Business Of Biotech
By: Ben Comer
Language: en
Categories: Business, Management, Science, Life
The Business of Biotech is the pod dedicated to leaders of emerging biopharma firms. SUBSCRIBE to our new newsletter at www.bioprocessonline.com/bob. We bring you insight into organizational, finance and funding, HR, clinical, manufacturing, regulatory, and commercial challenges you’ll face as you navigate your company from an idea to success in the clinic and beyond. Each episode features guest commentary and best practices from accomplished founders and biopharma industry luminaries. The Business of Biotech is produced by Life Science Connect.
Episodes
Transforming Chronic Kidney Disease With ProKidney's Bruce Culleton, M.D.
Dec 15, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Bruce Culleton, M.D., CEO at ProKidney, talks about moving from academic research to industry and the role a key mentor played in his career path. Bruce discusses his experiences as a first-time CEO at ProKidney, a late-stage autologous cell therapy biotech focused on pioneering new treatments for chronic kidney disease (CKD), the benefits of FDA's Regenerative Medicine Advanced Therapy (RMAT) designation, how delaying or avoiding kidney dialysis would be a game-changer for CKD patients, and more.
... Duration: 00:55:36Engineering B Cells With Immusoft's Sean Ainsworth
Dec 08, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Sean Ainsworth, CEO and Chairman at Immusoft, talks about transitioning from the research bench to entrepreneurship, his M&A experiences as a biotech founder, and why engineered B cell therapies offer a better, more patient-friendly administration for lysosomal storage diseases currently treated with enzyme replacement therapies. Sean also discusses FDA pathways, incentives, and agency engagement, and offers thoughts on the regulatory outlook for cell and gene therapies.
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Duration: 00:53:51Building A Cancer Pipeline In A Molecule With Actuate Therapeutics' Dan Schmitt
Dec 01, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Dan Schmitt, President and CEO at Actuate Therapeutics, talks about building a company around elraglusib, a GSK-3β inhibitor for cancer. Dan describes his fast-fail approach to early product testing and development, using basket trials to evaluate chemotherapy combinations, and choosing pancreatic cancer as a lead program. He also talks about surviving an IPO during a brutal funding cycle for biotech, building lean teams and efficient operations, and potentially onshoring API in response to changing U.S. policy.
... Duration: 00:51:25Biotech Collaboration Strategy With IGI's Cyril Konto, M.D.
Nov 24, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Cyril Konto, M.D., president, executive director, and CEO at Ichnos Glenmark Innovation (IGI) talks about the promise of multi-specific antibodies, funding the company during the 'biotech winter,' closing a $700 million upfront licensing deal with AbbVie, the impact of China's rising biotech sector, and the keys to successful collaboration. Cyril also discusses IGI's focus on developing innovative therapies for emerging markets, and the shift from animal models to in silico modeling in preclinical research.
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Duration: 00:58:41Biotech Funding And IPO Temperature Check With Create Medicine's Allan Shaw
Nov 17, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Allan Shaw, Chief Financial Officer and Chief Business Officer at Create Medicines, is back on the Business of Biotech this week, with a temperature check on biotech funding and the IPO market. We discuss the implications of recent blockbuster acquisitions, strategies for managing the current funding environment for biotech, what to look for in the IPO market in the coming months, alternative financing opportunities, and what besides lower interest rates might bring generalist investors back into the sector.
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Duration: 00:57:01Funding Tips And Moving From R&D To Commercial With Madrigal Pharmaceuticals' Mardi Dier
Nov 10, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Mardi Dier, CFO at Madrigal Pharmaceuticals, talks about building relationships in investment banking and investor relations before moving into business development and becoming a chief financial officer. Mardi describes how drug companies transition from an R&D focus to commercializing products, how to read IPO windows and manage expectations, pricing new drugs, and balancing commercial efforts with pipeline renewal and maintenance.
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Duration: 00:46:11Emerging From Stealth With Vima Therapeutics' Bernard Ravina, M.D.
Nov 03, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, we're speaking with Bernard Ravina, M.D., CEO at Vima Therapeutics, a company that emerged from stealth in May with $60 million Series A financing to develop an oral candidate for dystonia, a movement disorder. Ravina talks about transitioning from government and academic medicine to industry, partnering with Atlas Ventures and defining the company's thesis, the reasons behind working in stealth mode and when to emerge, and the clinical plan and potential for VIM0423.
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Duration: 00:42:48BoB in South Florida: Rich Daly, Catalyst Pharmaceuticals
Oct 27, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode — the last of our four-part series focused on South Florida — we catch up with Rich Daly, CEO at Catalyst Pharmaceuticals, a member of Life Science Leader's editorial advisory board and Miami-based location host for our in-person series. Rich talks about Catalyst's rare disease strategy built on operational excellence (including how to select a rare disease special pharmacy), his criteria for selecting de-risked, differentiated, and accretive products for rare diseases, partnering outside the U.S., and what new incentives Florida politicians could create to h...
Duration: 00:31:47BoB In South Florida: Anthony Japour, M.D., iTolerance
Oct 20, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech -- part three in a four part series recorded in-person at Catalyst Pharmaceuticals' Miami headquarters -- Anthony Japour, M.D., CEO at iTolerance, talks about his work as a physician treating infectious diseases, his CEO role in diagnostics at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, what he learned working as a medical director at a large CRO, and iTolerance's work toward a cure for Type 1 diabetes that doesn't require chronic immunosuppression. Anthony also provides insights on overcoming...
Duration: 00:33:34BoB In South Florida: Daniel Teper, NAYA Therapeutics
Oct 13, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
In this week's episode of the Business of Biotech -- part two in a four-part series recorded in-person at Catalyst Pharmaceuticals' Miami headquarters -- we're speaking with Daniel Teper, an entrepreneur and most recently, founder and CEO at NAYA Therapeutics. Based in South Florida, NAYA is developing NK-engaging bifunctional antibodies and Astatine-211 radiopharmaceuticals targeting hepatocellular carcinoma. Daniel discusses the company's decentralized manufacturing strategy, the current funding climate for early-stage companies, his plan to conduct clinical trials in China, and what's unique about the South Florida life...
Duration: 00:33:08BoB In South Florida: Raquel Cabo, Miami Biotech Collective
Oct 06, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
The Business of Biotech is on location in Miami this week! For the first episode in this four-part series on the biotech scene in South Florida, Raquel Cabo, Founder and President of the Miami Biotech Collective, talks about her experiences as a member of the founding team at Ovid Therapeutics, why South Florida needed an organization to connect regional drug developers, what Miami offers to biotech companies and operators, and what gaps in the South Florida life sciences ecosystem still exist.
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Duration: 00:34:58The Business Case For Health Economics And Outcomes Research With ISPOR's Rob Abbott
Sep 29, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Rob Abbott, CEO of ISPOR, explains how startup and early-stage clinical drug development companies benefit from conducting health economics and outcomes research (HEOR), and not just with patients and commercial payers. HEOR, viewed as a strategic lever as opposed to a compliance exercise, can help answer investor questions about market differentiation, pricing pathways, and real world product validation. Abbott talks about the value of cost-of-illness studies, burden-of-disease analyses, and payer landscape assessments, and how AI, real world...
