> VCs were out of patience and wanted returns for their money. Having spent 10s if millions and now, 2-3 years later, requiring even more didn't align with what they were used to.

Those numbers seem quaint now compared to OpenAI's "can we borrow $1B, actually $10B, hang on we need $50B, sorry we meant $500B, also we might need $7T" investment death spiral. Maybe when this is over VCs will be glad for how cheap and low-risk hardware development is, relatively speaking.