My name is Ashwin Varma and I’m a student at Rice University and an aspiring venture investor. This website is my dedicated place write about corporate strategy, venture investing, and the overall movements of markets, specifically related to the healthcare and biotechnology sectors.
Analogous to the method in which Ben Thompson of Stratechery transformed commentary on the technology industry, I hope to publish content that provides a bit more context and insight to the day-to-day bustle of the notoriously opaque healthcare industry, context that will ideally give individuals a better understanding of why certain events are important and how investors think about them.
I’m hoping to cover a wide variety of topics, including:
- Novel therapeutic technologies and the companies attempting to commercialize them. CAR-T, bispecific antibodies, CRISPR, traditional gene therapy - they’re all fair game. And as I mentioned before, I’m hoping to give them not just a scientific, but commercially-focused analysis that takes a peek beyond the press release to give you an investors viewpoint.
- The ongoing attempt to use technology to transform the healthcare system - a.k.a digital health.
- The venture ecosystem, specifically the dynamics of financing innovative biopharma, medical device, and companies operating in the healthcare vertical.
- General theories of competitive dynamics and innovation. I’m interested in understanding why new companies exist, what conditions make it possible for new companies to succeed at the behest of incumbents,
A little bit more about me
I’m currently a student at Rice University, where I study statistics, focusing on Artificial Intelligence and Computer Vision. I’m also a Rice-Baylor Medical Scholar, so if all goes well I should be at Baylor College of Medicine getting my MD soon enough! This past summer I was a venture analyst for Santè Ventures, a firm operating in Austin that invests in a variety of life-sciences companies, including medical device and therapeutics companies. You should head over and give their portfolio a look – they’re invested in a variety of really cool companies. Prior to that I also interned at CareSet Systems, a health-technology consulting company headed up by Fred Trotter, a legend in the health-technology community. I’m also a Venture Partner at Contrary Capital, a seed-stage fund that is attempting to find the next great university-sourced startups. We’ve already invested in some great companies like Cortex Healthcare and the Additive Rocket Corporation. Need funding? Drop me a line at av40@rice.edu and let’s chat!
Enjoy!