Duration: 00:57:58Cannabinoid And Psychedelic Combinations With Incannex Healthcare's Joel Latham
Sep 22, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Joel Latham, President and CEO at Incannex Healthcare, talks about developing cannabinoid and psychedelic combination therapies for conditions as diverse as sleep apnea, rheumatoid arthritis, and generalized anxiety disorder. Joel walks through his funding strategy for the publicly-traded company, his desire to lead in a new category of medicine, and what comes next.
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Duration: 00:57:27Dye Drug Conjugates For Cancer With Lahjavida's Lyle Small
Sep 15, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Lyle Small, Founder and CEO at Lahjavida, a dye drug conjugate start-up, talks about creating the famous color-changing technology that turned the mountains blue on cold Coors Light beer cans, to launching a dye-drug conjugate startup developing targeted cancer therapies. Small talks through Lahjavida's early preclinical work and the ongoing animal studies he hopes will secure an IND filing by 2027, his experience with scaling up manufacturing of new technologies, and his approach to leadership and company culture.
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Duration: 00:58:25Investing In The Biostack With Modi Ventures' Sahir Ali, Ph.D.
Sep 08, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On the Business of Biotech this week, Sahir Ali, Ph.D., founder and general partner at Modi Ventures, a family office investing at the intersection of technology and biology, talks about adapting the Markowitz model to improve returns and balance risk, his concept of the "biostack" for making direct investments into life sciences companies, and the revolutionary potential of scientific super intelligence. Ali explains why Houston, Texas is an underrated ecosystem for life sciences, and what AI will mean for medicine and the future of healthcare...
Duration: 00:57:54Improving Cardiovascular Outcomes With Immediate Therapeutics' Atul Deshpande, Ph.D.
Sep 01, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Atul Deshpande, Ph.D., CEO at Immediate Therapeutics, talks about partnering with American cities to conduct clinical trials during ambulance rides to the hospital, with the goal of preserving heart function and reducing mortality related to acute cardiovascular events, including heart attacks. Deshpande reflects on his previous experience developing and commercializing Dupixent at Sanofi, describes the history and mechanism of Immediate's glucose-insulin-potassium (GIK) candidate, IMT-358, and explains why there is more to intellectual property than just patents.
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Duration: 01:04:36Building A Biotech Incubator And Accelerator With Swiss Rockets Founder And CEO Vladimir Cmiljanovic, Ph.D.
Aug 25, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, ex-handballer Vladimir Cmiljanovic, Ph.D., Founder and CEO at Swiss Rockets, talks about co-discovering bimiralisib with his sister Natasa Cmiljanovic, Ph.D. (and COO at Swiss Rockets), losing his company to a hostile takeover, buying the company back, and building out Swiss Rockets as an incubator with manufacturing capabilities and shared scientific expertise. Swiss Rockets' portfolio of companies is developing radioligand therapies, vaccines, and cancer treatments, including bimiralisib for actinic keratosis. Cmiljanovic also discusses U.S. expansion plans, partnering, and funding strategies...
Duration: 00:52:07Biotech Product Partnership with Coya Therapeutics' Arun Swaminathan, Ph.D. and Dr. Reddy's Milan Kalawadia
Aug 18, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Milan Kalawadia, CEO, North America, Dr. Reddy's Laboratories, and Arun Swaminathan, Ph.D., CEO, Coya Therapeutics discuss their unique partnership to develop COYA 302, a novel dual-mechanism immunotherapy for the treatment of ALS. The partnership pairs Coya's scientific expertise with Dr. Reddy's manufacturing and commercialization capabilities, putting Coya in a financial position to advance development activities and commercialize COYA 302 upon FDA approval, and providing Dr. Reddy's -- a generics, biosimilars, API, and OTC manufacturer -- with an opportunity to pivot into innovative branded...
Duration: 00:52:37How To Hire And Build A Winning Executive Team With Occam Global's Bill Holodnak
Aug 11, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Bill Holodnak, Cofounder and CEO of Occam Global, a life sciences executive recruitment firm (and occasional investor), shares insights from his decades of experience pairing executives with drug development companies, and talks about the psychology of successful biotech leadership. From building an advisory board to the sequencing of executive hires, such as CSOs, CMOs, CBOs, and CFOs, as a company grows, Holodnak offers specific tips to help founders and investors create leadership teams capable of winning the "slow motion roulette" business of...
Duration: 00:58:11The Generalist Biotech CEO With Seekyo's Oury Chetboun
Aug 04, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Oury Chetboun, co-founder and CEO of Seekyo, a French biotech, talks about the range of experiences that prepared him to lead a company focused on developing innovative solid tumor treatments that target functional proteins in the tumor micro-environment. Chetboun talks about raising money for preclinical research and navigating the valley of death between research and clinical development, accessing French innovation funding and angel networks, how click chemistry can produce therapies at a lower cost compared to antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), and the potential...
Duration: 00:52:03Innovating On The Frontier Of Radiopharmaceuticals With RadioMedix's Ebrahim Delpassand, M.D.
Jul 28, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Ebrahim Delpassand, M.D., founder, CEO, and chairman of the board at RadioMedix talks about his personal journey standing up and growing a radiopharmaceutical company focused on oncology. Dr. Delpassand discusses the current trends in radiopharmaceutical drug development, the differences between alpha- and beta-emitting isotopes, overcoming manufacturing and supply chain challenges and restraints, and building strategic partnerships with companies like Curium, Fusion (now part of AstraZeneca), and Sanofi. He also offers specific advice to physician-entrepreneurs interested in building their own drug development c...
Duration: 00:54:07Building An Efficient Biopharma With South Rampart Pharma's Hernan Bazan, M.D.
Jul 21, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Dr. Hernan Bazan, M.D., co-founder and CEO at New Orleans-based South Rampart Pharma, talks about building an ultra-lean drug development company to address an unmet need observed in his own patients as a surgeon: safe treatments for acute pain. Dr. Bazan explains his strategy for building value through small raises and no full-time salaried employees, co-founding the company with his father -- a scientist and director of the Neuroscience Center of Excellence at Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center -- and...
Duration: 00:45:41The Business And Science Of Obesity With Roger Cone, Ph.D., Founder Of Courage Therapeutics
Jul 14, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Roger Cone, Ph.D., Founder and Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board at Courage Therapeutics, talks about discovering obesity-related protein receptors in the brain, how he spun his academic discoveries out into a biotech company developing new obesity drugs, the need for obesity treatments with fewer side effects than currently available GLP-1 therapies, and the value of pairing scientific leadership with a strong business partner as CEO.
This episode of the Business of Biotech is brought to you by Ecolab.
BoB Live At BIO: Amber Salzman, Ph.D., Epicrispr Biotechnologies
Jul 07, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
This week's episode is one from the road, recorded in front of a live audience in Boston's Seaport neighborhood during the BIO conference (special thanks to MasterControl for making it happen). Amber Salzman, Ph.D., CEO of Epicrispr Biotechnologies (aka 'Epic Bio') explains how epigenetic editing is revolutionizing genetic medicine by controlling gene expression, without cutting DNA like traditional CRISPR technologies. Amber talks about FSHD, a progressive muscular dystrophy, how the company raised $68 million in Series B funding despite challenging market conditions, her partnership with Springbok...
