How To Build If… It’s Time To Build?

Author: Bilal Zuberi (Lux Capital) URL: https://medium.com/lux-capital/how-to-build-if-its-time-to-build-f5294d5eb9d One-line: A practitioner’s response to Andreessen’s “It’s Time to Build” — agreeing on the imperative but laying out six concrete hurdles that keep deep tech from attracting mainstream investment.

Key Highlights

• Written as a direct response to Marc Andreessen’s It’s Time To Build essay (April 18, 2020), which Zuberi calls “likely to be remembered, discussed, and cited as much as Marc’s last seminal essay ‘Software is Eating the World.’”
• Lux Capital is one of the few large VC firms that has routinely invested in deep tech / hardware: DesktopMetal, Saildrone, Zoox, AirMap, Anduril, Recursion, and others.
• Six hurdles keeping deep tech from mainstream investment:
  1. Lower margin — hardware companies realistically target 40–50% margins, not the 70–80%+ of software. VCs must recalibrate what “successful” looks like.
  2. Long sales cycles — large buyers in infrastructure/defense buy through intermediaries and established primes; startups need purchase orders, not just grants.
  3. Complex supply chains — COVID exposed the fragility of globally distributed hardware supply chains; need resiliency premiums, distributed manufacturing, local sourcing.
  4. Regulatory hurdles — hardware, autonomous systems, healthcare, and security are regulated; need fast-track mechanisms akin to FDA Emergency Use Authorization.
  5. Capital intensity — R&D, manufacturing, and distribution of physical products require staged financing and larger syndicates to share the risk.
  6. Fewer acquirors — without big tech as acquiror, exit multiples are lower; more small-company IPOs would open liquidity.
• The closing call: Inaction on building the things we need to survive natural or human-caused disasters is not an option. “I am ready. Lux is ready. Are you?”

How It Connects

• It’s Time To Build — Marc Andreessen’s manifesto this piece responds to; the shared premise is that the West must want to build physical infrastructure.
• Lux Capital — Zuberi’s firm; the piece is also a portfolio showcase and thesis statement.
• Anduril Industries — named as a Lux portfolio company (modern defense systems).
• Technological Innovation — the core argument: deep tech is the next frontier; software-only investing has left critical infrastructure unbuilt.
• The Build-Nothing Country — Noah Smith’s later diagnosis on why we stopped building.