Sam Altman, bottom right, has launched a new fund to back moonshots called Apollo with younger ... [+] brothers Max, left, and Jack, top.

Sitting at their dinner table growing up, Sam Altman and his brothers dreamed about space travel. We all grew up as somewhat nerdy math and science kids, talking about spaceships, Altman says.

Years later, when Altman served as president of Y Combinator from 2014 to 2019, his brother Max continually and loudly criticized him, says Altman, 35, for using that uniquely powerful platform in the startup ecosystem not to help moonshot startups reach lift off, but to launch wave after wave of mobile apps. Max Altman was fed up of watching doctors and PhD researchers he knew spend months working on elaborate grant proposals for $100,000 or $150,000, while entrepreneurs more plugged into the venture capital ecosystem sought out $100 million. It just seems sort of like a broken system, says Max, 32.

At Y Combinator, deep tech or moonshot companies fared better than often expected, but were relatively few and far between, says Sam. Helion Energy, working on fusion power, orbital rocket business Relativity and biotech unicorn Ginkgo Bioworks as examples. The batting average was phenomenal, there just werent enough at-bats, he says.

Teaming up with their youngest brother Jack, 31, the Altmans debated the reasons for a relative lack of such projects getting funding the projects might seem too capital intensive; their would-be founders might not have connections to venture capitalists or come from Silicon Valley circles and eventually decided to act. Theyve launched a new fund called Apollo, with the explicit goal of backing more moonshots.

How the Altman Brothers band will work: Max will run day-to-day operations and oversee Apollo fulltime. Sam and Jack Altman, who serve as full-time CEOs of two startups, artificial intelligence company OpenAI and work software business Lattice, will join Max on Apollos investment committee to approve new companies and provide assistance to its backed founders and identifying and connecting them with advisors.

Apollo will invest $3 million in businesses, taking a 20% stake in each. Founders who participate will also have the chance to participate in an optional equity exchange with other Apollo founders. The Altmans are looking to back a first beta test batch of five startups by a deadline of July 11.

Any warm introductions sent the Altmans way will be referred back to Apollos open application process, says Sam. People tend to have networks that are sort of like them, he says. If you actually want to diversity Silicon Valley, one of the ways that you want to do that is with application processes.

What will Apollo consider a moonshot project? Sam Altman points to rapid response vaccines, non-carbon energy, new approaches to education and housing. Its a kind of company that I think is really important and that has traditionally not been very well served by Silicon Valley, he says. Apollo is unlikely to back startups that are primarily software businesses, says Max, as people already play that game very well. Potentially impact will also serve as a criteria; where the startup is based, no matter how far from Silicon Valley, is not a concern.

Asked for a list of existing startups that might have been a good fit for Apollo, Sam Altman provided ten: Helion, Ginkgo Bioworks and Relativity, but also Oklo, Boom, Aspen Neuroscience, Spring Discovery, 1910 Genetics, Neuralink and Tesla.

While Y Combinator eventually added a large-sized Continuity Fund to invest in its breakout companies later in their growth, Sam Altman says theres no plan for Apollo to do so; the fund will instead work to connect and identify businesses with follow-on dollars down the road. Today representing capital from Altmans own personal wealth, Apollo has no immediate plans to take on outside investors, either.

By offering the optional equity exchange, Apollo hopes it can spread the risk felt by its entrepreneurs across its founder group, so that they work more closely together and benefit more from any collective success. Its other selling point will be its promise to match each entrepreneur who takes its investment with a leading advisor to work more closely with the startup for at least its first year. None of those leaders are lined up yet, say Sam; better to know the companies and their domains first, and match them with the most valuable potential helpers second.

A look at Altmans own personal investing portfolio Airbnb, Instacart, Pinterest, Soylent, Stripe and many others suggests those advisors could include some founders or tech executives that entrepreneurs would typically go to great lengths to meet. But Altman says its possible the sectors from which the best advisors will come could prove a surprise.

As hes described past projects, Sam Altman calls Apollo an experiment, but an exciting one. Were willing to see it totally fail. But if it works, then I think this long-held view of Silicon Valley, that only software companies work, it would be great to bust that myth once and for all.

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Altman Brothers Band: Sam Altmans Newest Project Is A Fund To Launch Startup Moonshots - Forbes