
Ask HN: As an employee, what kind of company do you wish existed but doesn't? - trevyn
Companies tend to be defined by their missions.<p>Apple, to make kickass consumer products.<p>Google, to organize the world&#x27;s information.<p>SpaceX, to populate Mars.<p>What kind of company do you want to work for that you wish existed but doesn&#x27;t?<p>What is its mission?
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orionblastar
I would like to work for a company that seeks to treat or cure mental
illnesses. In 2003 I ended up on disability due to a mental illness I
developed due to too much stress. We also have disabled veterans who are also
mentally ill.

When you reach a level of mental illness, you are no longer able to work
anymore and nobody trusts you to do any work.

I'd like to work for a company that develops a neurochip to treat or cure
mental ilnesses so mentally ill people can go back to work. A neurochip that
can filter out negative thoughts and improve memory. A neurochip that can
download information off the Internet and store it in your memory so that you
learn faster. I figure just implant it in the frontal lobe using the lobotomy
method to access the frontal lobe to avoid a surgery. But once installed it
can't be removed or upgraded without causing damage. So it has to be perfected
first, and any upgrades will have to be software based.

It should have Internet access to send emails and social networking using your
thoughts into words. It should interface with your optic nerve system to
display text and images in your vision. Even correct your vision if you have
eyesight problems.

Yeah you'll basically be a cyborg, but psyche medicine doesn't work too well
and turns most people into drowsy zombies, a neurochip would be the next step
in treating or curing mental illnesses.

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urs2102
Echoing auxym something Bell Labs like, I've had two professors Bjarne [0] and
Aho [1] who both worked there, and I've always got the sense that it was just
about research and building things for the sake of building them. Seems like a
golden age of bright minds all together in one place. Maybe a mission of
building things just for fun

(that - or maybe another business whose goal was to organize the world's
information like Google - I've always like the idea of someone trying to build
a new search engine today).

[0]:[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Aho](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Aho)
[1]:[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bjarne_Stroustrup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bjarne_Stroustrup)

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rfc
For me, there are two companies I'd like to work for or build in my life time:
Personalized Health Care and "moonshot" infrastructure projects (for lack of
better wording).

Personalized Health Care - I'd love to work at a company that helps people be
rid of diseases for an affordable cost. Ideally, we'd make big bets on
understanding the genetic makeup of individuals and create drugs/therapies
based on that make up. This would probably combine some interests of mine such
as supercomputing, machine/deep learning, biotechnology, and a modern
healthcare system to achieve this.

"Moonshot" Infrastructure - This is sort of similar to the Hyperloop stuff in
a way. I think I'd really like to be part of a company that helps build the
vision of what we thought it would be like when we grew up. Not necessarily
flying cars but modernized & rapid transportation systems, incredible carbon-
neutral buildings, robotics, etc.

Seems like my theme would be build the future I thought we'd have. Any company
that contributes in a substantial way to progressing us towards something
better than we had today, something meaningful, something memorable.

~~~
maxerickson
The dynamics of health care and technology are sort of fascinating. It's not
clear to me that a cheap, effective cure for a particular disease does
anything other than create more future demand for health care.

(Which I guess is an oblique way of pondering whether the mission you state is
really any different than health research in general, with it being impossible
to really see the advances because of all the generated demand)

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auxym
As a (junior) mechanical engineer, I'd like to work in a BigCo that invests in
big R&D. Basically, I'd like to work in the 70s (or so).

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pshyco
focused on human values rather than $$$$

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eecks
X, to help the less fortunate people

