Austin Next

The $6 trillion chemical industry is on the verge of a revolution as biology moves from the doctor's office to the industrial zone. Veronica Breckenridge, Founder and Managing Partner of First Bight Ventures, is investing in early-stage bio manufacturing companies while building the ecosystem to catalyze their growth.  We discuss the tech powering the revolution, why Houston's first principles position the region to own the sector, and how Austin's innovation can help supercharge it.
 
Episode Highlights
  • First Bight Ventures: Investing in Industrial Bio
  • Disrupting a $6 Trillion Chemical Industry
  • Scaling Platform Molecules for Real-World Impact
  • Crossing Industrial Bio’s "Valley of Death"
  • Houston’s Chemical Engineering Advantage
  • Capital Efficiency and Scale-Up Strategies
  • How AI Is Accelerating Biotech Discovery
  • Building Pilot Facilities and Collaborative Ecosystems
  • Unlocking a Texas Bio Manufacturing Hub
  • What's Next Austin & Houston?
    • "Texas should create a consortium...we're going to own bio-manufacturing" 
Episode Links
Veronica Breckenridge
First Bight Ventures

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Ecosystem Metacognition Substack

What is Austin Next?

Austin is building the new tech, cultural, and intellectual stack. The region is a living laboratory to answer a single question: How do you build a global innovation superpower?

Host Jason Scharf dissects innovation from the individual to the ecosystem. From the soundstage to the data center to the fab, we decode the mechanics of Austin's innovation ecosystem.

As Atoms, Bits, and Intelligence converge, we explore how Hard Tech scale, digital velocity, and creative density collide. This is an audit of the future. We map the physics of the flywheel so builders and investors can navigate the chaos.