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Japan's Biotech Transformation: Drug Pricing, Clinical Trials & Global Investment · Making Medicine

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Speaker 1: At Making Medicine. We're reporting on the headlines, not making
0:03
Speaker 1: medical recommendations. For personal health questions, always ask your doctor.
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Speaker 1: Nothing in this episode constitutes investment, financial, or legal advice.
0:13
Speaker 1: Consult your own advisors before making decisions.
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Speaker 2: Between twenty thirteen and twenty twenty four, they are about
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Speaker 2: two hundred and forty five drugs launched, only half of
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Speaker 2: those which ever reached the Japan market. About seventy percent
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Speaker 2: of drugs that are in clinical trials today aren't actually
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Speaker 2: being studied within Japan ultimately may not launch there.
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Speaker 3: Welcome back to the Making Medicine podcast, where science, policy
0:40
Speaker 3: and innovation meet. Incubates Head of public Affairs, Grace Moster,
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Speaker 3: jumping in here from my usual role behind the scenes
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Speaker 3: to welcome you to a special episode. This week, we
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Speaker 3: have our policy director John Guy filling in for John
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Speaker 3: Stanford to host the show, and today we're recapping Incubate
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Speaker 3: Japan's recent delegation trip. Each year, Incubate travels with the
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Speaker 3: delegation of VC investors to Japan to talk with government
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Speaker 3: officials about incentivizing foreign VC investment. This year's trip landed
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Speaker 3: during the final drafting of the Prime Ministers Honiboto and
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Speaker 3: Growth Strategy documents, both of which named pharmaceuticals as a
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Speaker 3: strategic sector and included meetings across Japan's life sciences ecosystem,
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Speaker 3: from policymakers to investors to startups. We're joined by John
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Speaker 3: Gutierres of Ascenta Capital and Josh Lipscomb, Incubates International Programs Manager,
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Speaker 3: who also traveled with the delegation. Additionally, as America marks
1:34
Speaker 3: two hundred and fifty years, we're launching a new series
1:36
Speaker 3: later this month, How America Makes Medicine. No country does
1:40
Speaker 3: drug development like we do, and this series traces the
1:43
Speaker 3: uniquely American relay from university lab to startup, to investor,
1:48
Speaker 3: to pharma to regulator that makes us the world's leader
1:51
Speaker 3: in biotech innovation. We'll bring on guests at the heart
1:55
Speaker 3: of that story, from scientists and founders to investors and policymakers.
1:59
Speaker 3: You won't want to miss it. Let's get into the show.
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Speaker 4: Thanks Grace, happy to be here, joined today by John
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Speaker 4: Kutierras of Acenta Capital and Josh Letscom of Incubate. John,
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Speaker 4: great to see you as always, and Josh, nice to
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Speaker 4: see you again.
2:13
Speaker 5: Good to see it too, John.
2:14
Speaker 2: Great seeing both.
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Speaker 4: We had the opportunity about a month ago to head
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Speaker 4: to Tokyo for a few days of meetings with government
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Speaker 4: officials across the ministries and across the Diet. I thought
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Speaker 4: I would start by asking both of you kind of
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Speaker 4: like what your insights were on how those meetings went,
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Speaker 4: and kind of like some of the most kind of
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Speaker 4: practical insights that we got from from those conversations.
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Speaker 2: This being sort of a third trip to Japan, it
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Speaker 2: was interesting to kind of see how the dialogue has
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Speaker 2: progressed each time that we've gone there, and I think
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Speaker 2: much of that is reflected in both their publicized strategy
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Speaker 2: and their explicit sort of language that they used for us.
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Speaker 2: I think what we're seeing is there's been kind of
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Speaker 2: a shift from initially recognizing that there is kind of,
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Speaker 2: you know, a concern in terms of whether that's pricing policy,
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Speaker 2: the lack of kind of a sufficient startup environment, to
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Speaker 2: now having more tangible potential solutions, explicit language and sort
3:08
Speaker 2: of the growth strategy of the Hunabuto and others, and
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Speaker 2: so I think it was extremely encouraging. I think all
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Speaker 2: the Diet members we spoke with, while each had sort
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Speaker 2: of slightly varying opinions on what the potential solutions are.
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Speaker 2: I think very much acknowledge an issue and a need
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Speaker 2: for finding a solution, which I think was very encouraging.
