New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies • Hacker News Board

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#131

Post by rayiner » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 12:29 AM UTC

loganu wrote: post #127

rayiner wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, can they get Boeing to acquire one of those companies? Because those are the kinds of relevant players in most of these areas.

Why not? Advances in materials, energy, batteries, would be right up Boeing's alley. Diagnostics, communications for planes? What if YC funded a company that had a novel method to make petroleum extraction 20% faster, cleaner or more efficient? Or could help scale lotus-effect paints to mass production? Or could bring big data/ machine-learning to health care to crunch through our habits and health history to find st…

The value of YC is the connections, expertise, and support it provides. In terms of these things, what does it bring to the table in oil extraction or aerospace? You're not showing how to get from point A to point B.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#132

Post by nabla9 » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 12:48 AM UTC

Why should YC be involved in areas where it has no experience?

The money YC gives is minimal, so the main benefit for YC involvement is experience. If YC has nobody who has expert knowledge in biotech, it would be waste of everyones time to get involved.

Another thing is money. Most science startups need more than just people with PhD's willing to live with ramens. They need lab equipment, samples etc that cost tens and hundreds of thousands dollars.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#133

Post by chris_mahan » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 12:50 AM UTC

"We’re especially interested in preventative healthcare, as this is probably the highest-leverage way to improve health. "

I think the best preventative healthcare is a population (I almost said cohort (yikes)) that is educated enough (with all that entails) to make better short term and long-term decisions for themselves, including developing the desire to become and stay healthy, to know how to weigh the risks of activities, to know how to find information for themselves and evaluate such information with a critical and logical mind. This would also go a long way in helping our political process.

Is this a tall order? You bet. Beyond horizon, but desperately needed.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#134

Post by begriffs » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 12:50 AM UTC

nakedrobot2 wrote: post #25

I hope someone is crazy enough for the Tall Tower project. It is the kind of project the Human Race needs to convince ourselves that we are still capable of getting Big Things done. If you don't know about it already, it is a project jump-started in part by Neal Stephenson, to build a 15km tall tower. http://hieroglyph.asu.edu/project/the-tall-tower/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TE0n_5qPmRM

A tower of you might say, biblical, proportions.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#135

Post by sillysaurus3 » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 12:53 AM UTC

mikeyouse wrote: post #122

pbreit wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Tesla is a good example of starting reasonably. The Roadster was mostly a Lotus Elise and the batteries were off-the-shelf notebook batteries, for example.

> But Tesla is a good example of starting reasonably. The Tesla Roadster was first shown to the public in July of 2006. By that time, Tesla had already raised (and spent) nearly $60M . Before they sold the first Roadster, they had raised $145M including $40M of Elon's own money. Plowing $150M into a car company before making a sale isn't remotely reasonable.

Plowing $150M into a car company before making a sale isn't remotely reasonable.

Why not? After all, it resulted in Tesla.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#136

Post by hiddentao » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 12:59 AM UTC

foobarqux wrote: post #123

mattgreenrocks wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would reinvigorate some of us who are jaded by SV's astounding lack of ambition towards actually solving hard problems as well. I didn't become an engineer to crank out CRUD apps in some rock star's crazy DSL all day.

A VC's job is to take in money and return even more money. Not to be ambitious. Pension funds don't care about creating innovation.

Spot on. A VC will fund something really risky and innovative if and only if they think they'll likewise make a larger profit from it compared less risky ventures. But as pointed out by other commenters even this risk-taking is limited.

Ventures like SpaceX and Tesla that have a long lead time and (at least in these two cases) are loss-making at the start probably wouldn't get YC-VC funding. Or at least they wouldn't get anywhere near the level of funding they'd need to get to profitability point.

I wager that for some of the really big world-changing projects we simply have to be willing to fund it as long as necessary, taking an extremely long-term view. And for this, VC funding is probably not going to be enough. Both Tesla and SpaceX needed to take in public (read: Government) funding to keep going.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#137

Post by Jack000 » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 1:07 AM UTC

bfe wrote: post #124

foobarqux wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That looks like a great company with a great product but it's only capital intensive relative to web software.

But it's plausible as a fast, minimal entry point to electric vehicles in general, potentially attracting more capital to expand a proven product line, instead of trying to start with a car. I hope they're planning something like that.

I think another company ate their lunch, unfortunately. Came out with a similar product for 1/2 the price and 2x the range. That company also makes other EVs..

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#138

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 1:13 AM UTC

cbhl wrote: post #102

kyro wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that these more visionary, long-term, scientific startups will often require founders of a different demographic than what we're used to seeing (eg. older, more experienced in a given field, maybe with obligations like a spouse and kids), will you guys modify your approach to evaluating applications, more specifically the founding teams?

> older, more experienced in a given field, maybe with obligations like a spouse and kids I'm not convinced that this describes the Thalmic guys at all.

[deleted]

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#139

Post by marcosdumay » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 1:17 AM UTC

CodeMage wrote: post #69

"It used to be the case that governments funded a lot of development of breakthrough technologies. The bad news is that they have mostly stopped; the good news is that the leverage of technology is such that now small startups can do what used to take the resources of nations." Honest question: if small startups can now do what used to take the resources of nations, isn't there something even cooler that the resource…

Maybe a few, or maybe not even one.

Nations need to convince a lot of people about the viability and rationality of a project before putting many resources at it. Most great (and crackpot) ideas are lost on this process, the ones that survive are completely changed.

Re: New RFS – Breakthrough Technologies

#140

Post by raldi » Thu, Mar 20, 2014, 1:22 AM UTC

> We’re interested in better ways for people to live somewhere nice, work together, and have easier commutes.

> If a company needs to raise a billion dollars of funding over the course of its life, that doesn’t scare us—in fact, that’s a plus.

San Francisco's city government is falling over themselves to legalize and encourage in-law units, whether they're built in basements, garages, wherever. The problem is that the permitting process is a byzantine nightmare, and working with the local construction industry is equally maddening and fraught with peril. Also, because of Prop 13, a lot of homeowners are sitting on property that's disproportionally valuable compared to their liquid assets, and so there are a lot of situations where people can't afford to build an in-law unit, even though (if they could) it would pay for itself very quickly.

Therefore, I think someone needs to create the SolarCity of SF in-law units. The company takes care of all the paperwork and even pays for all the construction. In return, they get a cut of the rent for the next 20 years.

If you take my idea and run with it, all I ask in return is that, once you hit your first billion in revenue, you put a bust of me in your headquarters' lobby.