Duration: 00:32:56How To Be A Policy Advocate For Biotech With NewYorkBIO's Jennifer Hawks Bland
Jun 30, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Jennifer Hawks Bland, CEO of NewYorkBIO, shares insights on New York State's life sciences ecosystem while reflecting on her journey from Capitol Hill to biotech advocacy. Her experiences in politics, law, and biopharma government affairs uniquely positions her to navigate complex policy challenges while creating opportunities for biotech upstarts across New York and beyond. Jennifer also highlights key programs, capabilities, and funding on offer to early-stage biotech companies.
This episode of the Business of Biotech i...
FDA Trials And Tribulations With Connect Biopharma's Barry Quart
Jun 23, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Barry Quart, CEO of Connect Biopharma, weighs in on the current state of engagement between drug developers and the FDA, and how that key relationship continues to evolve under new leadership. Barry also discusses moving the company from China to San Diego, why a U.S. financial reporting structure helps attract investors, and how Connect is finding the white spaces in respiratory disease -- the company's lead candidate is a biologic drug targeting acute asthma and COPD exacerbations.
Proactive Procurement Strategies For Biotech With Tom Wells
Jun 16, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Tom Wells, Director of Life Sciences at 4C Associates, reveals why -- and how -- smart procurement practices can make or break emerging biotech companies during critical growth stages. Tom shares insights into procurement tools and strategies that can deliver breakthrough solutions, how poor procurement practices can damage investor confidence, and why thinking about procurement as the front end of demand flow, not the back end of supply chain, can help drug developers avoid costly mistakes.
The Discovery Of Microbes And Implications For Public Health Today, With Science Writer Thomas Levenson
Jun 09, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Thomas Levenson, MIT professor and author of So Very Small: How Humans Discovered The Microcosmos, Defeated Germs — And May Still Lose The War Against Infectious Disease talks about what he learned in the writing of So Very Small, how cultural and political forces shape scientific progress, and what it means for drug developers, public health officials, and patients everywhere.
This episode of the Business of Biotech is brought to you by Avantor. For more information, visit avantorsciences.com
Psychedelics For Mental Health Disorders With atai's Srinivas Rao, M.D., Ph.D.
Jun 02, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Dr. Srinivas Rao, co-founder and CEO at atai Life Sciences, explains how his engineering background led him to the development of psychedelic compounds for treating depression, anxiety, and other mental health disorders. Internal drug development efforts at atai are focused on short-duration psychedelics that can work within existing healthcare infrastructure, with the potential to transform the treatment of mental health disorders. Rao also talks about atai's hub and spoke model for investing in other psychedelic companies, what MAPS/Lykos Therapeutics got wrong...
Duration: 00:55:50Biotech Angel Investing With Yaniv Sneor
May 26, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Yaniv Sneor, founder of the Mid Atlantic Bio Angels and CEO at Native State Therapeutics, explains how life science angel investors evaluate biotech startups, and offers tips for young drug developers in search of funding. Our conversation covers how to create a successful pitch, red flags for potential investors, the importance of angel investing syndicates, the sweet spots for exit timelines and funding amounts, and why it still makes sense to invest in biotech over other industry sectors.
This episode of...
Duration: 00:56:27Leading A tRNA Startup With Alltrna's Michelle Werner
May 19, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode, Michelle Werner, CEO at Alltrna, talks transfer RNA (tRNA) therapy with host Ben Comer and guest co-host Anna Rose Welch, editorial and community director at Advancing RNA. Werner explains why a single engineered tRNA therapy has the potential to treat "hundreds, if not thousands," of rare genetic diseases, and how her own child's rare disease diagnosis shaped her career and approach to drug development. Werner also discusses Alltrna's use of AI and machine learning for drug optimization, the company's planned use of...
Duration: 00:59:23Executing A Product Pivot With Vir Bio's Mark Eisner, MD
May 12, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Dr. Mark Eisner, EVP and Chief Medical Officer at Vir Bio, talks about the company's post-COVID pivot into infectious diseases (Hepatitis Delta and Hepatitis B) and oncology (solid tumors), how he reprioritized the company's development candidates and assimilated Sanofi's acquired T cell engager platform, and his own transition from healthcare provider to clinical research.
This episode is brought to you by Avantor. For more information, visit avantorsciences.com
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Duration: 00:39:45Commercializing RNAi Therapies With Alnylam's Tolga Tanguler
May 05, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On today's episode, Tolga Tanguler, EVP and Chief Commercial Officer at Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, talks about commercializing RNAi therapies, how they fit into health insurance reimbursement systems, the company's use of value-based contracts, and building therapeutic franchise "skyscrapers." Tangular also shares his thoughts on commercializing RNAi therapies for larger patient populations, compared with rare disease populations, and reflects on changes in the biopharmaceutical sales and promotion model.
This episode is brought to you by Avantor. For more information, visit avantorsciences.com
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Duration: 00:55:54Big Pharma Insights For Building Biotech Startups With Uniquity Bio's Brian Lortie
Apr 28, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On today's episode I'm speaking with Brian Lortie, President and CEO of Uniquity Bio, about his "no jerk" policy and how his experience building teams at GSK, Endo Pharmaceuticals, and Onspira Therapeutics informs his leadership at Uniquity, a clinical-stage immunology startup backed by Blackstone Life Sciences. Lortie also walks through the formation and launch of Uniquity and provides detail on the company's business model and strategy.
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Duration: 00:55:45The Implications Of China's Growing Biotech Industry With Allan Shaw
Apr 21, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Business of Biotech MVP Allan Shaw is back to talk about the rise of China's biotech sector, and its evolution from fast follower to global innovation powerhouse. Increased deal activity with Chinese biopharmaceutical companies is injecting new risk into traditional development models in the West, despite an uncertain policy environment in the U.S. vis-à-vis China. Will faster trial starts, cheaper asset upfronts, and a growing talent base slingshot Shanghai's biotech hub into an innovation destination on par with Boston and San Francisco?
Ac...
Duration: 00:46:08How To Be A CFO With Insmed's Sara Bonstein
Apr 14, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On today's episode we're speaking with Sara Bonstein, Chief Financial Officer at Insmed, about what it takes to be a successful CFO. Sara provides useful insights on how to lead teams, especially when those teams have deeper subject matter expertise. Other topics discussed include when to make at-risk investments ahead of clinical data, how to balance commercial growth with pipeline investment, the importance of financial planning during early product development stages, and how to manage expectations with a potential blockbuster product in the pipeline.
A...
Duration: 00:44:20Deal And Investment Trends With Investment Banker David Sans
Apr 07, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Today we're talking life sciences investment trends and risks with David Sans, an investment banker with an academic background in chemical engineering and molecular modeling, and a professional background that began in Big Pharma and shifted to investing over 15 years ago. Our conversation covers patent cliff implications, hot therapeutic areas and delivery mechanisms, geopolitical risks, alternative funding strategies, and private equity's move upstream to pre-clinical and pre-revenue biotech.