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Speaker 4: So, John, you had the opportunity to join us about
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Speaker 4: a year ago for a prior delegation trip, kind of like,
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Speaker 4: do you have what are your thoughts on what you
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Speaker 4: saw a year ago versus you know, what you saw
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Speaker 4: in the last couple of weeks.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. I think it was interesting. The first trip
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Speaker 2: I went on a year ago was kind of my
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Speaker 2: initial sort of exposure to sort of how you know,
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Speaker 2: the government members think. I think initially there was kind
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Speaker 2: of a sort of an understanding of our perspectives and
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Speaker 2: wanting to acknowledge kind of some of the challenges of
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Speaker 2: operating in Japan from a drug launch perspective, from a
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Speaker 2: startup environment, and I think the shift I noticed was
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Speaker 2: was quite stark and very positive. A lot of that
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Speaker 2: was both explicitly in the language that they use in
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Speaker 2: terms of acknowledging, for example, the need to run greater
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Speaker 2: clinical trials, acknowledging the drug loss. Even you know, one
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Speaker 2: of the diet members mentioning, you know, if a certain
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Speaker 2: structure requires that Japanese drugs be spun out and taken
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Speaker 2: to the US, so be it. I think there were
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Speaker 2: much more tangible and practical solutions on the table versus
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Speaker 2: a lot of the discussion last year was a little
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Speaker 2: bit more kind of nebulous and sort of you know,
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Speaker 2: directionally good, but nothing sort of tangible. And I think
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Speaker 2: I'll add to that. You know, in the draft of
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Speaker 2: the Hunubutu which was released, which was obviously the intention
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Speaker 2: of this trip, there was explicit language if you look
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Speaker 2: at twenty twenty five versus twenty six last year, there
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Speaker 2: was language around, you know, having infrastructure for clinical trials.
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Speaker 2: For example. The draft this year explicitly stated doubling the
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Speaker 2: number of international joint clinical trials. And so I think
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Speaker 2: a much more tangible kind of focus lens is what
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Speaker 2: I saw and which is great.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, Josh as Incubates International Programs Manager, I wonder if
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Speaker 4: you have any additional thoughts on either the Hanabuta or
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Speaker 4: the growth strategy document that we released.
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Speaker 5: Well, again, great to be here. I've been helping set
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Speaker 5: up these trips to Japan for a few years now
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Speaker 5: on the back end and was very grateful to be
5:17
Speaker 5: able to go to Tokyo for the first time, and
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Speaker 5: I think John Gutira's to your point, the evolution of
5:24
Speaker 5: the thought processes around even our internal talking points has
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Speaker 5: become a little bit more dialed in. We've been able
5:31
Speaker 5: to be a little bit more specific every time in lawmakers,
5:34
Speaker 5: especially in the LDP. This time around, we're really you know,
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Speaker 5: our points were resonating with with what they had in mind,
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Speaker 5: and it seems like, you know, ideally our points to
5:47
Speaker 5: the LDP members had led to some of that information
5:50
Speaker 5: getting included in the hnabots on the growth strategy this
5:53
Speaker 5: year about the technology was obviously highly ranked as a
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Speaker 5: you know, a way that the Tech e G Administration
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Speaker 5: sees economic growth coming to Japan as a whole.
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Speaker 4: Something that I found interesting in a lot of our
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Speaker 4: conversations was this kind of dual idea of wanting to
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Speaker 4: support and grow the Japanese biotech ecosystem and wanting to
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Speaker 4: recognize that the current pricing structure just doesn't make sense
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Speaker 4: for companies, investors, and ultimately for patient access. What are
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Speaker 4: your thoughts on, you know, how Japan is considering its
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Speaker 4: reforms and how it relates to drug pricing.
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Speaker 2: They very much acknowledge that there is a need for
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Speaker 2: a form. I think there's external factors that I think
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Speaker 2: we started to get a sense of, particularly on this trip.
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Speaker 2: I think one of them being, for example, public perception.
