Blake Byers

I work on projects that can positively bend the arc of humanity over multiple generations, or are just fun, ideally both.

Please reach out of you have ambitious ideas. My email is not that hard to find. Twitter @byersblake.

Investing

I am an avowed generalist investing as Byers Capital. I’ve generated large multiples on companies across personal finance, cancer treatments, quantum computing, blood screening, and enterprise software.

My current investments include superintelligence, mathematical reasoning, coding agents, scaled drug development, brain computer interfaces and human longevity.

  • Neuralink - Series B. Brain computer interfaces. Cofounded by Elon Musk.

  • NewLimit - Series A. Longevity. Cofounded by Brian Armstrong, Jacob Kimmel and me.

  • Factory - Seed. AI coding agents. Cofounded by Matan Grinberg.

  • SpaceX - Growth (2018). Multi-planetary humans. Cofounded by Elon Musk.

  • Xai - Series A. Understand the universe. Cofounded by Elon Musk.

  • Harmonic - Series A. Mathmatical superintellegence. Cofounded by Vlad Tenev.

  • Vial - Series A. Clinical drug development at scale. Cofounded by Simon Burns.

  • Xaira - Series A. AI drug discovery. Cofounded by Marc Tessier-Lavigne.

  • Chai Discovery - Series A. In silico drug creation. Cofounded by Jack Dent and Joshua Meier.

  • The Bot Co - Seed. AI powered robots for your home. Cofounded by Kyle Vogt.

Extending Human Healthspans (aka, give you 20 more years of healthy life)

I co-founded NewLimit with Brian Armstrong (CEO and co-founder of Coinbase) and Jacob Kimmel to radically extend human healthspan. Our focus is on partial epigenetic reprogramming as a mechanism for age reversal, starting with immune and liver cells. Even if we stopped at more functional immune systems and metabolisms, the impact on humanity would be immense. But we’re aiming for much more—over the next few years, we plan to expand our efforts to many additional cell types.

Already, we’ve found a way to restore youthful function in aged liver cells. This breakthrough has shifted our perspective on the likelihood of success, and we’re now highly optimistic that aging is a plastic, reversible cell state.

We’re looking for team members in functional genomics, computational biology, machine learning, software engineering, and general operations. If you’re passionate about transforming the future of health, come join us!

Past Experiences

Google Ventures: I was a Partner at Google Ventures for a decade. I invested in 38 companies, 10 of which have gone public, 7 have been acquired, 17 are still active and 4 have shutdown.(1) I joined Google Ventures soon after the founding and helped grow the firm from a $50M fund to a $2.5B fund. My early stage investments while at GV included:

  • Robinhood - Seed. Nasdaq IPO. Mobile trading.

  • IonQ - Series A. Nasdaq IPO. Quantum computing.

  • SOFI - Series B (personal). Nasdaq IPO. Neo bank.

  • Forty Seven - Series A. Nasqad IPO, Acquired for $4.9B. Cancer therapies.

  • Denali - Series A. Nasdaq IPO. Neurological therapies.

  • Arcus - Series A. Nasdaq IPO. Cancer therapies.

  • Grail - Series A. Acquired for $7B. Blood test for cancer screening.

  • Armo - Series B. Nyse IPO, then acquired for $1.6B. Cancer therapies.

  • Gusto - Seed. Last round at $10B. Payroll and benefits platform.

  • Kensho - Seed. Acquired for $550M. Finance AI.

Academic Research: I’ve published papers with over 2000 citations across atherosclerosis, neurodegenerative diseases, and transplantations of optogenetically controlled human neurons. I first fell in love with basic research while moonlighting in a Stanford University chemistry lab as a high school student. I continued doing basic research during my undergrad years at Duke University, during my Ph.D. at Stanford University and finally published my last paper a couple years into my time at Google Ventures.

(1) Investment metrics as of Summer 2024