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Business of Biotech 2.0 with Ben Comer
Mar 31, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
After nearly five years as host of the Business of Biotech podcast, Matt Pillar is handing the mic over to the voice of the Business of Biotech 2.0, veteran life sciences journalist Ben Comer. On this epsiode, Ben shares his nearly 20-year journey covering the pharmaceutical space, from Haymarket Media to PwC to Pharmaceutical Executive and InVivo magazines, before joining Life Science Connect as Chief Editor at Life Science Leader. He shares stories of the wild ride he's enjoyed along the way, how the stories he's covered...
Duration: 00:34:44BoB@JPM: Nima Farzan, Latigo Biotherapeutics
Mar 24, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
In this final installment of our episodes recorded and filmed on-site at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference, Nima Farzan, CEO of Latigo Biotherapeutics, shares his company's mission to change the pain management paradigm by way of novel, non-opioid medications that target NAV 1.8 sodium channels involved in pain signal transmission. It's a timely and important conversation that explores how these selective inhibitors could provide effective pain relief without the addiction risks and side effects of traditional opioids. In addition to the social and medical implications of Latigo's...
Duration: 00:43:32BoB@JPM: Kasper Roet, Ph.D., QurAlis
Mar 17, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Dr. Kasper Roet's hands-on work at the Dutch Brain Bank informed his leadership at the biotech QurAlis, where three clinical programs targeting specific genetic mechanisms in ALS are now underway. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, Life Science Leader's Ben Comer joins to co-host a conversation with Dr. Roet that goes deep on his company's genetic medicine approach to ALS, and even deeper into his opinions on, and growing influence over, the regulatory environment. Roet says that as the FDA's conservative approach to genetic m...
Duration: 00:43:46BoB@JPM: Rick Modi, Affinia Therapeutics
Mar 10, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
The latest in our series of Business of Biotech podcasts recorded in-person at JPM in San Francisco features an inspiring conversation with Affinia Therapeutics CEO Rick Modi. Modi shares on how his upbringing in Kenya shaped his adversity-embracing worldview, and how that worldview contributes to his biotech leadership. We cover his transition from pharmaceutical work in Iowa to a career in biotech, the gene therapy advances Affinia is building on, the company's investment approach, its upcoming clinical trials, and much more.
The 2025 BoB@JPM...
BoB@JPM: Owen Hughes & Brad Sitko, XOMA Royalty
Mar 03, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this episode of the Business of Biotech, recorded on-site at the 2025 JP Morgan Healthcare Conference, we explore a new approach to biotech financing with XOMA Royalty's Owen Hughes and Brad Sitko. The CEO and CIO, respectively, share an innovative royalty aggregation model that mitigates risk while enabling immediate capital access to biotech firms. We learn the differences between royalty financing and equity-based funding, how the model addresses traditional risk in biotech financing, the evolution of XOMA's business model, and much more.
The 2025 BoB@J...
Duration: 00:56:27BoB@JPM: Tom Chalberg, Ph.D., Genascence
Feb 24, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Recorded in-person at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Franscisco, this episode finds Matt Pillar and Ben Comer exploring the evolution of gene therapy with Dr. Tom Chalberg, Founder, Chairman, & CEO at Genascence. We discuss ATMPS' transition from treating rare diseases to addressing common conditions like osteoarthritis, share insights on the delivery mechanism and regulatory challenges in the space, and get into the nuts and bolts of the Genascence partnership strategy.
The 2025 BoB@JPM series is supported by Alston & Bird, whose national health c...
Duration: 00:48:00BoB@JPM: Ran Zheng, Landmark Bio
Feb 17, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Ran Zhang was hire number one at Landmark Bio back in 2021. Today, she's CEO of the 70+ employee cell and gene therapy manufacturer. We caught up with her and Life Science Leader chief editor Ben Comer at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco for a discussion on Landmark's role in addressing the ATMP patient access and cost reduction challenges. Along the way, we cover innovations in distributed manufacturing, non-viral gene delivery, and the importance of collaboration with academia to make these transformative therapies widely available.<...
Duration: 00:37:00BoB@JPM: Peter Anastasiou, Capsida Biotherapeutics
Feb 10, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
From the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, Peter Anastasiou, CEO of Capsida Biotherapeutics, discusses his journey from big pharma to biotech and the challenges he's faces on the leading edge of first-gneration gene therapies. Anastasiou discusses the in-house manufacturing quality advantage, how building that capacity opened the door to important partnering opportunities, the company's preparation for clinical trials and IND submissions, and more. From mastering in-house manufacturing to forging strategic partnerships, Capsida aims to redefine genetic medicine.
The 2025 BoB@JPM series...
BoB@JPM: Stefan Scherer, M.D., Ph.D., 3T Bioscience
Feb 03, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
From the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco, Dr. Stefan Scherer shares insight from 3T Bioscience's transition from clinical medicine to drug development, and his experiences in biotech leadership along the way. Dr. Scherer discusses the balance between promising advances in T-cell therapy and the challenges associated with navigating a biotech from platform development to lead candidate status -- including staffing up for and funding the journey. Don't miss this episode, recorded in-person in San Francisco.
The 2025 BoB@JPM series is supported by A...
The Business Of CNS with Acumen's Jim Doherty, Ph.D.
Jan 27, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Life Science Leader's Ben Comer and Acumen Pharmaceuticals' Dr. Jim Doherty join the Business of Biotech to discuss Dr. Doherty's lifelong, singular focus on researching therapeis for CNS diseases. We cover the historical challenges associated with the development of new therapeutics for Alzheimer’s disease, advances in the space, the controversies that have ensued on the heels of recent amlyloid-targeting drug approvals, and where Acumen Pharmaceuticals and its lead candidate, Sabirnetug, fit on the landscape. We also cover the critical and growing role of bi...
Duration: 00:47:51High-Throughput Discovery With Bioptic's Andrey Dobry
Jan 20, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Andrey Doronichev, known to many simply as Dobry, is perhaps best known for taking YouTube mobile. You heard that right. If it weren't for him and the teams he led, YouTube might still be a desktop experience. He went on to lead product strategy at Google before launching the startup Optic in 2022. What's that got to do with biotech, you ask? Well, it's Optic where he feels his greatest contributions are to come, and his sights are set squarely on disrupting the way we discover therapeutic...
Duration: 01:13:36RNA Sandbox with Johns Hopkins RNA Innovation Center's Jeff Coller, Ph.D. and Michelle Kim, Ph.D.
Jan 13, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
In close partnership woth Johns Hopkins and TriLink BioTechnologies, Jeff Coller, Ph.D. and Michelle Kim, Ph.D. have built a sandbox for RNA developers and aspirational RNA business builders to play in. On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, we team up once again with Advancing RNA's Anna Rose Welch to learn about the venture, dubbed the Johns Hopkins University RNA Innovation Center. Anna Rose and I query Drs. Coller and Kim on how the Center came to be, what it has to...
Duration: 01:06:32Biotech Story Time With Tal Zaks, M.D. (Part 2, Tall Tales with Tal)
Jan 06, 2025We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Dr. Tal Zaks is back, along with Advancing RNA's Anna Rose Welch, for part 2 of "Story Time With Tal." On this week's episode, we turn from his time navigating medical affairs as CMO at Moderna during the COVID 19 pandemic to learn about his latest venture, an mRNA startup called Exsilio Therapeutics. We cover the foundational aspects of the company's start, from the science it's developing, who's been recruited to the team, and how Exsilio charted its way to an $82 million Series A co-led by Novartis Venture...
