P.S. You Should Know... | Issue #351
Closing on on the end of the year
my story 🚀
📅 Only two weeks left in 2023! I was talking with a prospective vendor this week about a project I’m leading. They asked if January would be good timing to deliver a proposal. I couldn’t contain a little laugh out loud before I clarified that I and those I work with like to move quickly. Wishing you all a productive sprint to the end!
fun facts 🙌
A peek into Montreal's mastery of snow. “Montreal doesn’t just push snow to the curb with plows - instead, snow is picked up by a fleet of trucks and transported up to one of 28 snow dump sites across the city. Throughout a typical winter, roughly 300,000 truckloads of snow are transported - a volume of about 12 million cubic meters.” How do they do this? A per capita budget of about $100, about 10x that of New York City. (my math) ~ learn more
What if psychedelics’ hallucinations are just a side effect? “Scientists are on their way to finding out for sure. For the first time, researchers have purposively developed psychedelic drugs that appear to bring about neuroplastic effects without producing a trip. These drugs stimulate the same serotonin receptor as traditional psychedelics: 5-HT2A, which, when triggered, causes the brain to produce more of a compound called BDNF…” ~ learn more
It’s an a(door)able game. Desktop only, not mobile. 1 minute play time. ~ play
tech, startups, internet ⚡
Digital health at the turn of 2024. A report from Rock Health, making use of their ‘maturity curve’ model that tech themes follow from nascent to mature. At maturity it should be clear whether a theme is a fad, a niche, or new table stakes. They, “selected seven buzzworthy developments to analyze: AI in Healthcare, Caregiver Solutions, Data Interoperability, Digital Obesity Care, Food as Medicine, Retailers as Providers, and Value-Based Care Enablement.” ~ learn more
Innovation in women’s health 2023. A report by SVB based on their proprietary data. “Our inaugural Innovation in Women's Health report unveils an optimistic outlook for this undervalued and rapidly growing sector, despite broader VC challenges and obstacles within the space.” One interesting chart shows that the pre-money valuations at seed for ‘women’s health’ lag behind ‘all healthcare’ by about 20%. ~ learn more
The best venture firm you’ve never heard of. The title rang true, I had never heard of this firm. Its first three funds produces more than 10x returns each. “Hummingbird Ventures has built an astonishing track record – all while staying out of the limelight. Its secret to success? A meticulous approach to identifying outlier founders.” ~ learn more
better doing 🎯
The smartest person. “I used to think I was pretty smart. I have lots of friends who are just as smart as me, and many who are smarter, but always the difference was a difference of degree. Until I met the Smartest Person.” ~ learn more
to your health ⚕
On Pharma’s incentives: cures vs treatments. “I’ve been in and around the pharma industry for nearly 30 years, and I’ve spent time in gene therapy/gene editing where the one-time cure model dominates. Some thoughts on chronic vs. curative dosing and why a curative therapy is likely worth less:…” ~ learn more
retail therapy 💸
Amazon CEO talks logistics. “Jassy said 60% of shipments in Amazon’s top 60 metropolitan areas have been same-day or one-day deliveries in the first half of the year. Amazon has found that delivery speed meaningfully changes customers’ conversion rates and the rate at which they’re willing to buy, he added.” ~ learn more
under the microscope 🔬
Portable, non-invasive, mind-reading AI turns thoughts into text. There’s a video demo. It’s pretty cool. “In a world-first, researchers from the GrapheneX-UTS Human-centric Artificial Intelligence Centre at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) have developed a portable, non-invasive system that can decode silent thoughts and turn them into text.” ~ learn more
A saliva test for glucose. “Those re-engineered aptamers were then mounted on a gold electrode within an E-AB biosensor, which was subsequently immersed in saliva gathered from a group of test subjects. Not only was the sensor able to measure glucose concentrations in the liquid – providing readings in just 30 seconds – it also retained its sensitivity for up to one week, as long as it was washed and stored in phosphate-buffered saline solution after each use.” ~ learn more
thoughts of food 🍔
The problems with lab-grown chicken. It’s the time of the business cycle when popular press takes shots at all the venture-funded concept that didn’t deliver on their promise. I feel ambivalent. Yes, the criticisms are often legit. But also, yes, it’s damn good that founders and funders keep trying to change the world. “Venture-backed startups such as Upside Foods have promised cultivated chicken as the solution to the meat problem. If only the solution made sense.” ~ learn more
How much ultraprocessed food are you eating? “To develop this tool, CNN examined nutrition labels and ingredient lists for menu items sold by popular fast-food and lunch cafés around the country.” ~ learn more
big ideas 📚
The great cash-for-carbon hustle. A long piece in The New Yorker digs deep into the carbon offsets market and one of its big players, South Pole. “Offsetting has been hailed as a fix for runaway emissions and climate change—but the market’s largest firm sold millions of credits for carbon reductions that weren’t real.” ~ learn more
Is nuclear power for east African countries a bad idea? Hartmut Winkler is a Professor of Physics at University of Johannesburg and a contributor to the 2023 edition of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report. He thinks the planned nuclear plants for Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya and Tanzania are a bad idea. ~ learn more
on the blockchain ⛓
The greatest marketing blitz in finance history is coming. “The bitcoin spot ETF is rumored to gain approval in early January 2024, which will kick off a global competition between financial heavyweights for billions of dollars in assets under management.” ~ learn more
profiles of people 🚶
Byrne Hobart, the unlikely oracle. “So, with the goal of attracting enough buzz to help him land writing gigs, he doubled down on writing his newsletter, then a substack on tech and finance, with an audience of around 1200, largely made of tech and startup employees. He never anticipated that it would eventually grow to a loyal 50K+ following. He definitely did not expect the shoutouts from some of the tech industry’s most admired leaders like Stripe founder and CEO Patrick Collison, writer Patrick McKenzie, and Susa Ventures’ GP Leo Polovets.” ~ learn more