Andreessen Horowitz initially made no healthcare-related investments.
Mostly true True in substance, wrong in a detail.
Factual: Statements about the present or the past, checked against the record: did they hold up?
The second judge said mostly false; the verdict shown is the first judge's.
Said for an organisation they lead or work for; it counts on both records.
What would count as true or false
Judge as of 2018-01-01. True: records show Andreessen Horowitz made no healthcare-related investments in its early period, starting from its 2009 founding, before it later moved into healthcare/bio (for example its first bio fund in 2015). Records could be a16z portfolio lists, fund announcements or dated deal reports. Mostly true: early healthcare investments were negligible, such as one or two marginal health-adjacent deals, so the claim of no healthcare focus at the start substantially holds. Mixed: the firm made several healthcare deals early on but had no healthcare practice or fund. Mostly false: the firm made clear, notable healthcare investments in its first years, though healthcare was a small share. False: healthcare investments were a significant part of a16z's activity from the start.
Set before the research began.
Evidence (12)
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E1 Why Marc Went From 'We'll Never Do Bio' to Betting on Bio Founders | Andreessen Horowitz Andreessen Horowitz (a16z Podcast transcript) · 23 August 2019 Own record
“So, in the early days of the firm, you famously said that you won't see a16z investing in bio and in healthcare. And that's obviously changed.”
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E2 Why Marc Went From 'We'll Never Do Bio' to Betting on Bio Founders | Andreessen Horowitz Andreessen Horowitz (a16z Podcast transcript) · 23 August 2019 Own record
“What we started to see about six years ago around 2012, probably 2013, is a new kind of founder show up.”
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E3 Andreessen Horowitz Gets A New GP, And A New Fund | TechCrunch TechCrunch · 18 November 2015
“It's the first sector-focused fund for Andreessen Horowitz, which is halfway through its main fund, a $1.5 billion vehicle that it announced in March of last year.”
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E4 Andreessen Horowitz - Wikipedia Wikipedia
“Chokkattu, Julian (August 18, 2014). "uBiome Raises $4.5M From Angel Investors, Andreessen Horowitz To Crowdsource Microbiome Research". TechCrunch.”
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E5 Why Marc Went From ‘We’ll Never Do Bio’ to Betting on Bio Founders | Andreessen Horowitz Andreessen Horowitz (a16z Podcast transcript) · 23 August 2019 Own record
“So, in the early days of the firm, you famously said that you won't see a16z investing in bio and in healthcare.”
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E6 Andreessen Horowitz - Wikipedia Wikipedia
“In 2013, Andreessen Horowitz invested in Clinkle, Coinbase, Databricks, Lyft, Oculus VR, PagerDuty, Pixlee, Ripple, Soylent, Swiftype, and uBiome.”
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E7 Andreessen Horowitz - Wikipedia Wikipedia
“It was founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz.”
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E8 Andreessen Horowitz - Wikipedia Wikipedia
“In January 2022, Andreessen Horowitz raised $9 billion for its venture capital, growth-stage, and biotech-focused funds.”
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E9 Mobile Health Startup Massive Health Gains $2.25 Million | TechCrunch TechCrunch · 2 February 2011
“just announced $2.25 million in funding from Andreessen Horowitz, Charles River Ventures, Felicis VC, Greylock Discovery Fund and Mohr Davidow Ventures as well as unnamed angel investors.”
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E10 uBiome Raises $4.5M From Angel Investors, Andreessen Horowitz To Crowdsource Microbiome Research | TechCrunch TechCrunch · 18 August 2014
“uBiome raised $1.5 million from angel investors and $3 million from Andreessen Horowitz.”
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E11 Andreessen Horowitz Starts $450M Tech-Heavy Bio Fund | Chief Healthcare Executive Chief Healthcare Executive · 20 December 2017
“The move follows the firm’s initial $200 million bio fund, which it created in 2015, in pursuit of projects that stood to disrupt medicine through machine and deep learning.”
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E12 Andreessen Horowitz AI Wiki (aiwiki.ai) · 28 October 2026
“A $200 million first bio fund in 2015, followed by a $450 million second bio fund in 2017”
Reasoning
Independent reports show a16z made at least two health-related investments before its first sector fund: E9 reports it took part in a $2.25M round for the mobile health startup Massive Health in 2011, alongside several other investors, and E10 reports a $3M investment in the microbiome company uBiome in 2014. E3 and E11 show that a16z's first dedicated bio fund came in 2015, its first sector-focused fund. These early deals are few and health-adjacent rather than a healthcare practice, so the claim of no healthcare investing at the start largely holds, though not absolutely.
Cite this claim
Marc Andreessen, “Andreessen Horowitz initially made no healthcare-related investments.” (said 1 January 2018). Verdict: mostly true. Reliability API, claim c_d605771bd7b2, method 0.1.0+c876030c, dataset release v1.1.2. https://epistacklabs.com/claims/c_d605771bd7b2
This claim is in dataset release v1.1.2, with the same verdict.
Reply to this claim
More factual claims by Marc Andreessen
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Mostly true
“One is Substack, and I’m super proud of those guys because they started from scratch and declared right up front that they were going to be a free speech platform.”
Substack started from scratch and declared up front that it would be a free speech platform.
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Mostly true
“I joined the board there in 2007 so I've seen everything in the last almost 20 years every step of the way.”
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Mostly true
“Peter flatly says the iPhone doesn’t count as innovation.”
Peter Thiel flatly says the iPhone does not count as innovation.
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Resolved true
“And we’ve now done an almost complete 180 on that.”
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Mixed
“One of the first things I did when I went to the University of Illinois was start working in a research lab, at the university's physics research facility.”
Verdicts are made automatically; how verdicts are made.