A framework for evaluating life-science startups rests on three pillars: team (domain expertise, drive, and an intangible confidence factor), technology (real science without hype), and timing (market and regulatory readiness). Even great technology fails with bad timing.
Hi, thanks. Thanks for taking the time. Um, this is a group of kind of returning investors and relatively new investors, and by nature, being in San Diego, we do get a lot of life sciences companies. For a lot of the first-time investors in the room who might see a life sciences deal for the first time, what's your framework for evaluating them in kind of a first principles way?
The simple answer is it's the team, the technology, and the timing is how I think about it, right? So The team is pretty straightforward. Are these people experts in their field? Are they motivated? Are they entrepreneurial? Do they have kind of an it factor of some sort that you can kind of hang your hat on? Is the technology real? Is this cold fusion? You know, stay away from that. Are they so— are they unreasonably ambitious, right? Are they saying, "We're going to cure cancer"? It's like, well, take it easy. So, do they have something accomplishable? And do they have a path to get to advance the technology, right? Because you could have a super cool technology, and that kind of comes back to the timing part of it. Is
