5 Year Frontier

The future of cybersecurity. In it we cover cybercriminal organizations, network effects of security, data as our biggest weapon, crypto’s gift to bad actors and the threat of cyberwarfare. Nick Schneider is CEO of Arctic Wolf, one of the leading companies safeguarding the enterprise from cybersecurity threats. With a global presence and over 2,000 employees protecting more than 3,000 customers, they are a force in security operations. With an eye on going public, Arctic Wolf has been valued at over $4B calling KKR and Viking Global amongst its deep pocketed investors. Leading the company is Nick Schneider, a veteran in the security industry, Nick has developed expertise in creating best-of-breed technology platforms and sales organizations, which have been the driving force behind Arctic Wolf’s explosive growth. Prior to Arctic Wolf, Nick led organizations at Dell and Code42. Of key interest to me is how Nick is deeply involved in being at the frontier of artificial intelligence’s influence on cybersecurity — in particulate the dual role of AI, as both an enabler and inhibitor of cybercrime, which epitomizes the modern cybersecurity conundrum. Sign up for new podcasts and our newsletter, and email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of biomanufacturing. In it we cover the emerging $4T bioeconomy, nature’s ability to manufacture products, AI’s acceleration of scientific discovery, China’s quest for biological supremacy, and rethinking sustainability. Edward Shenderovich is CEO of Synonym, prior he was both an investor and entrepreneur, founding commercial real estate company Knotel where he raised over $400M and managed 200 locations across 4 continents. As an investor he founded Kite Ventures as well as Essential Capital, which include Delivery Hero and Fyber as their investments, both reaching IPO. Uniquely, Edward is also an accomplished Poet, having published multiple books in his native Russian. Sign up for new podcasts and our newsletter, and email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of the industrial economy. In it we cover Generative Engineering, digital twins, AI for the physical world, data that dwarfs the internet, Saudi Aramco the tech giant, and the digital future of heavy industry. Greg Fallon is CEO of Geminus, a company at the forefront of simulating and automating industrial operations through cutting-edge AI technology. Geminus is revolutionizing how industries operate by bringing unprecedented speed and scalability to AI model deployment, with successful implementations in energy, oil and gas, manufacturing, and semiconductors. With heavyweight investors and partners like SLB and LAM Research backing them, Geminus is a key player in the digital industrial landscape. As a proud early investor in Geminus almost six years ago, alongside our friends at The Hive, I’ve had the privilege of watching this company innovate the industrial complex. Greg, who holds a Master’s in Science from the University of Virginia, has a wealth of experience, having held senior executive roles in product and commercialization at both Autodesk and ANSYS—two of the most influential companies in industrial software. Sign up for new podcasts and our newsletter, and email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of home building. In it we cover putting construction in the cloud, home buying simulations, AI co-pilots for builders, onsite computer vision, advances in material science, and the future of new homes. Marc Minor is the CEO of Higharc, a software platform that helps new home builders get to market with unprecedented speed and efficiency. Higharc’s mission is to modernize the $100 trillion U.S. residential real estate market and make home ownership more affordable. The platform has been used to design over 4,000 homes and has raised more than $80 million from top built-world investors such as Fifth Wall, Spark Capital, Lux, and a host of strategic partners, including Home Depot. Marc spent his career in the 3D printing and fabrication space, leading the marketing departments at Carbon and Desktop Metal before founding Higharc in 2018. Sign up for new podcasts and our newsletter, and email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of human potential and performance. In it we cover the quest to be superhuman, making biological enhancement mainstream, cyborg athletes, human longevity, and endeavoring to build the biggest sporting spectacle the world has ever seen. Aron D’Souza is the Co-founder and President of the Enhanced Games. This new model of the Olympic Games places performance-enhancing drugs and genetic modifiers front and center. The Games strive to showcase humanity’s unbounded potential by embracing scientific innovations and breakthroughs. In an era of accelerating technological and scientific change, they believe the world needs a sporting event that embraces the future, particularly advances in medical science. By doing so, they promise to give us all a glimpse of what the future of human performance could look like. Set to debut in 2025, the Games have the deep-pocketed support of some of the most successful and polarizing technologists and investors, including PayPal founder Peter Thiel and Balaji Srinivasan, the futurist and former CTO of Coinbase, as well as an upcoming documentary series by Ridley Scott. Prior to the Enhanced Games, Aron founded Sargon, a technology infrastructure company for the pensions and superannuation industry across the Asia-Pacific region. Now owned by Vista Equity, Sargon has 200 employees and nine offices. Aron, the author of three books, studied law at both Melbourne University and Oxford. Sign up for new podcasts and our newsletter, and email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of coding. We