6:45
Speaker 2: I think a few of the diet members had mentioned that,
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Speaker 2: you know, the public doesn't necessarily view this as an issue,
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Speaker 2: and they just kind of expect that they would have
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Speaker 2: the most innovative drugs ready and available to them without
6:55
Speaker 2: regard for the potential pricing presets needed. And so I
6:59
Speaker 2: think there's that there's that maybe we had to consider
7:01
Speaker 2: it that you do have to take into perspective, whether
7:03
Speaker 2: it's great or public awareness and education and how you
7:07
Speaker 2: sort of get that to then influence policy. And so
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Speaker 2: I think it became a little bit clear, and much
7:12
Speaker 2: of that I think has to do with them trying
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Speaker 2: to implement tangible solutions, but then seeing kind of what
7:17
Speaker 2: that pushback is, which is healthy and good, and I
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Speaker 2: think sort of a next, you know, point that we
7:23
Speaker 2: would need to solve and think through.
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Speaker 4: One of the quotes that stuck most with me throughout
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Speaker 4: the week was that, you know, with all the discussion
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Speaker 4: about biotech as a growth strategy, that the current pricing
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Speaker 4: policies are seen as more of a break than an accelerator.
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Speaker 4: I think that's something that we try to take into
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Speaker 4: other meetings and saying, you know, with all this work
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Speaker 4: to try to grow the biotech ecosystem, you can't really
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Speaker 4: do that if you don't have an appropriate pricing structure
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Speaker 4: that just values the you know, the the immense time
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Speaker 4: and cost that it takes to bring bring a treatment
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Speaker 4: to market.
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Speaker 2: Definitely, and I think we explicitly in the draft of
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Speaker 2: the Hunabutu which was released, I think we sort of
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Speaker 2: see that tension kind of playing out. I think, as
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Speaker 2: Josh mentioned, I think they've definitely sort of the language
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Speaker 2: I think was appropriately evaluating the initial price of a
8:11
Speaker 2: drug as well as trying to sort of maintain a
8:13
Speaker 2: fair price throughout the patent period, which was exactly kind
8:16
Speaker 2: of our intention for the trip. But I think the
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Speaker 2: challenge and kind of the flip side is it seems
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Speaker 2: that the price revisions, the annual price re visions, are
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Speaker 2: still in place, although there is positive language around you know,
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Speaker 2: potentially changing that, but there is that tension where they're
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Speaker 2: trying to appropriately value innovation while at the same time
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Speaker 2: maintaining you know, appropriate prices for the population and not
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Speaker 2: significantly increasing their health care costs.
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Speaker 4: Something else that came up I think in just about
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Speaker 4: every meeting that we had was the concern and issue
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Speaker 4: of drug lag or drug loss. For the listeners that
8:49
Speaker 4: aren't familiar with it, I'm wondering if one of you
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Speaker 4: could just explain what that is and explain kind of
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Speaker 4: like how that was coming up in the conversations.
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Speaker 2: So the drug loss is I think a pretty significant
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Speaker 2: issue where the Japanese population, unbeknownst them, doesn't see, you know,
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Speaker 2: the ultimate product of decades of research and innovation, both
9:08
Speaker 2: within Japan and even externally. I think one of the
9:11
Speaker 2: statistics that you know that we were making the DIE
9:13
Speaker 2: members aware of is I think between twenty thirteen and
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Speaker 2: twenty twenty four, you know, ten plus issuear period, there
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Speaker 2: are about two hundred and forty five drugs launched, only
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Speaker 2: half of those which ever reached you know, the japan market.
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Speaker 2: And so for one, there's just drugs. There's a lot
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Speaker 2: more innovation that's happening in the pharmaceutical space, and that
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Speaker 2: innovation isn't captured in the end product that reaches the
9:36
Speaker 2: Japanese population. The other point, I think was about seventy
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Speaker 2: percent of drugs that are in clinical trials today aren't
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Speaker 2: actually being studied within Japan and ultimately may not launch there.
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Speaker 2: And so I think the both the loss of drugs
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Speaker 2: in an absolute sense, and then I think the lag
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Speaker 2: of these drugs potentially being studied at some point in
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Speaker 2: the future and these patients having to wait several years
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Speaker 2: is a huge issue and have been sort of growing
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Speaker 2: over the last few years.
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Speaker 5: And back to our original point about public perception or
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Speaker 5: public knowledge about this, there's not many people, or at
10:09
Speaker 5: least we didn't get the sense that there's people in
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Speaker 5: Japan who understand that issue, that they understand that they're
10:14
Speaker 5: missing out on innovative treatments that are coming to market
10:17
Speaker 5: in other places. And I think some of the LDP
10:20
Speaker 5: members stress the need for that perception gap to be filled.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, actually, I would love if you could just kind
10:26
Speaker 4: of expand on that a little bit more. Something that
10:29
Speaker 4: came up again in almost every meeting was the need
10:31
Speaker 4: for data and the need to kind of like fill
10:33
Speaker 4: in that public understanding of what it takes to bring
10:35
Speaker 4: a product to market.
