Hard Problems I Want to Back in 2022
Photo by Marek Piwnicki on Unsplash
Last year I wrote a post outlining a bunch of areas that I was interested in exploring through founder conversations. While I wrote the piece to simply collect my thoughts, it turned out to be one of my more popular posts (low bar) and actually led to a good amount of dealflow. I’m pleased to say I was even able to check a couple problems of my list through a few investments.
With a new year underway I thought I would once again revisit my Hard Problems list and refresh it for 2022. As before, I am a proud anti-thesis investor and try not to form strong views of what the future will look like. Instead, I spend my time exploring problems that intrigue me and hope to find inspiration in the future that founders want to build. This list is meant to be a beacon to early stage or even prospective entrepreneurs: if you’re working on any of these, please reach out.
Climate
Producing biodegradable / carbon neutral packaging materials
Eliminating battery friction from EV adoption
Creating and enforcing non-governmental carbon taxation
Establishing effective and trustworthy carbon markets
Introduce industrial-grade carbon sequestration
Data & Infrastructure
Enabling cost-effective and humane harmful content moderation
Ensuring the authenticity of video media
Protecting data ownership and portability*
Enabling machine-to-machine micro-economies*
Enabling quantum-native applications
Eliminating semiconductor supply constraints
Transitioning to a modern data stack
Manufacturing & Logistics
Establishing anti-fragile supply chains
Ensuring supply chain authentication*
Eliminating marine shipping congestion
Allow effective reshoring
Enabling in-orbit manufacturing
Healthcare
Unlocking precision medicine
Instilling price transparency and patient choice*
Removing employers from care coverage
Reinventing pharmaceutical development
Shrinking clinical trial timelines
Post COVID Workforce
Redesigning hiring / onboarding / culture for remote-first orgs
Redesigning remote-first enterprise sales
Creating financial liquidity for employee stock options*
Solving international tax compliance
Launch the self-employed / creator economy for developer talent
* I have a working view that this can only be solved via a Web3 native solution