My 6 bets for the coming decade
Following the acquisition of my previous startup Snips, I am now moving on to new projects. Here are the things I will focus on, as an entrepreneur and investor.
There is a big gap today in Europe where very few people make bets on technologies that might take 10 years to mature, whether due to technology readiness, government regulation or market adoption. But cracking some of these could mean solving some of the biggest challenges we face today. Here are my personal bets for the next decade.
Homomorphic Encryption
It’s no secret I have been a big privacy advocate for close to a decade now. I remember back then, people thought privacy was a nice-to-have or worse, a hindrance. Now, everyone considers it a priority, but nobody has figured out how to deal with it yet. This is precisely where cryptography, and in particular Homomorphic Encryption comes into play. I believe it will be the technology that solves data theft and mass surveillance for good.
The idea of homomorphic encryption is that you can process data without ever decrypting it or even having the secret key to decrypt it. Imagine being able to do things like machine learning or database queries without knowing either what data you store, receive as input or what response you send back. In effect, it would enable end-to-end encrypted digital services, where companies and consumers can securely and privately use other companies’ services. Many applications would benefit from this, such as facial recognition, automated medical diagnosis, product recommendations, voice assistants, smart contracts, fraud detection, etc.. Basically anything that handles sensitive data.
This is the holy grail of data security, as it means that you no longer have to trust the company that you are sending your data to, as even if they got hacked or subpoenaed by a government, nobody would be able to access your data without the secret key that only you hold!
Although people have been working on homomorphic encryption for over 40 years, the first fully homomorphic scheme was only discovered in 2009. However, existing schemes have been too slow to be useful, requiring tens of minutes to do simple computations, or being limited to some basic arithmetic operations. As a result, it had remained an academic subject without industrial applications, something my new startup Zama aims to change.
I am convinced though that we have now reached a breakthrough moment, and that it is a question of 5 years at most before this is widely adopted by companies. It feels to me a lot like Deep Learning in 2010, just before it took off.
How I will get involved:
- I am starting a new company called Zama, based on a recent scientific breakthrough by my cofounder Pascal Paillier. Our first solution is a fast and accurate framework for encrypted machine learning. If you would like to join, we are currently hiring cryptographers and Rust engineers!
- I will be investing in companies building solutions using homomorphic encryption, and in particular those using our technology at Zama.
- I will be writing and talking about FHE a lot. This is essentially my main professional focus for the years to come.
Blockchain
Blockchain isn’t so popular in the mainstream these days. So many people have been washed out that they simply gave up, or worse, are so bitter that they talk down on people who are still believers. I myself did an ICO that failed, so I know how it feels!
But I like to think in terms of unique value, and in this case, blockchain is simply the best technology we have to coordinate a large group of entities. Indeed, beyond currencies, I believe blockchain to be a coordination layer that uses financial incentives to nudge people into a given behavior, enabling anyone to create a decentralized product that self-regulates. You can read more about how I see it here.
How I will get involved:
- I will be buying and holding some cryptocurrencies for at least 5–10 years
- I will be looking very closely at projects that enable decentralized compute, as I believe combining this with homomorphic encryption could finally enable a secure “Internet of Computation”
- I will be investing in Decentralized Finance companies that use blockchain as the backbone to create better and more transparent financial services
- I’m also interested in building an algorithmic trading bot, but most likely won’t have much time to commit to it. If you are interested in building one, let me know!
Quantum Software
Despite what many people think, Quantum Computers are not about faster processing of everything. Rather, they enable some types of algorithms to run much more efficiently than on traditional hardware. For a good introduction, you can take a look at this great comic strip.
Most of the effort is currently concentrated on building a programmable quantum computer, and I believe this will end up being available as a cloud service, like CPUs, GPUs and TPUs are currently. There is an issue however in building a fault-tolerant quantum computer, which limits the usecases short term. I have heard various guesses of when such a QC will exist, but given that scientific breakthroughs are hard to predict, it seems like the opportunity today is in markets where error-correction is not needed.