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Speaker 5: Sure, it seems like some of the agencies themselves MEDI
10:41
Speaker 5: MHLW may not collect as robust data as say US
10:46
Speaker 5: counterpart agency would on how they're deploying dollars in the country.
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Speaker 5: And so when we were having conversations with MEDI, MHLW
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Speaker 5: and DIET members, they stress the need for economic im data.
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Speaker 5: They's just the need for showing the value of some
11:06
Speaker 5: of the drugs that are coming to market, you know,
11:09
Speaker 5: building the biopharmaceutical pipeline. They show the need and the
11:13
Speaker 5: lack thereof in Japan of that data existing.
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Speaker 2: So I think one thing to add as well is
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Speaker 2: I think historically the sort of drug loss hasn't been
11:22
Speaker 2: as noticeable, given that the majority of drugs were kind
11:25
Speaker 2: of treating symptoms as opposed to root cause of disease.
11:28
Speaker 2: But I'd say over the last ten twenty years there's
11:30
Speaker 2: been significant innovation to where we're actually targeting root cause
11:34
Speaker 2: diseases and really extending life dramatically. I think one presentation
11:39
Speaker 2: that comes to mind at ASCO was a novel drug
11:42
Speaker 2: for pancreatic cancer, which double the overall survival time for
11:45
Speaker 2: a drug that's been historically very difficult to treat. And
11:49
Speaker 2: so I think these are the types of innovative drugs
11:51
Speaker 2: that over the next several years lack of access to
11:55
Speaker 2: will actually cause significant health burdens, and I think the
11:57
Speaker 2: diet members are starting to recognize some of that.
11:59
Speaker 4: Yeah, let's talk for a second about kind of the
12:03
Speaker 4: what japan strengths actually are. I think a lot of
12:05
Speaker 4: the conversations focused on just it is the it has
12:08
Speaker 4: such a world class background of innovation and technology. John,
12:13
Speaker 4: I'm curious if you can kind of talk a little
12:15
Speaker 4: bit more about what makes Japan a interesting place to
12:22
Speaker 4: invest and what makes it what makes it such just
12:25
Speaker 4: a fertile ground of innovation.
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Speaker 2: Definitely, I mean, I think, you know, the hardest part
12:30
Speaker 2: I think for an ecosystem to start up from the
12:33
Speaker 2: ground is having sort of the infrastructure in place. And
12:35
Speaker 2: the pieces to that infrastructure are one a healthy, large
12:38
Speaker 2: form of ecosystem, to a robust sort of startup environment
12:42
Speaker 2: that kind of feeds off of that, and then three,
12:45
Speaker 2: I think kind of having that flywheel both with the
12:47
Speaker 2: domestic kind of economy welcoming pharmaceutical products and innovation, as
12:51
Speaker 2: well as being able to sort of deliver that externally
12:54
Speaker 2: internationally as well. I think Japan has all those pieces,
12:58
Speaker 2: I think with caveats across each one. I think the
13:01
Speaker 2: farm environment is significantly healthy. I think the startup environment
13:05
Speaker 2: needs sort of a little bit of encouragement, both from
13:08
Speaker 2: a standpoint of encouraging folks to go into startups, leaving
13:12
Speaker 2: maybe well paying and secure jobs at pharma, but to
13:16
Speaker 2: branch out and kind of continue to deliver innovation. And
13:19
Speaker 2: then I think the third part is kind of the
13:21
Speaker 2: internal sort of logistics of getting drugs launch at an
13:25
Speaker 2: appropriate value within Japan. But they have all the pieces,
13:27
Speaker 2: and I think we've chatted throughout that week around ensuring
13:31
Speaker 2: that that flyweel kind of gets going. As an example,
13:34
Speaker 2: many of the drugs that you know, we think of
13:36
Speaker 2: that are very successful, you think of LDL targeting of
13:39
Speaker 2: DEVO and others, they actually initially sort of came out
13:42
Speaker 2: of research from Japanese universities. So there's a lot of
13:45
Speaker 2: innovative research and it's a matter of just kind of
13:47
Speaker 2: getting the pieces to sort of operate in unison and
13:50
Speaker 2: getting them to operate well effectively.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, and actually, you know, speaking of that, getting that
13:55
Speaker 4: flywheel going and really supporting that startup environment, we have
13:57
Speaker 4: the opportunity to visit the new Bio Labs Tokyo office.
