On building a healthcare franchise in a generalist fund with Julia Hawkins, GP at LocalGlobe & Phoenix Court.
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On building a healthcare franchise in a generalist fund with Julia Hawkins, GP at LocalGlobe & Phoenix Court.
Few come as highly recommended as Julia. Join us for this conversation to see exactly why and make sure to read Julia's show notes for a wealth of insights ✍️
Today, we have Julia Hawkins with us. Julia is a General Partner at Phoenix Court, a $1.5bn AUM EMEA multi-stage tech investor, backing the most ambitious founders on their journey from seed through to public markets and beyond over the last two decades. LocalGlobe is the pre-seed and seed fund investing out of Phoenix Court’s Fund 12 with an established portfolio of over 200 companies with notable investments including At-Bay, Motorway, Zego and Improbable. At Phoenix Court, Julia focuses on health and hard tech and led investments into AccuRx, Oxford Nanopore, Vaccitech, and more recently Spore Bio and Early Health.
Table of Contents | Scroll ⏬ for all guest show notes ✍️
This episode is brought to you in partnership with — Zero One Hundred.
A unique and curated setting for private equity and venture capital LPs and GPs from across Europe and the rest of the world to unite and build meaningful relationships.
00:00:00 Welcome to the European VC Podcast with Julia Hawkins
00:00:26 Diving Deep into Phoenix Court and Multi-Stage Investing
00:04:22 Julia Hawkins' Journey into Venture Capital
00:15:44 The Impact of Personal Experiences on Professional Paths
00:18:27 Exploring the Future of Hard Tech in Europe
00:34:09 Exploring Healthcare Innovations and Community Impact
00:34:33 The Unique Approach of Local Globe in Healthcare Investments
00:35:25 Building Relationships and Community in the Healthcare Sector
00:44:21 Mentorship and Diversity in Venture Capital
00:52:47 Advice for Emerging VCs
✍️ Show notes
We always ask our guests to write tweet-style notes for the conversation so we can share them with you all afterwards. These are the words of the guest, no alterations made. Feast.
Julia’s journey into venture
For my journey to venture, I’d like to call out 3 people and events which have shaped my journey.
One: my mum.
My mum comes from a very small town in Sweden, she is the 11th sibling of 12, when her dad died when she was 9, she got a scholarship to study in Stockholm and she has dedicated her life to opening Sweden’s borders for trade. I was raised mostly by my mum and my older sister.
My mum got a job working for EFTA and we moved to Geneva when I was 8 years old, and I started going to an international school
This was pivotal, my mum’s determination gave me an education that taught me about seeing the individual.
I was in the same class as Saddam Hussein’s niece and she was my friend
Two: the admissions officer at LSE.
I wanted to study government at LSE
I didn’t get in when I first applied, but got on a plane, went to London to knock on the physical admissions’ office to say I really wanted to study here, felt very aligned with the values of LSE and that I thought I would belong here, was there anything they could do for me.
She said, have I considered social policy and government?
I ended up studying social policy and government which I loved, and I learned so much at LSE, not only that a no can turn into a yes.
It led me to finance as I was inspired by the impressive women who came to speak to us from Goldman Sachs. My first job was on the trading floor in fixed income (I actually turned them down and did 2 summer internships, which I am also grateful for)
The person who introduced me to tech was actually not Saul, but Danny Rimer. When I was at Goldman I reached out to Danny and asked if he could introduce me to Last.fm as I thought Last.fm was the most amazing thing on the internet. Music recommendations based on what you had previously listened to!!! This ended up being a pivotal experience in my journey in understanding what it actually means to work for a very early stage venture backed company.
I met Saul the first time when I was at Last.fm, but he became more pivotal when I was at Universal Music.
Saul Klein.
I had joined Universal Music as I thought I could change how labels work with start-ups, I love music and felt that technology was playing such an important role in improving access. Last.fm had a phenomenal European exit, but didn’t reach its full potential (like Spotify) because it didn’t embrace working with labels and because it was predominantly built for hardcore music fans, not the masses.
At Universal Music, I thought that one way to have impact was to set up a Corporate venture arm.
Saul didn’t actually think a CVC was a good idea, and he made me see that in order to have the sort of impact venture capital can have, I needed to be inside a fund, where the main thing is investing.
One night I saw LG put out a tweet saying they were hiring more partners, I applied
There are many people who helped me get here. Founders (Rafe, Sofar Sounds; Roland, Roli) Co-investors (Daniel, Balderton) and LPs (Joanna at Chicago), and being a Kauffman Fellow.
But my First Believer was Saul, and I will be forever grateful to have been part of building this platform.
Pivotal moment.
A pivotal moment for me was when my daughter was born 9 years ago, she was very poorly and was diagnosed with a rare genetic condition when she was 8 months old.
The experience of navigating health systems to get to her diagnosis, finding our way to the right clinical team, identifying all researchers globally with any interest in her condition, reaching out speaking to them, finding and building a community of other patients and families with the same condition, setting up a charity and building a registry of health data and samples.
It was mind boggling to me how challenging every step was.
It opened my eyes to a massive $10T global market, where countries like the UK spend 10% of GDP on healthcare, up to 20% for countries like the US.
I saw huge potential for technology to improve every aspect of healthcare from early diagnosis to care delivery to clinical trials, as well as using data-driven approaches to develop new treatments.
It shaped me as an investor because it gave me an interest in a vertical that I knew nothing about, and over time it has showed me a blue print for how to develop a thematic approach to investing.
I turned my personal experience into mission, and I set out to make investments that improve healthcare experience and enable more people to live full and healthy lives.
Take a stance.
Hard tech is Europe’s next big thing.