Duration: 00:54:04Risk Mitigation With Meira GTx's Zandy Forbes, Ph.D.
Dec 30, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Zandy Forbes, Ph.D. learned about business risk mitigation in the riskiest of business environments. She was a public markets healthcare investor on Wall Street for well more than a decade. Her hedge fund experience followed the Human Frontiers/Howard Hughes postdoctoral fellowship at the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center that was preceded by an Oxford Ph.D. in Molecular Genetics. Since 2015, she's been drawing from her immersion in both the business and science disciplines as President & CEO at Meira GTx...
Duration: 01:02:34Biotech Story Time With Tal Zaks, M.D. (Part 1)
Dec 23, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Tal Zaks, M.D. was Chief Medical Officer at Moderna before, during, and immediately following the company's headline role during the COVID pandemic. If that doesn't pique your interest about the stories he can tell, this episode of the Business of Biotech surely will. Tal is now leading a new mRNA-centric startup called Exsilio Therapeutics, which Advancing RNA's Anna Rose Welch and I dig into in part two of our talk with Tal, slated for release in early January. Yep, Story Time With Tal is so...
Duration: 00:55:25A $1B AI Bet With Foresite Labs' Vik Bajaj, Ph.D.
Dec 16, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
This past spring, Xaira Therapeutics launched with $1 billion in backing, a who's-who mashup of Silicon Valley and biopharma stars led by Marc Tessier-Lavigne in the C-suite, and a mission to develop AI-generated drugs. On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, we're digging into the company's origin story and its place on the greater techbio landscape with one of the men bearing responsibility for Xaira's launch. Vik Bajaj is Managing Director at Foresite Capital Management (which led Xaira's funding) and Cofounder and CEO at Foresite...
Duration: 00:52:50Manufacturing Partnership With Life Biosciences' Jerry McLaughlin and Forge Biologics' John Maslowski
Dec 09, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, Jerry McLaughlin, CEO and President at Life Biosciences returns for a visit, and he brought a friend in John Maslowski, newly-appointed CEO at Forge Biologics. We revisit progress at Life Biosciences, followed by a deep look into the gears that make the company's contract development and manufacturing relationship with Forge Biologics go. From CDMO selection to contracting and execution, the episode is packed with actionable insight into building a foundation for collaborative success in advanced biologic therapy...
Duration: 01:03:50Novel Peptide Delivery With Revolo's Woody Bryan, Ph.D.
Dec 02, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Revolo Biotherapeutics President and CEO Woody Bryan, Ph.D. is pushing the boundaries of peptide therapeutic delivery. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, we dig into Dr. Bryan’s transition to the CEO chair at the company and how that coincided with an aggressive strategic decision to alter the course of administration of its peptide candidates in allergic and autoimmune diseases. That decision didn’t come lightly and its execution wasn’t easy, but it was an important one for the future of the busine...
Duration: 00:45:26Biopolitics With Allan Shaw
Nov 25, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
The notion that political influence has no place in biology appears poised for a test it hasn’t studied for. Trump administration nominations, from RFK, Jr. to HHS and Vivek Ramaswamy to the newly-proposed DOGE, are driving a storm of speculation over the implications for biotech and other life sciences industries. Throw in the increased probability of the Biosecure Act seeing the light of legislation day under a republican congress, and there’s no shortage of biopolitical pontificating to be done. How might this all play out...
Duration: 00:49:54T-Cells For The Win With Adaptimmune's Adrian Rawcliffe
Nov 18, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
In August of this year, the first TCR cell therapy to be approved for use in the U.S. was greenlighted by the FDA for patients with unresectable or metastatic synovial sarcoma who have previously received chemotherapy. It marked the first new treatment for those patients in more than a decade; a win for those patients, and a win for Adrian Rawcliffe, who’s had a hand on the wheel at Adaptimmune, the therapy’s developer and manufacturer, since he joined the company as CFO in 2015. Toda...
Duration: 01:01:35Serving The Underserved With Gates MRI's Claire Wagner, M.D.
Nov 11, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
On this episode of the Business of Biotech, Bill and Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute's (Gates MRI) Dr. Claire Wagner joins us to share insights into her work as head of Corporate Strategy and Market Access there. She shares the development of her North Star while working with the incomparable Dr. Paul Farmer in Rwanda, and how that experience translates to the growth of a biopharmaceutical company taking big swings for grossly underserved populations. We discuss the nuances assoiated with setting strategy and enabling product access...
Duration: 00:46:48An Unanticipated Biotech Startup With OS Therapies' Paul Romness
Nov 04, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Becoming a biotech CEO wasn't on Paul Romness' bingo card. He'd forged his place in the biopharma industry as a foremost public and policy affairs expert. Thirteen years at J&J, more than 5 at Amgen, and half a dozen at Boehringer Ingelheim had earned him the right to coast into a consulting gig that would enable him to finish out his career on his terms.
Then his daughter's best friend Olivia, a teenage girl and neighbor he'd watched grow up, was diagnosed with osteosarcoma.
Building On Pandemic Progress With Barinthus Biotherapeutics' Bill Enright
Oct 28, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
It might just be coincidence, but it sure seems like Bill Enright has a knack for making big moves at inopportune times, then turning the expected outcome on its ear. For example, he signed on as CEO at Altimmune when the company was struggling mightily. Enright had a turnaround plan in hand, but as he was in the thick of a non-deal road show to execute said plan, Lehmen Brothers collapsed. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, we'll learn in great detail how Altimmune...
Duration: 00:44:14Obesity Tx End-Around With Skye Bioscience's Punit Dhillon
Oct 21, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
While the trend toward CB1 inhibition for obesity took a small hit with the release of Novo Nordisk's small molecule oral cannabinoid receptor (CB1) inverse agonist monlunabant last month, Skye Bioscience Chairman and CEO Punit Dhillon is shaking it off. He's confident that his company's antibody-based approach to CB1 inhibition will make a moot point of the neuropsychiatric side effects that put a damper on Novo's data. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, we're digging into the uber-hot business of weight loss therapeutics and...
Duration: 01:02:41Biotech C-Suite Construction With Allan Shaw
Oct 14, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Allan Shaw is back with us this week to dig into the complexities of strategic hiring in biotech. We cover strategies for the step-wise assembly of effective executive teams, the importance of aligning key hires with clinical and regulatory milestones, managing salaries in line with cash runways, the pros and cons of fractional/consultative leadership, when it's time to turn fractional into full-time, and a whole-lot more. If you're growing a biotech in these volatile times, this episode of the Business of Biotech offers veteran insight...
Duration: 00:51:34The Peptide Promise With NervGen's Mike Kelly
Oct 07, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Mike Kelly faced a self-reckoning before he took the job as CEO at NervGen, a company developing peptide therapeutics targeted specifically at central nervous system repair. The veteran of life sciences business development knew the ropes of the biotech C-suite. He’d been a CEO twice before. He knew how to launch drugs, having seen commercial success several times before. He even knew how to sell them—he’d started his career carrying the bag for TAP Pharmaceuticals. But all he knew about peptides was that they w...
