[beakerbreaker]

I'm curious what you mean by bankable here? While I'd agree that there is idealism, it seems like reasonable efforts to cut through the catch-22 of funding nascent ideas (exemplified by the old chestnut about getting funding for work already done to do your new work under the table) and making stable career positions for folks who don't want to become a PI. I'd like to see what this really looks like after a couple years, but it doesn't seem completely naive.

[rscho]

I mean that the way we assess research output in the current system makes curiosity a liability. This means that even if investors are interested, the scientific community will judge the output from this institute as inferior. Except if the curiosity part is just for show, which I strongly suspect. Investors want results.

[beakerbreaker]

I broadly agree, and it's clear they are limiting the scope of curiosity to some directed areas and the long term research agenda makes me think there is an expectation of more directed follow-up. "Curiosity" is likely code for "many more 'fishing expeditions' from low friction funding with the expectation that the likely low hit rate will still have reasonable number of repeatable, translatable findings after eight years". I would personally wager that is correct.

It will be interesting to see the output of this funding mindset more reminiscent of VCs but with a timespan that biological research programs require.