Jul 15, 2017 · 53m · a16z
Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this Andreessen Horowitz Academic Roundtable session, Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon discuss the evolving relationship between academic computer science, university technology transfer, and venture capital innovation. They explore strategies for commercializing research, expanding CS education into multidisciplinary fields, and building successful founder-led startups.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. How this is scored →
The host as informed peer 3.8 Guest teaching 3.5 Guest disagreement 1.6 The host pushing back 0.6
speaking balance: gold is the host, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 3:48 Marc attacks hypocritical media columnists
Marc forcefully calls out media commentators who write contradictory columns claiming technology is simultaneously useless and societal ruin, calling their view slightly too cynical.
Hardest push from the host ▶ 26:04 Chris challenges pop culture startup narrativesChris directly rejects the popular cultural framing that startups originate from a single board equation or isolated patent epiphany, emphasizing that execution and recruitment dominate real startup creation.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 13:20 Marc introduces C.P. Snow's 'Third Culture'Marc educates the host and audience by adapting C.P. Snow's 1960s essay on the 'Two Cultures' to explain how computer science can integrate with and transform liberal arts disciplines.
The host holds their own ▶ 47:06 Chris explains VC market mechanicsChris demonstrates deep venture capital expertise by correcting the audience's premise, explaining that unlike public stock markets, startups choose their investors based on firm reputational value.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The host as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The host pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Shift in CS Academia: Practical Skills vs. Pure Theory | 2 | 4 | 1 | 0 | Chris Dixon sets up a broad question on how university academia interacts with VC and startups. Marc Andreessen shares his historical perspective from Mosaic/NSF days and details the shift in CS departments from pure theory/PhD focus to practical industry skills. | |
| Evaluating Silicon Valley's Impact: Are We Tackling Big Problems? | 3 | 4 | 4 | 1 | Chris asks about the critique that Silicon Valley avoids big problems. Marc aggressively dismantles mainstream media commentary, pointing out that journalists write contradictory columns accusing tech of both doing nothing useful and destroying society simultaneously. | |
| Why Stanford and Berkeley Excel & University Commercialization Models | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | Chris asks why Stanford and Berkeley excel at university spinouts. Marc outlines the porous boundary and philanthropic flywheel model, while Chris actively contributes expertise on why startup investors care little about university patents compared to team talent. | |
| Early Computer Science Education and C.P. Snow's 'Third Culture' | 2 | 6 | 1 | 0 | Chris asks about early CS education initiatives like New York City's public school push. Marc educates the audience by adapting C.P. Snow's classic 'Two Cultures' essay to argue for a 'Third Culture' where CS intersects with liberal arts. | |
| The Intersection of Computer Science with Biology and Medicine | 2 | 4 | 1 | 0 | Chris invites Marc to expand on the intersection of CS and biology. Marc explains how a new generation of scientists who grew up programming is fundamentally transforming biomedicine and quantified health. | |
| Actionable Advice for University Computer Science Programs | 2 | 3 | 1 | 0 | Chris asks for practical advice for CS professors wanting to foster entrepreneurship. Marc provides tactical suggestions regarding VC connectivity, founder alumni networks, and top-tier tech firm relationships. | |
| Q&A: Avoiding the Primary Pitfall in University Spinouts | 6 | 3 | 2 | 2 | An audience member asks about common failure points in university startups. Marc highlights the part-time professor/mediocre CEO trap, while Chris asserts strong domain knowledge by debunking pop-culture startup myths like single-patent epiphanies. | |
| Q&A: Developing Student Leadership and Business Skills for Engineers | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | A professor asks about developing student leadership. Marc jokes about MBAs looking for engineers in computer labs before recommending business training within engineering schools, while Chris adds examples like Waterloo's co-op program. | |
| Q&A: Tech Trends, Mass Media Nerds, and Regulatory Obstacles | 5 | 2 | 1 | 0 | An audience question about macro trends leads Chris and Marc to jointly detail exciting sectors like VR, drones, microsatellites, and Bitcoin. Chris articulates how tech nerds now control mass media through internet platforms. | |
| Q&A: University Intellectual Property, Patents, and Tech Transfer | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | An audience member asks about university IP and patent licensing. Marc warns against draconian university licensing offices, while Chris shares his own experience trying to persuade Columbia administrators to adopt liberal IP policies. | |
| Q&A: Contrarian Investing & 'Good Ideas That Look Like Bad Ideas' | 6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | An audience member asks about contrarian investing. Chris takes the lead in explaining how VC market dynamics differ from public markets because top founders choose their VCs, and Marc elaborates on why big company blindspots create opportunities for bad-looking good ideas. |
Statements from this episode (21)
Andreessen: Mosaic web browser development was entirely funded by the NSF
“My work at University of Illinois around Mosaic, which later became Netscape was all, was NSF funded.”
