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Pharma & Healthcare
Covers pharmaceuticals, biotech, medical devices, diagnostics, healthcare systems, and increasingly AI applied to drug discovery and healthcare. Drug development is long, complex, and science-driven. Understanding the biology, chemistry, and clinical pipeline behind a company tells you more than its balance sheet. This category analyzes pharmaceutical and biotech opportunities through a science-first lens — from molecule to market — so you can read the opportunity before the stock price moves.
1,451 AI Medical Devices, Two Real Winners: The Truth About AI in Medtech
The FDA has cleared 1,451 AI medical devices since 1995. Only two have ever proven they actually change what happens to a patient — everything else has proven it's accurate, not that it matters.
Jul 19
The Medtech Moat AI Can't Easily Break
AI is changing medical technology in two opposite ways. Using Abbott's cardiovascular devices and Intuitive Surgical's robotic platform as case studies, this article shows how AI strengthens the core switching-cost moat while gradually eroding the vendor-specific software layer surrounding it.
Jul 19
AI Won't Save Medtech From Pharma — It Might Make the Gap Worse
Artificial intelligence is transforming both pharma and medtech—but not in the same way. This article explains why AI reinforces pharma's patent-based competitive advantage while offering only limited moat expansion for most medical device companies, and what that means for long-term investors.
Jul 19
Inside a Pharma Bet: From Science to Revenue
Casgevy's climb from $10 million to a projected half-billion in revenue looks like one decision. It's actually six — and the same stack explains almost any pharma company's next move.
Jul 16
The Acquirer's Playbook: How a Pharma VP Actually Chooses What to Buy
What actually happens inside a pharma company before a $10 billion acquisition gets announced? This piece maps the real decision framework — build vs. partner vs. buy, the screening checklist, and why a target's leverage is easy to underestimate — using real negotiations like Novartis's standoff with Avidity Biosciences.
Jul 15
The Target's Playbook: How a Startup Actually Gets Acquired by Big Pharma
Getting acquired well isn't luck — it's the result of decisions made years earlier. Using SEC filings from Seagen, Avidity Biosciences, and Verona Pharma, this piece walks through exactly how founders identify the right buyer, price their asset, and negotiate from strength instead of desperation.
Jul 14
AI Can Out-Invent Big Pharma. It Still Can't Out-Build It.
AI in pharma is often described as one trend. It's really two, and it only wins one on its own merits. In drug discovery, AI directly attacks the problem of finding the right molecule, letting small teams compete with giants using nothing but data and talent. In drug manufacturing, AI can't shortcut anything, since it depends on years of proprietary production data that only exists once a company has already built an expensive facility, for reasons that have nothing to do wit
Jul 10
From Pills to Living Cells: Why Pharma Builds So Many Kinds of Drugs, and How Complex Each One Really Is
From a chemically synthesized pill to a patient's own genetically engineered living cells, drug modalities span an enormous range of manufacturing difficulty. This article explains why the pharmaceutical industry needs so many different approaches in the first place, then ranks every major modality, from small molecules to gene therapy, by how hard it actually is to build, and why.
Jul 10
Antibody-Drug Conjugates: Why Big Pharma Is Betting Billions on the Hardest Drug to Build
Antibody-drug conjugates are among the most complex drugs ever built, combining an antibody, a chemical linker, and a toxic payload into a single guided-missile therapy for cancer. That complexity hasn't stopped pharmaceutical giants from spending tens of billions of dollars chasing the technology. This article breaks down why ADCs are so hard to manufacture, why Japan's Daiichi Sankyo has built the strongest platform in the field, and how a newly approved bispecific ADC out
Jul 10
Who Funds What: A Map of Startup Capital from Angel to Wall Street
Angel checks range $25K-$350K, VC spans $500K seed to $200M late-stage, PE requires $50M+ ARR — and investment banks aren't investors at all. A full map of who funds what, at each stage, and how to actually reach them.
Jun 22
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