Harvard Is Selling a $699 Course Taught by A.I. Clones of Its Faculty

I’ve just started a video call with a general partner at a venture capital firm. “Whenever you’re ready, please start your pitch,” he says.

For a reporting experiment, I am playing the role of a hopelessly delusional tech founder. As I outline my plan to build an “Uber for bananas,” his calm, polite smile doesn’t move. Neither do the small shadows cast by the drape of his shirt. His shoulders hover back and forth just slightly — and a little too consistently. Because while it looks like I’m talking with Jeff Bussgang, the co-founder of Flybridge Capital and a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School, I’m actually talking with his A.I. generated video avatar.

When I speak with the real Bussgang — who, much like his A.I. counterpart, is not impressed with my idea for faster banana delivery — he concedes that the simulation is at least a little “creepy.” But, he says, “My students love it.”

Bussgang is one of several teachers at Harvard Business School who volunteered to help create A.I. clones of themselves for a new eight-week entrepreneurship boot camp called H.B.S. Foundry. Harvard has tested the product, which costs $699, with more than 100 universities across 50 states.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/22/business/dealbook/harvard-ai-faculty.html