121. Mission-driven biotech investing, Josh Wolfe, Co-founder & Managing Partner, Lux Capital

Synopsis: Josh Wolfe is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Lux Capital, a venture capital firm that invests in emerging science and technology ventures. Josh joins us for a discussion centered around investing in biotech. He discusses the arc of his career and the forces that led him to pursue a path at the intersection of science and finance. Josh also talks about the current state of biotech investing, trends he expects to see in the future, his advice to founder-led biotech companies, what he believes are the top three criteria for success for biotech companies, and his thoughts on the future of biotech. It’s an illuminating conversation you won’t want to miss. Biography: Josh co-founded Lux Capital to support scientists and entrepreneurs who pursue counter-conventional solutions to the most vexing puzzles of our time in order to lead us into a brighter future. The more ambitious the project, the better—like, say, creating matter from light. Josh is a Director at Shapeways, Strateos, Lux Research, Kallyope, CTRL-labs, Variant, and Varda, and helped lead the firm’s investments in Anduril, Planet, Echodyne, Clarifai, Authorea, Resilience and Hadrian. He is a founding investor and board member with Bill Gates in Kymeta, making cutting-edge antennas for high-speed global satellite and space communications. Josh is a Westinghouse semi-finalist and published scientist. He previously worked in investment banking at Salomon Smith Barney and in capital markets at Merrill Lynch. In 2008 Josh co-founded and funded Kurion, a contrarian bet in the unlikely business of using advanced robotics and state-of-the-art engineering and chemistry to clean up nuclear waste. It was an unmet, inevitable need with no solution in sight. The company was among the first responders to the Fukushima Daiichi disaster. In February 2016, Veolia acquired Kurion for nearly $400 million—34 times Lux’s total investment. Josh is a columnist with Forbes and Editor for the Forbes/Wolfe Emerging Tech Report. He has been invited to The White House and Capitol Hill to advise on nanotechnology and emerging technologies, and a lecturer at MIT, Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Columbia and NYU. He is a term member at The Council on Foreign Relations and Chairman of Coney Island Prep charter school, where he grew up in Brooklyn. He graduated from Cornell University with a B.S. in Economics and Finance.