Bill Maris
Bill Maris
Bill Maris is a venture capitalist and the CEO at GV, a venture capital firm established by Maris and funded through Alphabet. With approximately $2.4 billion under management and investments in Uber and Nest, the six-year-old fund is described as one of the hottest in Silicon Valley. Maris oversees all of GV’s funding activity and has a particular interest in next generation life sciences and artificial intelligence. He was instrumental in the formation of Google’s Calico project...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBusinessman
CountryUnited States of America
VC firms are... responsible for the full life cycle of a company: they find it, help it grow, open up a Rolodex, and sell it.
You make a great investment in the consumer Internet, maybe you make a lot of money and create something useful, interesting, or fun. But in life sciences, you have a chance to be part of something that lets people live longer and healthier and not lose the people they care about. That is really profound.
We actually have the tools in the life sciences to achieve anything that you have the audacity to envision. I just hope to live long enough not to die.
As life expectancy extends beyond 80 years in some parts of the world, more people are struggling with brain diseases. For older people, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and other conditions become a major impediment to quality of life.
The reality is the technology exists now to extend life and have people live healthier, happier lives. Not to be kind of immortal - that's not what I'm talking about.
I'm interested in the ideas that sound a little crazy, such as radical life extension, curing cancer, being able to create a simulation of the human brain and map every neuron.
We're looking for people who are working on things that seem out of reach, uncomfortably difficult.
Time is the one thing I can't get back and can't give back to you.
The reality is regulation often lags behind innovation.
The reality is if you were going to die tomorrow, and someone offered you another 10 years, most people would take those 10 years.
Silicon Valley has been a technology capital like New York is a financial capital.
Organizing healthcare information is a daunting task, but it is not an impossible task. We've had people walk on the moon. This is a lot more doable.
If I'm an entrepreneur, and I have a term sheet from Sequoia and Kleiner, that's the safe choice. Google Ventures is the brave choice.
I'm not bothered when other VCs start hiring great designers or start recruiting. That's the direction I'd like it to go.