Mike Edelhart, AlleyWatch

Mike Edelhart

AlleyWatch

San Francisco, CA, United States

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Recent:
  • Unknown
Past:
  • AlleyWatch
  • Entrepreneur

Past articles by Mike:

Covid and the Winter of Our Discontent

What is an entrepreneur (last time I looked, entrepreneurs are people, too, subject to all the slings and arrows of human experience) to do during a dark moment like this? How can an emerging business move forward when everything is locked down? → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Microbiome

Scientific exploration of the microbiome represents the opening of one of the greatest new areas of science in decades, perhaps centuries. It has the potential to rival Einstein’s impact on physics or the double helix on understanding biology. While young, this area shows historic potential across a dizzying expanse of health and human experience. → Read More

Quotes to Entrepreneur By: Hope in the Time of Covid

It has been a long year. It feels like several long years, actually, jam-packed into a few dreary months. Locked down, cooped up, hemmed in, beset by a profusion of woes, wary of illness and peeking between our fingers to see what fresh Hell comes next. 2020 hasn’t been a romp in the sun. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Neuroscience

Neuroscience has always been a focus area for Social Starts and Joyance Partners and should continue to be due to the large and clear unmet need. Stress, anxiety, mental illness, and their associated impacts are at all-time highs. People seem desperate for solutions. Science points toward many potential new approaches. We also recognize that there … → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Market-Based Education

Education is part of health and happiness as a means of intellectual and financial empowerment and as a vector for delight. Happiness can be enhanced by the acquisition of new skills. Where education was once the province only of formal institutions and largely as part of long-term pedagogical programs, today education is becoming a pure consumer product. It is available by the course, by the… → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Longevity and Aging Economy

Longevity and Aging Economy will be one of the core investment areas for Social Starts for the remainder of 2020. Longevity ties strongly into Health and Happiness: “Healthspan”—the number of years a person can expect to live with full health and no activity limitations—is an emerging concept in this area and should stand at the … → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: FemTech

Women supporting women in everything related to being women is a growing and inexorable worldwide trend. This is manifestly truly related to health and happiness, where the worldwide female 51% is demanding new and better approaches to every part of their lives. In that forceful expression of ascendency, we see a singular investment opportunity. This … → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Health Tech

Because of the inextricable tie between health and happiness, there exists an equally strong connection between happiness and health. Now, powerful new science is opening whole new categories of products capable of contributing to happiness. Therefore, we see Health Tech as a central investment focus area. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Health and Happiness Digitally-Native Vertical Brands

We believe that successful digital brands have these characteristics... → Read More

Individual Health in the Time of the Pandemic

Mike Edelhart of Social Starts walks us through some observations on how COVID-19 has impacted trends from a VC's perspective. → Read More

Why we are Strong in the "Mighty Middle"

Many venture funds believe they can predict what is going to happen next and where. They invest based on that certainty, focusing in specific regions, or on specific types of tech, or, commonly, both. At our funds, we know it’s impossible to predict exactly what is going to happen next or where. Instead, we study … → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: XR in Health

We have been interested in XR for Health for some time. This year, however, we think the time has come for these technologies to take a great step forward. In the past, we viewed it purely through the lens of other areas of science. Now, in 2020, XR for Health is officially an independent focus area for us. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Life Sciences, Part 2: A Framework for Deep Science Startups

Our last post explained how we are looking at Life Sciences investment this year. But the challenges of life science demand more than merely an appropriate organization. We have to change the way we think about investing to be effective here at the earliest stages. We have to approach deep science companies differently than we … → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Life Sciences, Part 1

Life Sciences are the heart of health. New approaches in bio, microbiome, treatments, disease prevention, neuroscience, and pharma propel transformation in care. As such, life sciences stand at the heart of our fund’s focus on individual health and happiness. We have been investing in life sciences since 2016 when we started Joyance, our initial health-focused … → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Individual Robotics

Robotics, for us, means devices that replicate or augment a previously human-delivered activity through direct interaction with humans or human systems. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Emergent Community

SocialStarts VC discusses the concept of emergent communities and how they differ from community in the past and how it relates to investment ideas. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Esports/Gaming SaaS

We see a single seam in Esports and gaming content that has true venture scale. We call it Esports SaaS. Esports SaaS companies have these characteristics. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Affordable Luxury and High Emotion Consumer Products

VC Mike Edelhart shares why he is looking at opportunities in the affordable luxury (aspirational) product space and consumer goods derived from deep science with high emotional content. → Read More

Where We Are Investing Now: Next-Gen Food, Ingredients, and Beverages

Health and happiness science is one of the most profound investment opportunities in decades. We feel it is natural and appropriate to make the most of the transformation of these core human experiences in all our current and upcoming funds. → Read More

Our New Fund: Social Starts Health and Happiness (SH2)

SH2 is the only venture fund focused on the emerging science of individual health and the delivery of happiness. → Read More