Duration: 00:59:19Biotech Course Correction With Treehill Partners' Ali Pashazadeh
Sep 30, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
It wouldn't be accurate to say that surgeon-turned-healthcare investment banker and consultant Dr. Ali Pashazadeh traded his scalpels for spreadsheets. In fact, he still wields a scalpel quite frequently, and on this episode of the Business of Biotech podcast, he offers a fantastic reason why. Yes, it's a bit of a departure from our normal routine of biotech founders occupying the guest chair. But, Pashazadeh's no-holds-barred reflections on and analysis of biotech breaking points, drawn from more than 2 decades of troubleshooting broken bipharmaceutical businesses and correcting...
Duration: 01:17:16An AI Awakening With Profluent Bio's Hilary Eaton, Ph.D.
Sep 23, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Hilary Eaton, Ph.D. was a self-described AI skeptic, particularly as it relates to using the tool in drug discovery. Then, a series of professional and deeply personal life events and medical discoveries put her in a position to confront that skepticism head-on. Today, she's Chief Business Officer at ProFluent Bio, a company that's committed to democratizing access to open-source AI gene editing tools that are custom-built for pharmaceutical development. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, Dr. Eaton shares her story and makes a...
Duration: 01:14:26Picking Biotech Jockeys With SR One's Simeon George, M.D.
Sep 16, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
SR One Capital Management CEO Simeon George, M.D. has a seemingly innate ability to pick winning biotech builders. Early on, he and his firm got behind CRISPR's Samarth Kulkarni, Ph.D., Arcellx' Rami Elghandour, and Nkarta's Paul Hastings, for example. With nearly 50 biotech leaders in SR One's portfolio, there are plenty more where those three came from. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, Dr. George, admits that despite his gifted brain he more readily follows his heart. Still, over the course of our...
Duration: 00:54:03Embracing Biotech Chaos With Memo's Erik van den Berg
Sep 09, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Erik van den Berg is CEO and board member at Memo Therapeutics, and he's a student of biotech chaos. In fact, he's been embracing it with intention for the past 30 years. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, he walks us through the management of that chaos in specific detail. Navigating gluttonous Covid-fueled financial markets. Achieving clinical outcomes during the pandemic. Keeping development on the rails in a protracted financial drought. Creating differentiation in crowded and noisy renal and oncology antibody therapeutic spaces. We cover...
Duration: 00:54:05Pivoting To RNA With Circio's Dr. Erik Digman Wiklund
Sep 02, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
This week, it’s another “Business of Biotech-meets-Business-of-RNA” takeover with Circio CEO Erik Digman Wiklund, Ph.D. and guest co-host Anna Rose Welch of Advancing RNA. While Circio’s legacy is in cancer immunology (it still boasts a cancer vaccine candidate targeting KRAS driver mutations), the company made a bold pivot, of sorts, when it committed headlong to the circular RNA future. Now, it’s in the throes of fine-tuning a platform for the development of novel circRNA medicines for rare disease, vaccines, and cancer. On this episod...
Duration: 01:04:47mRNA Upstarts With Radar Therapeutics' Sophia Lugo and Eerik Kaseniit, Ph.D.
Aug 26, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Guest co-host Anna Rose Welch of Advancing RNA fame joins us on this week’s Business of Biotech podcast for a conversation with the leaders of RNA upstart Radar Therapeutics. The company’s co-founders, Eerik Kaseniit, Ph.D. (CSO & President) and Sophia Lugo (CEO), are making waves in the mRNA therapeutics space on the heels of the invention of a precision-expressed mRNA technology that laid bare the path to Radar’s inception. On this episode, we dig into that science, why it’s timely, and how it fits...
Duration: 01:03:07Pivoting To RNA With Circio's Dr. Erik Digman Wiklund
Aug 26, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Ever wondered how a PhD project can evolve into a groundbreaking biotech business? Meet Dr. Eric Kazanet and Sophia Lugo, who turned their fascination with CRISPR and mRNA control into a revolutionary RNA therapeutics company. In this episode, you'll uncover how their pioneering technology promises to precisely target cells, potentially transforming genetic medicine. Eric's journey from Stanford to startup success will illuminate the intricate process of developing RNA therapies that could change patient care forever.
What does it take to build a successful biotech...
Steering Through Setbacks with AVEO Oncology's Michael Bailey
Aug 19, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
For all the drug commercialization successes he's played a leading hand in during his tenures at GSK, Genentech, and ImClone—Androderm, Augmentin, necitumumab, and Erbitux among them—Michael Bailey concedes that he's likely better known for his failures. After hearing his stories on this episode of the Business of Biotech, I tend to disagree. While he offers a transparent and instructive look at the failures themselves, I'd contend it's what he's done with those setbacks that defines his biopharma and biotech leadership legacy. Today, Bailey is CEO...
Duration: 00:58:06Leading From Within with ISCT & Kiji's Miguel Forte, M.D.
Aug 12, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
He's been a big pharma executive. He's a multi-time biotech founder and current biotech CEO. He was once a regulator. He's a physician. He serves on multiple boards. And as of this summer, he's president of one of the most influential global organizations dedicated to the advance of cell and gene therapies (ISCT), and an executive member of another (ARM). Miguel Forte, M.D. simply can't stop finding places to apply his talents and energy to influence the advanced therapies landscape. The experiences he's amassed give...
Duration: 00:59:37The Allogeneic Future with Poseida's Kristin Yarema, Ph.D.
Aug 05, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Kristin Yarema, Ph.D. thinks the progress of CAR T therapeutics is allogeneic. In fact, she says CAR T-cell therapies have to become a one-to-many proposition, if their early autologous success can possibly live up to the promise of offering widespread accessibility to life-saving treatments. Dr. Yarema is the newly-appointed CEO at Poseida Therapeutics, a company we first covered with founding CEO Eric Ostertag, Ph.D. On this episode of the Business of Biotech, we'll learn about Dr. Yarema, how she earned the company's reins, how...
Duration: 01:04:44Expanding The Proteome with ProFound's John Lepore, M.D.
Jul 29, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Flagship Pioneering’s ProFound Therapeutics is on to something, and it could be something big. It began with a simple question: What if more RNAs were being translated into proteins? Answering that question took ProFound deep into the translatome, where it’s now studying the full compendium of RNA sequences that are being translated into proteins. Along the way, the young company is gaining confidence that its research will reveal important insight into potential therapeutic protein targets and medicines. On this episode of the Business of Biote...
Duration: 00:56:38From The Bench To The Boardroom with ImmunityBio's Enrique Diloné
Jul 22, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
While organic chemistry lectures caused many of his peers at NYU to wring their hands, gnash their teeth, and question life choices, then-19-year-old Enrique Diloné ate those classes for lunch. They inspired him to earn a Seton Hall Ph.D. in chemistry, and to go to work as a big bio research scientist. Along the way, Dr. Diloné got bit by the biotech business bug. It wasn’t easy. A whole bunch of MBA and executive learning programs at Rutgers, MIT, and Harvard, and many year...