14:01
Speaker 4: I thought it was a great opportunity to walk around
14:04
Speaker 4: and see what it's going to be home to. I
14:06
Speaker 4: think they said they have space for about fifty biotechs
14:09
Speaker 4: to you know, get started out on their R and D.
14:12
Speaker 4: There is there anything that stood out in that part
14:14
Speaker 4: of our trip that makes you optimistic for for Japan's ecosystem?
14:19
Speaker 2: Definitely. I think it was very refreshing kind of walking
14:21
Speaker 2: through the lab and seeing the space and it sort
14:24
Speaker 2: of it invites kind of you know, thought, curiosity and innovation,
14:29
Speaker 2: and so I think that's very healthy for the ecosystem there.
14:32
Speaker 2: I think obviously, you know, one of the professors at
14:35
Speaker 2: the University of Kyoto who's done extensive research kind of
14:38
Speaker 2: was there and leading the effort, and I think that's
14:40
Speaker 2: exactly what's needed. We need academicians to come in and say, hey,
14:44
Speaker 2: this is part of you know, what makes pharmaceutical and
14:48
Speaker 2: drug discovery exciting, and it should be inviting and welcoming
14:51
Speaker 2: as opposed to what's been historically a little bit of
14:54
Speaker 2: a reluctance to leave kind of you know, safe while
14:56
Speaker 2: paying research or pharmaceutical jobs.
14:58
Speaker 4: Fast forward a couple of weeks we come back from Japan,
15:01
Speaker 4: start preparing for the bioconvention in San Diego. All three
15:05
Speaker 4: of us were in San Diego kind of I think
15:07
Speaker 4: tackling different different projects and different meetings throughout the week,
15:10
Speaker 4: but Japan still was kind of a focus for all
15:13
Speaker 4: three of us. I'm happy to start here, but I
15:15
Speaker 4: would love to hear your thoughts on the kind of
15:17
Speaker 4: like what what you all were doing in San Diego
15:19
Speaker 4: as it relates to the Japanese biotech ecosystem. I had
15:22
Speaker 4: the opportunity to sit in on a couple panels on
15:25
Speaker 4: Japan's biotech ecosystem where government officials from from MHLW and
15:31
Speaker 4: others had candid discussions about what they're doing to support
15:37
Speaker 4: support that flywheel that you were just talking about, John.
15:39
Speaker 4: You know, one of the one of the examples that
15:41
Speaker 4: came up a lot was am ed's startup program that
15:44
Speaker 4: kind of gives a two to one match of investment
15:47
Speaker 4: for investors. They saw that, and you know, the people
15:51
Speaker 4: around the room saw that as as a real mover
15:55
Speaker 4: in terms of bringing together more investment, more companies and
16:00
Speaker 4: or scientists in the biotech ecosystem in Japan. Obviously, MFN
16:05
Speaker 4: and drug priting came up in those conversations as well,
16:08
Speaker 4: and I actually found it interesting that while they said
16:11
Speaker 4: that they weren't able to get into specifics that they
16:14
Speaker 4: understand and recognize it as as a real issue that's
16:17
Speaker 4: that's impeding Japan's own biotech growth. I think it was
16:22
Speaker 4: refreshing to hear them speak as candidly as they could
16:26
Speaker 4: about it and say that they are working on it
16:29
Speaker 4: and to expect more to come from that soon. So
16:32
Speaker 4: I will personally be really looking forward to seeing what
16:35
Speaker 4: what that looks like. But Josh, I know you actually
16:37
Speaker 4: did way more than me, and in Bio or around
16:41
Speaker 4: San Diego as it relates to Japan, we'd love to
16:44
Speaker 4: hear what you were doing.
16:45
Speaker 5: Sure. Yeah, So it's interesting that I was actually able
16:48
Speaker 5: to avoid BIO entirely with the amount of sideline events,
16:51
Speaker 5: which are typical, but the amount of sideline events that
16:54
Speaker 5: were Japan focused, in Japan biotech focused was really impressive.
