Ideas

Thought Paper

Robots and Humans

The movie A.I. Artificial Intelligence came out in 2001, and for many it was their introduction to the phrase “artificial intelligence”, and despite the evolution of the industry, the term “AI” will always be inextricably entwined with Haley Joel Osment’s Mecha humanoid robot. I, Robot, The Terminator, and Battlestar Galactica depicted a robot filled future, and in most of these popular depictions, the robots took human form. The media was a reflection of the real excitement of the time. Those decades saw the birth of Boston Dynamics and the DARPA Grand Challenge. So twenty to thirty years later, are we any closer to this vision of the future?

Thought Paper

Critical Minerals for a Clean Energy Transition

The term “clean energy transition” is likely one you’re familiar with given the recent windfall of climate-related legislation from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) to the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill. These bills provide over $500 billion in tax credits, loan guarantees and other incentives, hoping to spur clean energy innovation from R&D to demonstration. However, investments in clean energy are not limited to the public sector. The private sector is also investing heavily in clean-energy startups with approximately $70 billion invested over the past two years.

Article

Too Many Venture Capitalists Are Focused on the Wrong Startups and Priorities

The collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX is leading to a lot of soul-searching in the startup and venture capital ecosystem. With the full extent of the scandal still coming to light and a domino effect playing out across the crypto space, one thing is clear to me: Too much money is going into Web3 startups that are not going to address large-scale challenges like climate change, feeding a growing population and treating mental health problems.

Article

Breakthrough Science and the Future of Venture Capital

Sam Lessin’s recent article The End of Venture Capital as We Know It has received a lot of attention in the startup community. Lessin argues that a monumental shift in startup investing is coming to fruition as software has already eaten the world, and larger institutions continue to jump into the software venture capital market at an unprecedented rate. I think he is largely correct. I believe that today, the future of venture capital is breakthrough science transforming billions of lives in sectors like energy, transportation, infrastructure, manufacturing, agriculture and human augmentation.

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Startups Should Look For VC Firms With Unfair Advantages

I previously wrote about what venture capital firms look for in startups when looking to invest. This time, I want to turn the tables a little bit and share what startups should be looking for in their investors. I like to describe these traits as unfair advantages. What do I mean by an unfair advantage? Unfair advantages are characteristics that give a venture capital (VC) firm a leg up over the competition that enables them to find the most promising startups, support those founders and provide bigger returns for their investors time and time again.

Thought Paper

Orbital Debris

Some high-value areas in orbit around Earth are getting crowded. The number of spacecraft launched per year has increased ten-fold compared to a decade ago. Statistics vary as references are quickly obsolete with each new launch (which alone reinforces that orbital content is increasing rapidly). Regardless, the trend does not appear to be slowing. The latest Euroconsult Analysis predicts a four-fold increase in satellite launches in the next decade – or approximately 17,000 new satellites.

Article

How Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine Could Drive Advances in Energy Technology

No one would accuse Vladimir Putin of being a green energy advocate. However, by invading Ukraine, the Russian leader may inadvertently become one of the most critical actors in the world’s shift to new energy technology. And that’s not all. Other sectors like transportation, manufacturing, infrastructure, agriculture, and human augmentation are also going to see huge breakthroughs in the coming years because of Putin’s reprehensible actions in Ukraine.

Article

It’s Time for Startup Founders to Face Reality

Financial experts have been predicting that the tech bubble is on the verge of bursting. While those predictions have been wrong for nearly a decade, they may finally be right. The combination of high inflation, rising interest rates, broken supply chains, the war in Ukraine, and a host of other issues make this correction a little different. The tech-heavy NASDAQ is down almost 30% this year, IPOs will likely be down 70% by the end of the year, and the effects are just starting to be felt in the private markets. While this may seem like a scary time for startup founders, current market conditions actually provide a lot of opportunity. A recent conversation between my team and the CEOs and CFOs of our portfolio companies brought up some important points relevant to startup founders.

Article

Use Chronological Scenario Planning to Help Your Startup Get Through a Potential Recession

Over the past few months, investors from Sequoia to YC have sounded the clarion call to get their portfolio companies preparing for winter. At this stage, it does not matter if we agree or not: Enough momentum in the market has shifted that market behavior has become a self-fulfilling reality. Over the past 60 days, we have been working closely with our portfolio companies to help devise “winterization plans.” We have gone through this exercise enough that we have seen some patterns that might be helpful to others as they create their own plans.

Thought Paper

High-Speed Flight

Over the last decade, I have been delighted to see the end of the ‘Great Stagnation’ in the aerospace industry. The upswing in aerospace technology development has been driven by a combination of advancements in materials and computers, the public’s increased appetite for technical risk, and the rise of a new Great Power Competition. This thought paper will review the fundamental physics, history, enabling technologies and current market landscape underpinning today’s high-speed flight renaissance.

Thought Papers

Psychedelic Medicine

In modern translation, Renaissance means rebirth, revival, and recovery. And if you have been watching, even a little bit, the popular press coverage around the medicinal use of psychedelics, it is easy to see why that descriptor has been attached. After a long winter of being relegated to illegal, Schedule I drugs, nature’s pharmacy of psychedelic compounds is going through a rebirth of exploration and acceptance for the treatment of an increasingly wide range of mental health issues. It has been a long time coming.

Thought Paper

Fuel Cells

Currently there is a fairly sharp line between the worlds of electric power and the hydrocarbon fuels (oil and gas) we use for transportation and industrial heat. Hydrogen doesn’t play a big role in providing electricity or as a transportation fuel at the moment, but its role is set to expand, especially in Europe. Looking ahead, hydrogen could provide a solution for both sides of our energy needs: as a flexible form of energy storage to support the electric grid, and as a transportation fuel.

Thought Paper

Agricultural Automation and Food Processing

The advent of agriculture in ancient times may have been the fundamental enabler for all known civilizations to flourish. And ready access to food remains a cornerstone to society even today. We all need to eat, and there are more of us every day. Advances in farming technology have been enabling increased crop yields since time immemorial; and nowhere is this more visible than in the last hundred years with the widespread adoption and expansion of agricultural automation.

Thought Paper

Lithium Batteries

There is an ever-growing need for portable energy storage solutions ranging from cell-phone batteries to electric vehicle batteries, and from microbatteries for tiny disposable sensors to lightweight powerpacks for flying cars. This is an overview of the current state of the lithium battery industry. We explore the future of portable battery technology, and how to evaluate new battery technologies for applications ranging from electric aviation, autonomous vehicles, medical implants, to portable electronics.