So, I do think that hard tech is the next big wave to come out of Europe
I don’t think anyone disagrees with the macro trends about talent, spin-outs, a large category, very resilient, with many emerging pools of capital including government support.
Staffan’s main criticism was about the nutty professors not being able to build big businesses, and I want to share 3 examples:
Oxford Nanopore - portable next generation sequencing
It took 16 years from lab to listing. Oxford Nanopore was spun out from Hagan Bayley’s Chemistry lab at Oxford University in 2005 along with Gordon Sangera CEO, and Spike Wilcox, CBO.
It then took 12 years to get to product market fit. The Minion, the 1st portable commercial sequencing device was first available commercially only in 2015.
We think this is a company that over long term - as biology, software and data converge - can be at least as significant as ARM
There was a nutty professor, but also Gordon as CEO, John as CFO and Zoe McDougall in Strategy, these are world class operators, swinging for the fences.
Automata - lab automation company, during COVID helped a single Trust to increase tests from 1,000 per day to 100,000 per day.
Mostafa - Architect. After his undergrad and masters, trained with Zaha Hadid where he was the Lead Designer
Saw the need for automation and robotics to be applied in other sectors outside of architecture.
Initially focused on manufacturing affordable robotic arms, now he’s on a mission to transform how scientists work, delivering industry-changing automation solutions that lead the way in quality design and engineering.
Comind - non-invasive brain monitoring.
James - we met him when he was 17. From a small town in Yorkshire. Started programming at 13 years old, became interested in machine learning, taught himself TensorFlow, applied it to detect skin cancer from photos of the skin.
Following a death in his family, he became obsessed with understanding how the brain works.
Didn’t go to University, became a Thiel Fellow, 2022.
The first product is a medical device which helps triage and monitor traumatic brain injuries, which impacts millions globally.
We know that Hard Tech founders are yearning for investors who “get it” - I think we need more investors who want to be there for them:
Access to long-term capital. We know patience is key and that the inflection points are less obvious.
Deep sector expertise and in particular help to find Technology Market Fit as well as Product Market Fit.
I believe the most valuable companies of the next 20 years emerging from Europe will be science based and multi-disciplinary and can well be DJ Collins and Thomas Heatherwick building Early Health or Amine, Mohamed and Maxime building Spore Bio.
Shout-out.
Shout-out to Bruce Golden, co-investor in Moshi, children’s wellness app.
Bruce is the Chair, LocalGlobe have been investors in MindCandy since 2004, when Latitude invested in 2020 I joined as a Director.
Bruce has been a partner at Accel for many years, and was based both here in London and now in SF.
I am grateful to Bruce for his mentorship and partnership.
He taught me about conviction, and what it looks like in another investor.
His clarity of thought, long term thinking, applying principles and values to govern decisions, when to be slow versus quick has been a masterclass that has been a privilege for me to see up close.
Moshi’s journey has not been straight-forward, several pivots and leadership changes. Bruce’s conviction has been unwavering.
I hope that I can repay my debt of gratitude that I have to Bruce in providing similar mentorship to the next generation of investors.
3 biggest life learnings
Personal learnings.
Values. Be clear about your own values and your firm’s values and use these to make decisions.
Turn poison into medicine. Your biggest challenges will become your most important teachers. And winning over these challenges will be the most rewarding progress you can make.
Having conviction feels uncomfortable. You will do the work to build conviction, you will work with your team and you can make the case, the largest outcomes will come from those bets where there was not consensus, and so for me it will always feel scary.
VC learnings.
Founder splits are very common and are not a death sentence. Founders who make tough decisions quickly (and fairly) move faster. Don’t try to please everyone, do what is best for the company.
Don’t optimise for valuation, optimise for partner fit. Raising at high valuations doesn’t equate to long term success.
Pre-seed to seed company building blocks are similar across sectors, but healthcare companies also need to be considering regulation and healthcare GTM.
Trust and agency are critical in the Founder-investor relationship. Trust means you can come and share problems earlier than a 999 call. Agency, it’s the Founders’ company, and they make the decisions.
Discipline leads to freedom. Some of the best Founders I work with are ex-military, ex-athletes or have deep faith.
Advice to 10 year younger self
There is literally no challenge you cannot overcome. You will have many disagreements and struggles in relationships. Use your courage, wisdom and your voice to overcome them.
It’s kind to be clear. A quick and friendly no doesn’t have to be an art form.
It doesn’t have have to be perfect, you just have to start. The word YET will change your life.
You can be yourself and still win.
Top tips for fundraising emerging managers across Europe
I love working with emerging managers and they play such an important role in the innovation ecosystem.
Like all of us, continue working on your edge. Make sure you see everything within the theme you’re focusing on and articulate your value proposition to Founders. Karl at BlackSeed, Jamie McFarlane at Creator Fund and Chris at Atria do this exceptionally well. For example, Chris gets into very good companies because he has a strong value proposition, helping Founders with their pharma GTM.
Track your investments closely and write thorough memos. Best in class here is Ramzi at No Label.
Broaden who you would target for investment. Consider raising from angels, family offices, and VCs who are aligned with your thesis. Listen to Gloria Bauerlein’s EUVC podcast on how it’s done.
Develop deep relationships with follow-on investors. Carmen at Cocoa is phenomenal and Izzy at Outsized also does this well.
Most counterintuitive learning in venture
I would never have thought that location mattered so much. But our decision to base ourselves in Somers Town, in a building owned by the council, has become our super power and I couldn’t imagine being based anywhere else.
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On building a healthcare franchise in a generalist fund with Julia Hawkins, GP at LocalGlobe & Phoenix Court.