16:59
Speaker 5: So I was a to go to REZI for one
17:01
Speaker 5: of the days, which was mostly focused on the startup
17:04
Speaker 5: ecosystem and connecting vcs to investor. Or started connecting vcs
17:10
Speaker 5: to startups, and there was a lot of folks from
17:13
Speaker 5: Japan who came a lot of Japanese startups that were
17:16
Speaker 5: pitching themselves in the sort of traditional, almost like our
17:20
Speaker 5: Science to Startup Summit that we attended in Japan but
17:23
Speaker 5: happening in San Diego this year. There are many officials.
17:26
Speaker 5: Professor Kuainagi, who is leading the Biolabus Tokyo effort was
17:30
Speaker 5: also there lots of Kyoto based startups, so very impressive
17:35
Speaker 5: to see all of that. I also attended Bullpen, which
17:39
Speaker 5: is a sort of founder led coalition that is a
17:43
Speaker 5: convener for these sort of events, and it was interesting.
17:46
Speaker 5: There were four different events at Bullpen that I attended
17:50
Speaker 5: and they were all geographically focused. So there was a
17:52
Speaker 5: Japan event, a China event. There was also Australia and
17:56
Speaker 5: UK and the difference in attendance between each of those
18:00
Speaker 5: was really interesting to see. Specifically, the Japan event was
18:05
Speaker 5: completely filled investors, startup practitioners, everyone was filling the entire
18:12
Speaker 5: event space. We were at a you know, U see
18:14
Speaker 5: San Diego event space and it was completely filled. And comparatively,
18:20
Speaker 5: you know, Australia, UK, China panels were you know, there
18:24
Speaker 5: wasn't as much attention. So good to see that much
18:27
Speaker 5: attention towards the growth and I think some demystifying towards
18:32
Speaker 5: the idea that Japan is slow.
18:36
Speaker 2: Josh definitely was heavily involved in a lot of the events.
18:38
Speaker 2: I think my one take I'll mention is I sort
18:41
Speaker 2: of attended kind of a jetro sort of happy hour
18:43
Speaker 2: at one of the days, and the one takeaway I
18:46
Speaker 2: had was just increased kind of clarity on both Japan
18:51
Speaker 2: wanting to kind of be sort of a hub as
18:53
Speaker 2: well as inviting external investors, and so for myself and
18:57
Speaker 2: other investors, I know, the AMED matching program is still
19:00
Speaker 2: a little bit obscure in terms of how it actually
19:02
Speaker 2: works in the mechanics, so there was someone from AMED
19:04
Speaker 2: there that kind of described it better. They publicize a
19:07
Speaker 2: lot more of events like Bio Japan, which we're aware of,
19:10
Speaker 2: and then the Global Startup Expo that's happening in Osaka
19:13
Speaker 2: just before then, so there was a lot more publicity
19:15
Speaker 2: and awareness, which I thought was great.
19:17
Speaker 4: Incubator is planning additional trips over the next several months.
19:21
Speaker 4: Curious you know, from your perspective, what has you optimistic
19:24
Speaker 4: as we kind of plan these trips and what do
19:28
Speaker 4: you think we can accomplish in the next in our
19:30
Speaker 4: next delegation trip.
19:32
Speaker 2: I think I'm incredibly optimistic. I think, for one a
19:36
Speaker 2: lot of the feedback, as we mentioned that we kind
19:38
Speaker 2: of came in explicitly wanting to convey, was reflected in
19:42
Speaker 2: their strategy, and so I think I'm very optimistic of
19:46
Speaker 2: the fact that we sort of have a little bit
19:48
Speaker 2: more of a direction, and I think we understand some
19:50
Speaker 2: of the kind of obstacles that that are in the
19:52
Speaker 2: way of that. So as an example, increase public awareness,
19:56
Speaker 2: increase data and sort of statistics around whether that's quality
20:01
Speaker 2: of life improvement or significant you know, say mortality benefit,
20:04
Speaker 2: around drug lag and lack of access. So I think
20:08
Speaker 2: we have a sense of kind of in our part
20:10
Speaker 2: certain things that we can maybe help them on as
20:14
Speaker 2: well as helping them think through and sort of overcome
20:16
Speaker 2: a lot of those challenges to getting effective policies in place.