Duration: 01:06:39First AI Antibody In Humans with Aulos' Aron Knickerbocker
Jul 15, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Data drives decision-making at Aulos Bioscience. It's also driven the career trajectory of its CEO. On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech podcast, we get an introspective walk through Aron Kinickerbocker's strategically-orchestrated career path, from his early days in the labs at Bristol-Myers Squibb and Genentech to his leadership of Aulos Bioscience, a company that boasts the first AI-generated antibody in human clinical trials. We explore Aulos' innovative IL-2 antibody and the role AI played in its highly-targeted and toxicity-reducing design, and we do...
Duration: 01:08:52Drug Delivery Differentiators with Syncromune's Eamonn Hobbs
Jul 08, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Syncromune's Sync-T solid tumor therapeutic platform is, in a word, complex. The company's three phase 1 programs combine T-cell science with a proprietary drug delivery device to target solid tumors, specifically metastatic breast, non-small-cell lung, and castrate-resistant prostate cancers. But, while orchestrating a successful drug/device combination therapy presents unique regulatory challenges and requires a diverse array of in-house skillsets, President and CEO Eamon Hobbs is confident. He's done this before, and Syncromune's lead candidate has just been fast-tracked by the FDA. On this episode of the...
Duration: 01:12:31Topical Ocular Biologics with Claris Bio's Clarke Atwell
Jul 01, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Built on the back of hepatocyte growth factor discoveries by Harvard Drs. Reza Dana and Sunil Chauhan, ClarisBio is rewriting the ophthalmology rulebook. CEO Clark Atwell acknowledges that it's not the first to bring topically-administered biologic therapies to the front of the eye, but if successful in the clinic, its Neurotrophic Keratitis candidate will vastly improve the patient experience. It will also prove unequivocally that there's biotech business value in front-of-the-eye therapeutics, as opposed to just parenterally-administered back-of-the-eye biologics. On this episode of the Business of...
Duration: 00:58:06C&G Regulatory Guidance with Lineage Therapeutics' Brian Culley
Jun 24, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
When we last caught up with Brian Culley, CEO at Lineage Cell Therapeutics, it was January, 2021. A pandemic was raging. His company was moving mountains to keep its OpRegen dry AMD clinical trial together, and did so despite lockdowns that kept a largely aged patient population from setting foot anywhere near a healthcare clinic. Lineage emerged stronger, signing a collaboration and license agreement with Roche and Genentech later that year. In May of this year, it doubled down on the commitment with a new services agreement...
Duration: 01:04:02True DEI Value in Biopharma with Arcellx's Rami Elghandour
Jun 17, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
The cell therapy company Arcellx has, by any and every measure, been outperforming its peers. Its stock has rallied on the back of the strong performance of its multiple myeloma candidate, and the promise of its AML, MDS, and solid tumor pipelines is attracting the kind of interest it takes to be in it for the long run. Asked about his company’s rapid rise since taking the helm in 2021, CEO Rami Elghandour cites a few critical and risky decisions, the execution of some specific people on...
Duration: 01:04:08Mission-Driven Dementia Funding with DDF's Jonathan Behr
Jun 10, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
If there's anyone qualified to analyze an early-stage therapeutic technology and place bets with other people's money, it's scientist-turned-venture capitalist Jonathan Behr, Ph.D. He built a distinguished venture capital career on the back of an MIT Ph.D. in biological engineering, having co-founded no fewer than 7 life sciences companies, served on or observed the boards of at least 17, and led investments at Pure Tech Ventures, the JDRF T1D Fund, SV Health investors, and now, the Dementia Discovery Fund, where he's a partner. Drawing from a...
Duration: 00:55:46ADCs Ignited with Daiichi Sankyo Inc.'s Ken Keller
Jun 03, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Just a few years ago, Daiichi Sankyo wasn't considered a player in the oncology therapeutics space, and it certainly wasn't a player in ADCs. But then, just a few years ago, who was? Fast forward to 2023, and we see an ADC arena that drove nearly $100 billion in M&A, licensing, and partnership deals, and a Daiichi Sankyo that can rightfully lay claim to lighting that fire. In fact, it was our guest on this episode of the Business of Biotech, Ken Keller, Chairman of the Board...
Duration: 01:04:06Accelerating ADCs with Mythic Therapeutics' Brian Fiske, Ph.D.
May 27, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Mythic Therapeutics Chief Scientific Officer and co-founder Brian Fiske, Ph.D. broke some unwritten protocol with his rapid and multifaceted transition from academia to industry. He calls his many, and sometimes concurrent, early experiences as an MIT Ph.D. student, a Flagship Ventures Fellow, a Bain consultant, a hospital researcher, and a biopharma consultant indiciative of a young man who didn't want to make decisions. In retrospect, it looks more like the perfect preparatory mix for a guy who's leading a company with a unique approach...
Duration: 00:56:38The Anti-CDMO with CTMC's Jason Bock, Ph.D. and KSQ's Thomas Leitch
May 20, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
This isn't your typical drug sponsor + CDMO story. In fact, CTMC's Jason Bock, Ph.D. says you shouldn't even classify his company a CDMO. He's not wrong. While some of the company's services aren't dissimilar from those offered by a contract developer, CTMC began with a more fundamental mission in mind -- to help early clinical-stage companies like KSQ Therapeutics prepare for and enter their clinical stage on the best possible footing, and with the best possible clinical partner in the MD Anderson Cancer Center. On...
Duration: 00:57:35A New Prescription For PBMs with Allan Shaw
May 13, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Back by popular demand, biopharma industry opinionator extraordinaire Allan Shaw rejoins the Business of Biotech to expose the murky role Pharmacy Benefit Managers (PBMs) play in the last, costly mile of the drug distribution supply chain. Allan pulls no punches in his criticism of the current rebate structure and shares why the model leaves patients and manufacturers stuck with the spiraling tab. He also explains why an election year, all-time lows in public perception of the pharmaceutical industry, and inflation might create the perfect storm for...
Duration: 00:40:13New Apps For AI in mRNA With Anima Biotech's Yochi Slonim
May 06, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
From San Francisco’s Silicon Valley to Tel Aviv’s Silicon Wadi, software business entrepreneur Yochi Slonim made a name for himself in global tech hubs around the globe. Notably, he was co-founder of billion-dollar Mercury Interactive, which HP acquired for $4.5 billion, and previous to that a leader at Tecnomatix, which sold to UGS and was acquired by Siemens. Those big deals that came on the heels of several other Yochi Slonim software startups. But Slonim's not in software development anymore. Not for the software industry, anywa...
Duration: 00:59:10Circular RNA with Orna Therapeutics' Tom Barnes, Ph.D. and Advancing RNA's Anna Rose Welch
Apr 29, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
As if Orna Therapeutics' CEO Thomas Barnes, CEO isn't a enough to draw you in to the Business of Biotech, we teamed up with Advancing RNA Editorial & Community Director Anna Rose Welch to co-host this week's episode. Together, Anna Rose and I press Dr. Barnes on his transition from academia to biotech, the therapeutic proposition of circular, or "O" RNA and why it holds great potential to best linear RNA constructs, the novel, platform- and partnership-based approaches Orna is taking to address B-cell lymphomas and Duchenne...
Duration: 00:59:11Physician + Biotech Builder with Tome Biosciences' Rahul Kakkar, M.D.
