Brainwaves by Burak Büyükdemir
Field notes from 26 years of investing in early-stage startups.
October 30, 2026
20 startups, 6 picks
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I went through many applications and emails in September and October, and decided to meet 20 of the founders.
Eleven of them were in bio and health. I did not plan it that way. It is simply who is building right now.
Here are six I want to tell you about. I am not going to say which ones I invested in, or if I did at all. Just take a look.
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01
Verustruct · USA 🇺🇸
Robots that build the concrete walls of a house on site, with the plumbing and wiring already inside. The robot rides on top of the wall it is building and uses ordinary concrete. The founder led the structure for the Polaris Dawn spacewalk at SpaceX. It matters because housing is short almost everywhere, and the slowest, most expensive part of a house is still people pouring walls by hand.
www.verustruct.com →
02
HarborSite · USA 🇺🇸
A spinout from George Church's lab at Harvard. An engineered enzyme adds a whole new gene at one safe spot in the genome, so a single treatment can last for life. They start with rare childhood liver diseases, and four large pharma companies are reviewing the data. It matters because most gene therapies today are either imprecise or temporary, and this one tries to be neither.
www.harborsite.com →
03
SCRY Bio · Canada 🇨🇦
Molecular computers made of DNA that run AI directly on a sample. No power, no lab equipment. It sounds like science fiction. It matters because if testing no longer needs a lab, it can happen anywhere a sample can be taken.
www.scrybio.ai →
04
Deleon · USA 🇺🇸
A Georgia Tech spinout that turns Mars-rover chemistry into a bathroom device. A cheap disposable chip reads amino acids from a daily urine swab, building a day-by-day record of how your metabolism reacts to food, exercise and drugs. It matters because medicine today mostly sees you once a year, on the day of your blood test.
deleon.bio →
05
EnergyBank · New Zealand / Norway
Energy storage at floating offshore wind turbines, with data centers placed right next to them and cooled by the ocean. It matters because AI's real bottleneck is no longer chips. It is power and cooling, and this puts both in the same place.
energybank.nz →
06
PlayAlong TV · USA / UK
A smart TV app that makes real game shows playable. You answer along with the contestants on shows like Family Feud and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, with your remote or your voice. Founded by a former Netflix and Ubisoft product lead. It matters because everyone already shouts answers at the TV. Now the TV can hear them.
playalongtv.com →
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If you know a startup I should meet, send it to me. A warm intro, a company you saw last week, anything. I read every one myself.
I will be in San Francisco in the first week of November. If you are there, let me know.
Which one would you fund? Hit reply.
Next time I will share how you voted, and which one I would pick :)
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P.S. Two new videos.
Understanding investors is sometimes hard. Founders speak one language, investors speak another, and both sides love their jargon. I don't. So I started VC Translator, short videos that put what investors say into plain, simple words. The first one asks a question every founder has: when do VCs actually invest?
And a longer one: Everything About Evaluating Startup Ideas in 10 Minutes. If you have an idea and wonder whether it is worth the next few years of your life, start here.
 VC Translator · Short
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 Startup ideas · 10 min
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