Two such markets are post-quantum cryptography, which is about creating software that runs on traditional hardware but that is resistant to quantum computers, and physics simulations, which is about using quantum computers to simulate physical effects, such as for drug discovery, material science etc..
How I will get involved:
- I will be investing on the software side of quantum computing, and in particular in post-quantum cryptography and physics simulation.
- This is probably the space I know the least about in this list, so I will spend a significant amount of time learning about it. If you work in QC, I would be more than happy to trade some deep learning or homomorphic cryptography knowledge in exchange of quantum computing knowledge!
Psychedelic Therapies
Recent scientific studies have shown that of all the known active compounds, none has been as effective as psychedelics (such as Psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms) at treating drug-resistant depression.
For having been through multiple episodes myself, I know how difficult and lonely it can be. When you consider that close to 30% of the western population takes some kind of anti-depressant drug, and that over 75% of millennials know someone who suffers from depression, it becomes obvious that we need to rethink mental healthcare. I can’t even imagine what these numbers must be after the pandemic..
Unfortunately, being illegal in most countries, psychedelics is not available as a treatment, unnecessarily leaving millions of people in pain. I believe that regulation will soon change in favor of therapeutical use of Psilocybin and other safe compounds, as far more people have ended up in hospitals due to alcohol and other legal substances. In the USA for instance, the FDA has granted Psilocybin the status of “breakthrough therapy”, meaning it will be fast-tracked as a potential cure, most likely becoming legal under medical supervision within a decade. This will likely be an even bigger market than cannabis.
For a good understanding on the topic, I recommend reading this book by best selling author Michael Pollan.
How I will get involved:
- I will be donating to non-profit organizations that research the effects of psychedelics on depression, as this is where some of the much needed clinical trials are currently being conducted.
- I will be investing in companies developing novel psychedelic compounds, as well as in companies creating digital tools and therapy centers.
Microbiomics
The microbiome, also called the gut flora, is the population of bacteria and other living organisms that makes our gut work. Without these trillions of living organisms, we wouldn’t be able to digest foods, and thus function properly.
Beyond gut health, we have also found links between mental health and the microbiome, as neurotransmitters are directly affected by the microbiome. The more we study the microbiome, the more we realize how tightly linked it is to all important body functions, from digestion to happiness to immunity.
There are many things that affect the microbiome, from diets to sports and even sex, but we still understand very little about it. I believe that unlocking this knowledge and learning to manipulate the microbiome will be essential to healthcare in the future.
I have tried quite a few of the online microbiome services, but they are either very expensive or highly inaccurate. In virtually all cases, they also give very little holistic insights, and thus are not easy to analyze or act upon.
How I will get involved:
- I am looking to invest and take active advisory roles in companies building microbiome profiling technologies, as well as companies creating novel supplements that can modify the microbiome.
Medical Data
The Coronavirus pandemic has shown how important data is to prevent and manage pandemics. From epidemiology models, to contact tracing, accurate medical sensors and tests, we need data to inform our decision making and save lives without destroying our economy and mental health.
This is an interesting space, because it touches on highly sensitive data, such as medical records or health status, and thus will need privacy-preserving technologies such as homomorphic encryption.
How I will get involved:
- I will be investing in companies building hardware, software and biotechnologies to help manage our health, in particular companies building medical-grade technologies.
- I am interested in participating in any study or experiment in that space, and am willing to donate my personal health data. I have been collecting over 100 data points daily for 4 years, including everything I eat, my sleep, emotional feelings and medications taken. If you are a researcher in the space, please get in touch!
I decided to focus on these 6 areas because although I believe there are many other important challenges to solve (climate being an obvious one), I am simply not familiar enough with the state of the art to know where to invest. I will most likely get involved at some point when I have more resources, but for now I will focus on things I understand already. I am also not listing AI, as I believe it is now part of everything, and thus I will have enough indirect exposure to it as it is.
If you are working in something that I’m interested in, reach out directly (twitter, linkedin). I’m a founder just like you, so I am always happy to chat!
Cheers,
Rand
