
Fifty Years — The new VC that wants to save the world and make money - CapitalistCartr
https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/03/50-years-the-new-silicon-valley-vc-that-wants-to-save-the-world-and-make-money/
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meredydd
_> Fifty Years will invest at the seed stage, based on a built product, and
ideally some market validation. Right now, Fifty Years is into synthetic
biology..._

I'm inclined to blame a confused journalist, but otherwise: What are these
guys _smoking_?

This stuff is all "hard tech" by definition - by the time you have a working
product in these fields, you are waaay past the seed stage. This is mostly
because they are so hard - biology in particular is so difficult that
entrepreneurs tend to target things that would be obviously great products if
only someone could make them work. (Eg: jet fuel from algae at a competitive
price: Build it and the world will batter down your door. Lab-grown meat is in
the same category.)

Almost all the risk is product risk, and little-to-no market risk. An
allegedly "seed stage" biotech fund that insists on a built, market-validated
product just looks like they have no idea what they're talking about.

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fil_a_del_fee_a
Do they actually know how to make these chicken pieces? If so, why can't
purdue or anyone else just simply grow chickens? I assume it would save them a
fortune.

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madamelic
>If so, why can't purdue or anyone else just simply grow chickens? I assume it
would save them a fortune.

Because raising chickens (or really anything) if you only need 10% of it is
insanely wasteful. Livestock is an incredibly huge waste of resources, one
hamburger (1/3lb) takes 660 gallons of water.

If instead we can use synthetic meat (created in 'lab' then mass produced), we
could completely cut out raising livestock, cut out livestock feed, cut out
inhumane treatment of animals and at the exact same time, reduce the risk of
eating animal products.

(And yes, there has been [semi-successful] research into synthetic meat.
[https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/aug/05/synthetic-
me...](https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/aug/05/synthetic-meat-burger-
stem-cells))

