← Start with Part 1: Course Drift
Part 2 of Navigation & Drift
Wake vs. Direction
Why past progress can obscure future risk.
A boat’s wake tells you where it’s been.
Not where it’s going.
I see this in biotech fundraising all the time.
Founders spend most of the pitch talking about:
• what they’ve accomplished
• the data they generated
• the technical hurdles they overcame
And those things matter.
But increasingly, investors are asking a different question:
“What happens next?”
How does this scale?
What breaks first?
What are the sources of technical or commercial risk?
What milestones actually de-risk the business?
What does the path to commercialization look like?
In tighter markets, past progress alone isn’t enough.
Investors want confidence that the team understands the path ahead – not just the ground already covered.
Your wake proves movement.
Your roadmap proves direction.
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