Joining Andreessen Horowitz to Invest in America

I’m joining @a16z! I’ll be investing in startups that make America a more perfect union as a Partner on the American Dynamism team — and I believe there’s never been a better time to do so. When I started building high-orbit satellites at Astranis in 2019, hardware was not yet cool. SpaceX was launching only once per month; Anduril was a one-product company; Astranis had no revenue, no satellites, and no capital-markets momentum to ride. Flash-forward to 2026, and the times have decidedly changed. Astranis announced today a new, sovereign satellite program for Oman, SpaceX and Anduril are among the most successful and exciting companies in the world, and a tense geopolitical climate has reminded Silicon Valley that technology ought to support the national interest. As we head into America’s 250th year, and as I step into this new role, I decided to learn more about the past, present and future of technology’s impact on America’s trajectory as a nation. # Introducing: More Perfect. View full report at http://www.moreperfect.tech. Inside, you’ll find my framework for how the founding fathers might judge America’s progress, including: • An analysis of America’s national security in respect to existential risk, geopolitical competition, economic rivalry, and supply chain control — and why we should colonize more planets • How American welfare has trended in recent years, across health, wealth, and reported happiness — and why Americans are “thriving” but “unhappy” • An in-depth look at the quality of American domestic life, including the rights to be safe from harm & to thrive as part of a community — and which institutions Americans still trust • The status of the American Dream, both economic and personal — and why we rank highly in all democratic ideals except political stability The report also covers how I expect the next 250 years to play out. I talk at length about the two (meta-)technologies I expect to have the biggest impact on American life: • A detailed review of the current & near-future electrical grid — and how humanity went from 0.75 kWh per person per year (Roman Empire) to 150 kWh per person per year (Iceland, today) • The various bottlenecks (data, chips, power) that might stand between us and limitless artificial intelligence — and why America’s capital markets might be the difference-maker in the global race to AGI The report concludes with a vision of human life in the year 2276 — and why I think we are closer to utopia than dystopia, as long as we play our cards right. It’s a beast of a report — 350 slides — and I understand that only the biggest nerds (i.e., my favorite people) will read them all. So here’s the tl;dr: # Over the last 250 years, technology has brought America freedom, abundance, and an intact, if fraying, union. The vibes in present-day America are rather bleak. Our national conversation centers around partisanship, political violence, cancel culture, inequality, climate change, fentanyl overdoses, gun violence, collapsing fertility rates, the loneliness epidemic, the collapse of communal bonds, high housing & healthcare costs, the ballooning national debt, and the resurgence of socialism and/or authoritarianism, depending on who you ask. But the social-media screeching can fade and reality can come into clearer focus with a simple reframe: > Imagine that you had just one minute to tell a Founding Father about the last 250 years of American history. What would you say? I would start with this: The progress of our Union over the past 250 years has been remarkable. Americans are living longer and healthier lives. We have attained incredible material wealth. Our military has kept Americans safe from conflict & the free world free through two World Wars. America has immense economic power (19 of the top 25 largest companies by market cap are American), and immense cultural power (media, goods, brands, etc.). But the bad vibes above are not to be dismissed as pessimism: after looking through the data, it’s clear to me that although Americans are thriving as individuals, our union is deteriorating. Fewer homicides are solved today than fifty years ago. Three out of every four Major Defense Acquisition Programs are behind schedule. High housing costs disproportionately affect younger generations. Trust in American institutions is at an all-time low. And too many people no longer believe in the American Dream. It’s a complicated story — hence the breadth of the report: Arrows represent trends over the past fifty years. Red is bad, blue is good. # So, where does America go from here? Prediction is hard, especially about the future. There are infinitely many possible futures that could play out over the next 250 years. Some would see American innovation usher in a new era of global abundance; others would be far darker. But I fundamentally believe that prediction is on the same continuum as invention — meaning that you’d better be careful about what you predict, or it just might come true. The world bends towards clearly-articulated futures, and a common thread among the world’s best entrepreneurs is that they are phenomenal storytellers who know how to set an aspirational vision of the future. So here’s one possible future, the one that I most want to manifest: • Unlimited, clean energy — solar costs continue to fall, nuclear energy gets unshackled, the physical world electrifies, and global median energy consumption per capita rises above 350 kWh/day. (i.e., 120 TW electricity generation for the current global population, ~30x today.) • Ubiquitous intelligence — every item/appliance/system in public and private gets better at its job; machines maintain steady-state, yet ever-growing systems of abundance; humans gain immense leverage to create and explore. • High social trust — the physical world regains primacy; a sophisticated state apparatus defends the nation and keeps the public safe; abundance raises the floor of human wellbeing; communal bonds reforge. If you can help this future come to pass — or if your version of the future is even better than mine — please get in touch. I am excited to invest in America as part of Andreessen Horowitz, because I believe that technology can and will help America become a more perfect union. I am unbelievably pumped to work alongside @davidu, @KTmBoyle, @espricewright, and the team — and will wake up every morning and work hard to make that vision a reality. I hope you’ll join us, whether as an investor, a founder, a follower, or just a proud American.