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Back to Thrive Capital's Bet on Neuralink, OpenAI & the Future of Medicine, with Nworah Ayogu.

Why Is Drug Discovery Moving Faster Than Ever?

Nworah Ayogu said that, more so than at maybe any other time in history, the frontier of science and the frontier of what has been accomplished is moving faster than ever. The explosion of artificial intelligence and drug discovery is changing the way drugs will be delivered and made, and the change will also run through the entire value chain.

Artificial intelligence labs already sent needs around compute, memory, and energy through the entire supply chain. Biotech will follow the same path, and the path is not just drug discovery. It will be manufacturing, development, how clinical trials are done, and commercialization. N of 1 medicine is the ability to create a customized treatment for an individual and to treat conditions that could not be treated before. Customized treatments have already occurred and have already had an effect, with more of them still to come. The remaining marker is an intersection between hardware and biotech that unlocks treatments people could not unlock before. Neuralink and Fortel are two of the companies named, and the problems they are solving, plus the capabilities they allow, are almost biblical in proportion.

Transcript

Thrive Capital's Bet on Neuralink, OpenAI & the Future of Medicine ·

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More from this episode

  1. What Do Drug Discovery Models Actually Get Right?Drug discovery models have gotten better and better at the first job: choosing a molecule that binds a chosen target well.
  2. How Does Neuralink Give Paralyzed People Function Back?Nworah Ayogu said healthcare often does a very good job of extending life and does not do a very good job of improving quality of life or giving people life…
  3. Why Is Neuralink More Interesting Than SpaceX?Nworah Ayogu called Neuralink a more interesting company than SpaceX, because the brain is vaster than space. "A $3 trillion company?"
  4. How Did One Merck Drug Outearn Every Major Lab?Nworah Ayogu said Keytruda, one Merck drug, had 2025 revenue larger than the revenue of all the major labs combined. Biotech is already big business.
  5. How Did OpenEvidence Reach Two Thirds of Doctors?Nworah Ayogu said OpenEvidence spread because doctors wanted it. Nworah Ayogu said he had never heard doctors rave about a clinical tool.
  6. What Is the Price of One Child's Life?Nworah Ayogu said medicine can now treat rare genetic problems one patient at a time, and said a million and a half dollars to make and deliver a treatment is…
  7. How Did Oscar Health Recover From a 95 Percent Drop?Oscar Health, the first company Thrive ever invested in, fell 95% from its peak value in December 22. It then climbed back above its IPO price.

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