20:20
Speaker 2: So I'm very positive and optimistic, and I think directionally
20:23
Speaker 2: it's all been heading quite well.
20:25
Speaker 4: We didn't just have meetings, obviously, we were able to
20:28
Speaker 4: get around town and see some see some sites, and
20:30
Speaker 4: have some great meals. You know, curious both your perspectives,
20:34
Speaker 4: what was maybe one thing that stood out, one good
20:37
Speaker 4: meal or one interesting thing that you saw.
20:39
Speaker 2: One of my favorite meals was one of the nights
20:41
Speaker 2: where we had yakimiku, which is kind of a Japanese
20:44
Speaker 2: sort of barbecue style, where we had different meats on
20:47
Speaker 2: a grill, which was great. And always loved having a
20:50
Speaker 2: sahi beer pretty much at a moment's notice, which is
20:54
Speaker 2: not as easy to find in the US.
20:56
Speaker 5: I think my favorite was probably the night where we
20:59
Speaker 5: convene the ICJ Big Coalition Japan Advisory Council. It's very traditional,
21:05
Speaker 5: take your shoes off at the door, and had a
21:08
Speaker 5: lot of jokes about Japanese salaryman to the to the
21:12
Speaker 5: ICGA Advisory Council, which they thought was really funny.
21:15
Speaker 4: Yeah, I can say I always love visiting Japan, especially
21:19
Speaker 4: for the food, although the tripe might be something that
21:23
Speaker 4: I probably will not be trying again, but I was
21:25
Speaker 4: happy to have the opportunity. Josh John, this has been
21:29
Speaker 4: a great conversation, but I would love to give you
21:33
Speaker 4: the opportunity to share any final thoughts about Japan's biotech
21:36
Speaker 4: ecosystem and about incubates work.
21:38
Speaker 2: I think Japan's ecosystem is robust. I think the flywheel
21:42
Speaker 2: is kind of that piece we keep hitting on, and
21:44
Speaker 2: I think it's what we're tweaking all the pieces to
21:46
Speaker 2: kind of get that flywheel going, and I think we're
21:48
Speaker 2: definitely heading in that direction. I think incubates work has
21:52
Speaker 2: been incredible, you know, from what we heard. Consistently, we've
21:56
Speaker 2: been a big, big advocate for their ecosystem and it's
21:58
Speaker 2: been incredibly appreciated, and I think it even encourages them
22:02
Speaker 2: to be a little bit more engage and active in
22:05
Speaker 2: getting policies put in place, and so I'm excited for
22:09
Speaker 2: what's to come. I think it's certainly no small feed
22:11
Speaker 2: and I think to where we've gotten also in terms
22:13
Speaker 2: of some of the language and perspectives, has been great.
22:17
Speaker 2: There's more work to do, but it's encouraging and I
22:19
Speaker 2: think it's what makes it exciting.
22:21
Speaker 5: I'm also incredibly optimistic, and I love the position that
22:26
Speaker 5: Incubate plays in the ecosystem, both to offer the US
22:30
Speaker 5: investor perspective to Japanese biotech companies that are really curious
22:33
Speaker 5: to tap into the US market, but also to take
22:37
Speaker 5: some of the insights that we hear from Japanese startup
22:40
Speaker 5: leaders and founders and taking them to the policy makers
22:44
Speaker 5: that need to hear them.
22:45
Speaker 4: Well, it was a great time seeing you in Japan
22:47
Speaker 4: and seeing you all again in San Diego as well.
22:51
Speaker 4: Looking forward to our future trips and looking forward to
22:54
Speaker 4: staying engaged in supporting the biotech industry here and across
22:59
Speaker 4: across the world.
23:00
Speaker 2: Awesome.
23:01
Speaker 3: That wraps up this episode of the Making Medicine Podcast.
23:04
Speaker 3: Another huge thank you to John Gutierra's and Josh Lipscomb
23:08
Speaker 3: for joining us on today's show, and John Guy for
23:10
Speaker 3: his interim hosting gig. Be sure to subscribe on YouTube
23:14
Speaker 3: and follow us on our other channels so you don't
23:16
Speaker 3: miss upcoming conversations. Do you have thoughts on anything we
23:19
Speaker 3: discussed today, Let us know and we might feature your
23:22
Speaker 3: comment in next week's episode. Thanks for listening and as always,
23:26
Speaker 3: keep innovating