Andreessen: NSF rejecting customer support funding catalyzed the founding of Netscape
“We applied for NSF funding to basically build a customer support team. And they informed us very kindly that that wasn't part of what NSF funds. So that was a good catalyst to go start a company”
Andreessen: CS departments have shifted focus toward practical industry skills
“The biggest change is just we have a sense for a lot of the universities we deal with that the computer science departments have a much I mean, they still want to breed PhDs and professors, but a much bigger focus on practical impact in industry and, you know,…”
Andreessen: Media hypocritically claims tech is both useless and excessively disruptive
“Nobody attempts to ever reconcile those two critiques and the same commentators will literally write both critiques. In, like, different columns, you know, two weeks apart, without ever attempting to reconcile them.”
Andreessen: Physical-world engineering advances much slower than software
“I think it's a fair critique, and I think this is the part of Peter Thiel's critique that I agree with. It's a fair critique that there are many fields that are not moving as fast as they could. And in particular fields, you know, applications of computer scie…”
Dixon: Patents are never core to Andreessen Horowitz's startup investments
“We, you know, for example, when we make investments, we ask about patents, but it's like a side item. Like, it's never actually core to any investment, because anyone who's built a company knows it's a dynamic process.”
Andreessen predicts continuous full-body biological monitoring will become standard
“Whereas in the future, I, we just think it's gonna be standard that you're gonna know everything's happening in your body, and you're gonna know your blood work, and you're gonna know your genome, and you're gonna know your biome, and you're gonna know your MR…”
Andreessen: Only 3 to 5 scale-ups absorb top tech talent per generation
“In any given generation of companies, there's three or four or five that are kind of clearly top of the heap. You know, kind of have, you know, they're kind of at scale and are doing very interesting, important things but have not become kind of classic big co…”
Andreessen: Part-time professor founders are top failure mode for university spinouts
“There's a very clear failure case which is the dominant failure case that I think that we see which is The professor has the idea. The professor starts the company but with no intention of going full-time at the company. The professor runs the company or gets …”
Dixon: Startup success is 90% recruiting top product and engineering talent
“What startups really are is a dynamic process that probably, you know, 90% of it is frankly recruiting a great product and engineering team, and What we find is only, just empirically, is it only great Product engineering people are able to recruit those peopl…”
Andreessen: Early startups require five years of 18-hour days to succeed
“There is no substitute. The big takeaway, and this applies to everything we fund, and it's what we work on all the time, there is no substitute to the first five years of people in the office, 18 hours a day, six days a week, grinding away. And it's grinding a…”
Andreessen: VCs prefer engineers who learn business over MBAs hiring engineers
“The much better model is for the engineer to have the business skills for the engineer to be a top flight engineer, but also have the business skills to be able to start a company, and then the engineer hires the MBA as, you know, the head of marketing, or the…”
Dixon: University of Waterloo produces highly sophisticated engineering graduates
“See, like, Waterloo's a great example of that, where they, I think they have a, it's like they have a crazy number, like six or plus internships over their four years of undergrad. The whole sort of, it's deeply integrated, sort of, working in industry and wor…”
Andreessen: Tech companies expand internships to lock in graduates early
“And so in the last five years alone in the valley, the tech companies have hugely increased their focus on their internship programs. And basically the goal is to get all of your best students as interns and then be able to basically get them locked in at leas…”
Andreessen: Global early-adopter tech market now starts at 50 million people
“A subtle but important thing that's happened in the last 20 years is the market of early adopters now is now very large. And so, and I just, like, look at it numerically, like, the number of total internet users in, like, 1999 was maybe fifty million people. A…”
Dixon: Tech nerds control mass media because the internet is mass media
“The funny thing, the thing to remember about nerds is that nerds now control mass media, because the internet is mass media.”
Andreessen: Software expansion is increasingly colliding with government regulations
“More and more, the interesting things that are happening is computer science gets applied to more fields. More and more, we're hitting the real world which is to say we're hitting real world regulations we're hitting real world laws, we're hitting real world p…”
Andreessen: Deep hardware patents are far more valuable than software patents
“Like, what I would argue is, like, the further down the stack, the more useful the patents are. Like, patents at the level of chips or radios you know, can be, or, you know, I don't know, memory or something like that can be incredibly valuable. Patents at the…”
Andreessen: Draconian university licensing offices can kill early startups
“I have seen cases, and I've lived through cases, where the universities take a very draconian view on this, and the university licensing office has this just highly inflated view of the value of what they're going to be licensing, and they can kill companies i…”
Dixon: VC differs from public equity because founders choose their investors
“Venture capital works very differently than the public stock markets, for example, where it's not here we just sort of decide, okay, let's invest in this company. A lot of it is, frankly, the entrepreneurs drive the process and decide who do they want to work …”