Apr 22, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Novel technologies aren’t interesting to Rahul Kakkar, M.D. unless they help patients. Sounds rational, but it’s actually a unique perspective in a platform-crazed biotech industry. Dr. Kakkar’s worldview is shaped by his work as a physician—work he continues at Brigham and Women’s Hospital even as he builds Tome Biosciences, where he serves as President & CEO. Tome, which is developing programmable genomic integration technology, is the latest of Dr. Kakkar’s entrepreneurial efforts—he previously led Pandion Therapeutics to a $1.85B acquisition by...
Duration: 01:01:30Commercial Readiness with ImmunityBio's Bobby Reddy, M.D.
Apr 15, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
This episode of the Business of Biotech begins with a personal story about my dad and the standard of care in bladder cancer, before shifting to the work that Dr. Bobby Reddy and his team at ImmunityBio are doing to change that standard of care. They're painfully close. Dr. Reddy, Chief Medical Officer at ImmunityBio, gives us a long look behind the curtain at the commercial preparations the company is making as its lead Phase 3 candidate, Anktiva, nears the goal line in non-muscle invasive bladder cancer...
Duration: 00:56:54Precision Drug Delivery with Ampersand Biomedicines' Jason Gardner, D.Phil.
Apr 08, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Ampersand Biomedicines CEO Jason Gardner, D.Phil. first took the leap from a global pharmaceutical giant to a startup at the forefront of transplant medicine innovation. Since that time, he's seen most of the ups and the downs that come with biotech leadership, and in his latest venture with the Flagship Pioneering-backed Ampersand, he's putting all those hard-fought lessons to good use. On this episode of the Business of Biotech -- the final (finally!) of several recorded at the JPM Healthcare Conference in January -- Gardner...
Duration: 00:49:47Funding Alzheimer's Tx Dev with ADDF's Karen Harris
Apr 01, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
We've really been looking forward to dropping this episode with Karen Harris, Chief Financial Officer and Head of Mission-Related Investing at the Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation. While the markets have warmed a bit since we recorded this episode, Karen's thoughtful perspective on the sometimes tumultuous Alzheimer's therapeutics space is valuable to any drug developer working in the cognitive medicines arena. In this episode of the Business of Biotech podcast, we follow Karen's journey from institutional investment banking to the incredibly gratifying work she does now, helping...
Duration: 00:40:16The AI Impact with Generate:Biomedicines' Mike Nally
Mar 25, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Few drug discovery and development concepts are as hyped, and as such, draw as much polarity from drug developers, as machine learning and artifical intelligence. One company on the bullish end of the spectrum is Flagship Pioneering's Generate Biomedicines, which bills itself at the "intersection of machine learning, biological engineering, and medicine." To get a grip on the "generative biology" work it's doing and the AI/ML impact it anticipates in the discovery and development of therapeutics, as well as clinical trials, we sat down with...
Duration: 01:13:54Strategic Deals with CinRx's Gavin Samuels, M.D.
Mar 18, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Gavin Samuels, M.D. found his work as an intensive care physician boring. After earning his M.D., he did that for a few years before moving into intensive care management roles. It wasn't until he left the hospital and entered biopharma that he found his footing, cutting his teeth in business development at places like Merck, Pfizer, Quark Pharma, and Teva. He even headed growth strategy at Lonza for a while. Now, he's Chief Business Officer and General Partner at CinRx Pharma, where a deep...
Duration: 00:47:52Serial Success With Triumvira's Rob Williamson
Mar 11, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Rob Williamson's mind and hands have shaped more than 20 biotech startups, leading some to IPO and landing others firmly in Big Bio through acquisition by companies like Merck. Hanging around as many successful exits as Williamson has seen, one might become expert via osmosis. But Williamson isn't passive about honing his vision for progressive therapeutic dealmaking. He's an active leader, and for this episode of the Business of Biotech, he took a breather from a hectic agenda at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference to share...
Duration: 00:31:32The Innovator's Dilemma with Lumen Bioscience's Brian Finrow, J.D.
Mar 04, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
In biotech, when "one of these things doesn't look like the other one," it can be a blessing or a curse. On one hand, scientific novelty is praised and rewarded. On the other, unfamiliarity breeds skepticism from the investment community. Brian Finrow, J.D. embraces that reality and the challenges that come with it. Despite an approach to developing antibodies and other biologics that looks decidedly different--they're developed from spirulina cell lines and, in some cases, designed for oral administration (gasp!)--Lumen Biosciences has won hard-fought...
Duration: 00:50:43Precision Radiopharmaceuticals with Ratio's Jack Hoppin, Ph.D.
Feb 26, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Multimodal approaches to the delivery of radiologically active compounds have created a fertile environment to for players in the space to put on a precision medicine clinic, so to speak. What’s more, Radiopharmaceuticals create a unique business opportunity given the closely-related and necessary companion diagnostic arena. On today’s episode of the Business of Biotech, recorded in San Francisco, we sit down with Dr. Mark Hoppin, CEO of Ratio Therapeutics, a company that’s well-positioned in the space with a fresh Series B and the founda...
Duration: 00:40:38Managing Mergers With Sail Biomedicines' Guillaume Pfefer, Ph.D.
Feb 19, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
While you might be aware that Sail Biomedicines was just formed up in Q4 of last year, the product of Flagship Pioneering’s decision to merge Senda Biosciences and Laronde, two of its programmable medicine platform companies. What you likely haven’t heard is the inside story on how the merger was executed, how the two companies are integrating their talent, IP, and resources, and what Sail Biomedicines CEO Dr. Guillaume Pfefer and team are currently doing to take the fruits of the company’s platform into the...
Duration: 00:51:07Reprogramming Human Cells With bit.bio's Mark Kotter, M.D.
Feb 12, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
The concept of programmable biology is fueling a new breed of biotech, one that requires the marriage of computational and traditional science (and both computational and traditional scientists) on the entire journey from discovery to commercial. Bit.bio is exemplary of this new breed. Its CEO, Dr. Mark Kotter doesn’t pull any punches when addressing the complexity involved in building out the company’s capabilities. At the discovery stage alone, bit.bio has hired – and integrated – stem cell biologists, synthetic biologists, genetic engineering experts, cellular biologist...
Duration: 00:45:51Inhalable mRNA with Ethris' Carsten Rudolph, Ph.D.
Feb 05, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
Without doubt, the grand and collaborative experiment that was the mRNA COVID vaccine contributed mightily to the pandemic response and continues to save lives untold. It also demonstrated the collective power of public/private partnership in biopharma. Having acknowledged that, no first iteration of a new technology is ever the best iteration of that technology. On this week's episode of the Business of Biotech, we welcome Carsten Rudolph, Ph.D., co-founder and CEO of a company that recognizes this room for improvement. Ethris is developing mRNA-based...
Duration: 00:46:59Biotech Is Back with Allan Shaw
Jan 29, 2024We love to hear from our listeners. Send us a message.
The Business of Biotech took a trip to San Francisco for the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference, that most target-richest of environments for those of us who like talking shop with biotech builders. The results of that trip will feed the next several weeks of Business of Biotech podcast programming, and we're kicking things off with everyone's favorite life sciences CFO, Allan Shaw. On this episode, Allan shares what's driving the cautious optimism for biotech's return, pointing to factors like December's flurry of M&A activity, interest...
Duration: 00:51:02