Summary
The core message of the session is that scientific capability is accelerating faster than the healthcare, regulatory, manufacturing, and commercial systems built to turn discoveries into products. The opening contrast is stark: a single new drug now takes well over a decade and about $2.6 billion on average to reach market, while AI materials companies can rise from $250 million to $2.6 billion in valuation in nine months. Julia, general partner at Phoenix Court, frames this as the gap she has been investing in for nine years: science is moving at AI speed, but clinical trials, pharma batch processes, and healthcare economics still move far more slowly.
Key Topics
5 key topics from Julia Hawkins at Bits & Pretzels 2026 | Founders Festival in Munich. Thicker branches were mentioned more often in the talk.
Key Takeaways
- Invest where impossible technologies have just become hard.
- Validate frontier science by speaking directly with academics and technical experts.
- Assess what systems must change beyond the science itself.
- Look for founders pulling infrastructure, regulation, and economics forward.
- Target markets where changed economics unlock previously impractical science.
“the science has outrun the system that we built around it.”
Julia Hawkins
General Partner; Moderator•Phoenix Court Group
Up Next
Next in agenda
Energy Tech 2.0: Price and Resilience, Not Purpose
Also on venture capital
When Will Quantum become Mainstream?
Also on venture capital