will discuss the competitive AI landscape, NVIDIA and the hyperscalers, specialized versus generalized models, synthetic data, software that writes itself, and the future of software development. Jason Warner is co-founder and CEO of Poolside. Poolside is an AI startup challenging OpenAI and Anthropic by creating its own models to build the most capable AI for software development. Although less than two years old and launching this summer, Poolside has already raised over $500M from leading investors such as Redpoint, Bain, and DST. Jason was previously the CTO at GitHub, the world’s largest developer platform, both before and after Microsoft’s $7.5B acquisition, where he helped develop Co-pilot. Prior to that, he was the Head of Engineering at Heroku and a senior technical leader at numerous other companies. In addition to leading top software development teams, Jason served as a General Partner at Redpoint Ventures, who have invested in companies like Snowflake, Stripe, Hashicorp, and Netflix. He also sits on the Operator Board at Bridgewater Associates, helping them innovate at the technology frontier. Subscribe for the latest episodes. Email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of the brain. In it we cover digital therapies, psychedelics, co-evolving with AI, technologies impact on society, and re-inventing how clinical trials are run. Guiding us will be Dr Adam Gazzaley, a Distinguished Professor of Neurology, Physiology and Psychiatry at UC San Francisco and the Founder & Executive Director of Neuroscape, a neuroscience center engaged in technology creation and scientific research of novel brain assessment and optimization approaches. Adam is also co-founder of Akili, a company developing therapeutic video games, that brought the first FDA approved game to market. He is also a founder of JAZZ Venture Partners, a venture capital firm with close to $1B AUM investing in experiential technology to improve human performance. He has been a scientific advisor for dozens of companies including Apple, General Electric and PepsiCo. Adam has filed multiple patents and authored over 180 scientific articles. Subscribe for the latest episodes. Email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of intellectual property. In it we cover programmable IP, the new economy of ideas, convergence of fan and creator, tackling LLM data attribution, blockchain’s gift to AI, and the future of human creativity. Jason Zhao is co-founder of Story Protocol, who are building a programmable intellectual property infrastructure for the internet. Built on the blockchain, Story provides a neutral source to track IP origins, enable remixing of IP with multiple stakeholders receiving attribution, and delivers an economic framework for everyone to participate in revenue that is created. Born out of South Korea, a global cultural innovator, the startup has raised over $50M from the likes of A16Z Crypto, Endeavor, and Samsung to become the leading contender to reimagine how intellectual property is managed for our modern age. Prior to founding Story Jason was at Google’s Deepmind focusing on putting novel AI research into production. He is an investment Scout at Sequoia, a computer science graduate from Stanford and can be seen lecturing about his passion in philosophy at Oxford University. Subscribe for the latest episodes. Email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of genetic engineering. In it we cover de-extinction, growing the Woolly Mammoth, human longevity, AI-led drug discovery, and the future of biotech. Ben Lamm is CEO of Colossal Biosciences, a Texas based biotech company on a mission to safeguard our worlds biodiversity and re-wild our planet. As part of that they are endeavoring to bring back extinct species such as the Woolly Mammoth, the Dodo, and the Tasmanian Tiger by as as early as 2028. Colossal has raised $225M to date and is a truly revolutionary organization pushing the frontier of genetic engineering with some of the leading minds in the field. The innovations developed from their research has impacts beyond animal conservation and advances our ability to fight diseases, uncover new drugs, protect our climate, reproduce successfully, and extend human lifespan. Ben comes from a software background and successfully built and sold three companies prior to Colossal. He brings to the world of science the energy and unique thinking of a software entrepreneur at a time when AI and computational biology is really propelling the field in leaps and bounds. Ben is prolific in the world of scientific innovation, sitting on the board of the Planetary Society, The Explorers Club, as well as owning the award winning science publication Nautilus. Subscribe for the latest episodes. Email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The future of space operations. In it we discuss how software is making launches safer, AI co-pilots for complex workflows, predictive simulations, El Segundo and new deep tech hubs, and upcoming interstellar missions. Laura Crabtree is CEO of Epsilon3, a software platform to manage and orchestrate engineering, testing and operations for the space industry and other complex industries. Backed by frontier investors Lux Capital and Village Global, Epsilon serves NASA, Virgin Galactic and United States Space Force. Their software is embedded throughout the organization and seeks to drive operational excellence amongst the complex chaos. Laura spent a decade within SpaceX as Senior Mission Operations Engineer as well as 5 years at Northrop Grumman as a Systems Controller, providing us a unique perspective of the two generations of space companies. Subscribe for the latest episodes. Email me on danieldarling@focal.vcSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.