How do VC's impact the world?

Often VC's tell a story. X product has a huge impact, X grew with the support of Y VC. Ergo, Y VC is changing the word. One criticism is that the successes stories are cherry picked. The narrative lacks rigor and only presents winning hands. This is a common and often valid academic criticism of people or firm who claim to consistently beat the market. 

A much more vicious critique comes from industry giant Peter Thiel, “We wanted flying cars. Instead, we got 140 characters.” The accusation is that technology starts ups have narrowed their objectives. 

The Narrowing Ambitions of Venture Capital | MIT Technology Review

Could it be that VC is only successful in industries where the innovation cycle is short? Are firms racing to the bottom on the fickle whims of uniformed consumers. Do startups matter? Definitely, maybe.

The difficulty in framing winning industries is defining which cohort's utility should be maximized. Sugar farmers at the expense of all consumers? Income earners in the lowest quartile at the expense of the top 1%? American's at the expense of Syrians? These are challenging questions that are impossible to answer theoretically. Generally growth, transparency, and freedom to enter/exit positively impact everyone.

Part 2

Mark S. Smith

Chief Innovation Officer, MedStar Health

Mark is a Medical Doctor who attended medical school at Yale University. He completed his internship at George Washington. He also has a master’s in computer science from Stanford. His unique background as a medical doctor and computer scientist gives him authority in both realms.

As co-creator of Azyxxi / Amalga clinical information system Dr. Smith understands the importance of salving the database problem of bringing together diverse patient data streams.

Dr. Smith presently heads the MedStar Institute for Innovation. He is chief intraprenour and leads the initiative to foster innovation within MedStar Health.

This role is hugely important because most organizations are programmed to minimize friction and maintain the status quo. Famously the US rail road industry at the dawn of the 20^th century failed to realize they were in the transportation business not the business of providing train travel. In the years following WWII as the population surged, train ridership plummeted.