Dear friends,
A few weeks ago, I shared the story of the first 1,000 days of Deep Tech Catalyst.
130 episodes, more than 2,500 minutes of conversations, and nearly three years spent approaching the same question from different angles:
What does it really take to turn a scientific discovery into an investable and scalable company?
That was the question I started with.
Coming from the world of science, I had quickly discovered that proving a concept could work was only the first step.
The entire journey was far more complicated.
It meant navigating an intricate landscape shaped by capital, customers, economics, procurement, manufacturing, regulation, and decisions made almost invariably with incomplete information.
Deep Tech Catalyst was created to explore that territory.
Over the next 130 conversations, however, something happened that I had not expected.
I came away with two main insights from my research and from your feedback:
Despite my decision to approach Deep Tech from a generalist perspective (sector-agnostic, stage-agnostic, and geography-agnostic) I found that there are recurring patterns in how resilient ventures are designed and built. In that sense, my original assumption was right. And I’ll continue moving in that direction.
Simple but not obvious: “investability” is the result of an evolving picture of a smart sequence of decisions. In Deep Tech, there are many crossroads, and uncertainty is high. So moving the focus closer to them and providing a couple of practical ideas each week that you can carry with you as markets shift, supply chains break, or circumstances demand speed sounded like a good way to proceed.
For example:
What happens when the first meaningful numbers start showing up on the P&L?
Which decisions matter most when the company begins to expand? Where should the company concentrate its resources and attention?
How do you manage team growth when it is time to scale?
In other words, the mission of Deep Tech Catalyst must become broader.
Meanwhile, the landscape and the market are changing as well.
Deep Tech holds a very different position today than it did when I started this project in 2023.
Technologies and companies that once sat at the edges of many venture conversations are increasingly connected to industrial capacity, economic resilience, infrastructure, energy, defense, supply chains, and the competitive position of nations.
That makes the conversation far more interesting. But it also raises the bar for what I want Deep Tech Catalyst to become.
So over the past few weeks, I have been working hard on its next chapter.
I went back to what I had learned. To what had worked. To what I now want to explore.
I reconsidered the questions. The visual design. The areas where it makes sense to go deeper. The kinds of experience worth bringing into the discussion.
Even the way Deep Tech Catalyst should look and feel today.
Some of the changes will be visible immediately. Others will probably reveal themselves only over time.
And there are a few things that, I admit, I would very much like to tell you about already.
I’ll resist. For one more week. :)
Below, you can see our new logo. Consider it the first signal.
Behind the scenes, new conversations are already taking shape, along with a few things I have wanted to bring into Deep Tech Catalyst for quite some time…
For now, they will stay there.
Next week, I’ll start showing you why.
For the moment, all I can say is that I’m genuinely happy to see Deep Tech Catalyst back in motion.
And I’m looking forward to seeing what the next 130 conversations will teach both me and you.
See you next week!
Warmly,
Nicola
P.S. This next chapter of Deep Tech Catalyst will bring quite a few other things with it. If you know someone who spends much of their time somewhere between technology, company building, industry, and capital, this is probably a good moment to bring them along!