I think the world has changed.

I think people realize that we're in a new reality. Our view is investing in sort of ahead of what is the next theater? What is the thing that we need to be investing in in the next 10 years? Is that the next war is actually going to be fought in space. A couple years ago, if I had said I invested in a hypersonic weapon company in Silicon Valley, I think I would have been kicked out of the room. And in 2023, when we invested in Andreessen Horowitz, there was not a peep out of people thinking that this was terrible.

Technology is the backbone of what makes America strong, what is the envy of the world.

And if we don't apply that to our national security and our national interest, we lose a lot of that competitive nature.

This is something that I think is going to define the next 25 years of innovation in Silicon Valley.

In 1956, Lockheed Martin had six times as many employees in Silicon Valley as HP defense investment built the region.

Then the pendulum swung to software, and by 2017, Google employees were walking out

rather than work with the Department of Defense.

Three weeks after A16Z announced its American dynamism practice in January 2022, Russia invaded

Ukraine.

That changed everything.

SpaceX and Palantir alumni started founding companies focused on the national interest,

autonomous surface vessels, hypersonic weapons,

attritable systems built cheaply and mass produced quickly.

Now every venture firm in Silicon Valley is investing in defense.

The question is whether this represents a lasting category of innovation or a one-time thesis.

In this episode, we share a recording from WSJ Invest Live,

where Barron's editor at Large Andy Surwer

speaks with Catherine Boyle,

general partner at A16Z,

about why this moment will define the next 25 years of Silicon Valley.

So tell us about the American Dynamism practice at Andrewson Horowitz, which is one of the world's most prominent VC firms. And what does it mean?

...