BioVenture VoiCes with Chris Garabedian

He describes his early life and career experiences at Bell Labs, consulting work, and EPIX Pharmaceuticals before landing in his true interest, venture capital. Dr. Knight describes the foresight of Fidelity to focus on life sciences in its early days, and F-Prime's investing philosophy today.

He describes his early life and education, 18 years of company building at Flagship Pioneering, founding Averin (previously called Bedford Bridge) with his brother, and investing at the intersection of healthcare and technology.

Clay Thorp describes his early education and becoming a business partner to his brother on a genomics startup. He describes the genesis of Hatteras, the history and strengths of the life sciences ecosystem in the North Carolina area, and his philosophy of backing founders.

Jay Lichter describes his roots growing up in Chicago, Yale, and an early career role at DuPont Merck before getting a call from Kevin Kinsella to try the world of venture at Avalon. Since that pivotal move, he describes numerous companies he either operated or funded, leading to his work today at Avalon Bioventures.

Corey Goodman shares learnings for his career in biotech, including working in academia, biotech, pharma, and as a venture capital investor. He describes the unique learnings from all of them and why he is thankful that he has experienced these different components of life sciences.

Bruce Booth discusses his education and early career, the structure of Atlas and the types of investments it makes, investing in assets vs platforms, and more.

The Founder & Managing Partner of Samsara Biocapital, Dr. Akkaraju describes his early move from Standford to industry and various investment firms he worked for before founding Samsara in 2016. He discusses how the firm invests in all stages of life sciences companies and why he believes patience is a key virtue.

Still a practicing physician today, Vineeta Agarwala describes her educational background and early career, including experiences at the Broad Institute, Flatiron Health, and GV (Google Ventures). She talks about a16z's investment philosophy of "providing more than just a check," and a recent $500M fund partnered with Lilly.

Glenn Rockman describes the introduction to impact investing he gained from working for J.P. Morgan and along with the Gates Foundation on the Global Health Investment Fund, and how the idea of investing for public good ultimately sparked Adjuvant Capital in 2019. Armed with a $300M+ fund that was raised from numerous foundations and for-profit funds in 2021, Adjuvant has been investing in public health technologies, post proof of concept, to help accelerate their development and ultimately make them more accessible to those around the world who need them.

Aaron Kantoff describes the road on the public markets side that eventually led him to venture, and recalls successful investments he helped lead at firms like Apple Tree Partners and Medicxi, such as Stoke Therapeutics, Akero Therapeutics, Centessa Pharmaceuticals, and RayzeBio. He discusses founding Scion with his partner, Samuel Hall, and describes raising their first fund and how the firm has a longer outlook than is traditionally thought of in venture.

Lindy Fishburne describes her educational background and career, and transitioning from the philanthropic Breakout Labs within the Thiel Foundation to Breakout Ventures, a traditional venture firm that has a diverse set of limited partners. Plus, how she is navigating these challenging times in healthcare and biotech.

Dr. Westphal describes his upbringing and early career at McKinsey and Polaris, founding or co-founding companies like Momenta, Alnylam, Sirtris, Acceleron, and VeraStem, and creating the Longwood Fund. He shares his thoughts on venture investing, the current environment in biotech, focusing on creating new medicines, and his love of the Boston ecosystem.

Jory Bell shares the details of his expansive educational background and early career, which included being a product designer at Apple during the return of Steve Jobs. He describes Playground's engineering and tech angle to investing in life sciences, and weighs in on sizable seed and pre-seed investments the industry has seen lately that get startups to a proof of concept.

Tiba Aynechi describes her career path, which has been spent entirely in the Bay Area since she earned her PhD from UCSF in the early 2000's. She describes the value of BD experience she earned while working on licensing deals early in her career, her more than a decade at Novo Ventures, and what appealed to her to join Norwest. Plus, her thoughts on a board of directors' relationship with management teams.

Josh Resnick describes his career path, which includes working on the venture side of both private funds and pharma (Merck). He explains the different investment strategies of RA Capital, and talks about how the firm's Raven company building incubator fits in. Plus, his thoughts on venture investing in the current environment.

Steve Tregay describes his career path, including how early roles at Array BioPharma and Novartis led him to found Forma Therapeutics. He describes the founding and growth of LabCentral, for which he is still the chairman today, and how getting a look at entrepreneurs at such an early stage naturally led to the investment work that he and his partners do at Mission BioCapital.

Joe Jimenez describes the career path in consumer products that led him to pharma, his time running Novartis, and the idea to co-found Aditum Bio with his partner Mark Fishman. He explains Aditum's investment philosophy, and why they like focusing on translational medicine opportunities that are just heading into the clinic. Plus, his thoughts on making R&D more efficient.

Shahram describes his upbringing as a refugee from Iran, his early career in law and banking, and how his initial experience in the tech industry has benefitted his eye towards life sciences. He recalls founding Civilization Ventures with an initial $1M fund, and talks about what it has quickly grown into today, Plus, his take on AI and the current state of tech bio.

A General Partner at Flagship Pioneering, Avak describes his upbringing and studies in the Middle East and Montreal, Canada, working in industry at Helicos, and co-founding companies at Flagship since 2011. He discusses Flagship's unique platform of company building and innovation.

A Partner at Pillar VC, Tony describes his start at MIT, founding the MIT BioMakerspace, his work at Petri, being an early supporter of Nucleate, and his philosophy of not being overly influenced by what is in vogue today.

The Co-Founder and Operating Chairman of Curie.Bio, and serial entrepreneur, shares experiences from his early life, CombinatoRx, Foundation Medicine, Third Rock, EQRx and more.

He describes his career path and learnings from the tech industry, co-founding Adimab, the work that Alloy and 82VS do to support and invest in scientist-entrepreneurs, and why he believes smaller organizations are best suited for discovery work and other early stage innovation.

A general partner the firm, she describes her career path, including time spent at Goldman Sachs and Genentech, before landing at Canaan over a decade ago. She discusses the firm's investment approach to healthcare, and boldly moving into new categories of medicine even in cases where an organization doesn't have existing commercial infrastructure.

MPM's founder and managing partner discusses the firm's 30+ years of investing in life sciences, including the philosophy of placing entrepreneur partners at companies from the start, and teaming up with research institutions and investment collaborators. Plus, the keys making it through a down cycle like the industry has been in over recent years.

He describes his career path, including time in the lab and doing quant work at Goldman Sachs. Plus, what he has learned about VC investing and biotech over time, and how Omega Funds is able to successfully invest in various stages and rounds of companies.

He describes this path to venture investing from his start in science at the NIH to becoming a pathologist, and eventually raising a modest first fund and building off of its success. Plus, his investment philosophy and investing in science - including outside of therapeutics.

Sara Nayeem describes her career path and how different firms she has worked for have had different approaches to investing. She introduces us to Enavate Sciences, and shares her thoughts on investing in various areas such as rare diseases and digital health.

D.A. Wallach describes how he went from music to healthcare/biotech investing, and the similarities he sees between the two industries. Plus, the firm's investment philosophy and how he partnered with Tim Wright to create the firm.

Beth Seidenberg tells the story of how her career went from physician, to product development in industry, to investor. She describes the qualities she looks for in an entrepreneur, and discusses the Los Angeles core of Westlake BioPartners.

Bryan Roberts discusses Venrock's history, moving from NYC to the Bay Area, his investment philosophy, portfolio construction and concentration, the types of entrepreneurs he looks for, what qualities make for a good early stage investor, thoughts on AI, Tech Bio, and more.