endowment heads and chief investment officers from places like the University of Michigan and Mizuho, who can write checks into their next fund.

Getting those LPs to make commitments proved frustratingly slow again this year, especially for less-established players, according to multiple VCs and LPs I spoke to at the conference. Two LPs said they were impressed by the many funds they met with, but when I asked which funds they would invest in, they said they were not deploying any capital right now.

As the gravity of tech has been moving rightward with Donald Trump's return to the White House, the Upfront Summit retained its bluer, California vibe. There were appearances from Chelsea Clinton and Gov. Gavin Newsom, who received a frosty reception from some in the audience still upset about his handling of last month's catastrophic wildfires in LA. (Sequoia partner and Elon Musk confidant Shaun Macguire, as well as developer and former LA mayoral candidate Rick Caruso, also spoke.)

Former Vice-President Kamala Harris held an hourlong private meeting at the conference with around a dozen venture investors and other attendees to discuss AI, according to multiple people in the room. Harris's appearance was kept highly under wraps, and few at the conference knew she was there.

Harris, who served as AI czar during the Biden administration, was eager to hear about where the technology is heading, according to those in the room. She will also be speaking at HumanX in less than two weeks, an AI conference in Las Vegas.

Mark Suster, managing partner of Upfront Ventures, created the Upfront Summit over a decade ago to put LA's tech scene on the map, and the event has always served as a love letter to Los Angeles. This year, the wildfires loomed large, with many there, including Suster, affected by the fires that burned through Pacific Palisades, where many in LA's tech community live.

A teary-eyed Suster took to the stage to ask for donations for fire relief and raised over $130,000. Paris Hilton closed out the summit with Tim Cadogan, CEO of GoFundMe, and a somber panel on rebuilding.

Afterward, investors, founders, and limited partners mingled over tacos, BBQ chicken, and funnel cake at a glitzy closing party on the Clippers' hardwood court. It was back to work as investors tried to seek out the few remaining LPs who had not yet flown home, trying to pitch them one last time.