Latest / The BioHub - by Avetix / Episode 201 - Bennett Smith - SVP Commercial Beren Therapeutics

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Episode 201 - Bennett Smith - SVP Commercial Beren Therapeutics · The BioHub - by Avetix

• 0:06
  So welcome back to another episode of the Bio Hub and
• 0:09
  Avetix podcast. Today, I'm joined by Bennett
• 0:12
  Smith, SVP of Commercial at Baron Therapeutics.
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  Bennett has more than 20 years building commercial strategy
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  across biotech and pharma, working on major products at
• 0:21
  companies like Novo Nordisk, Regeneron, Orchard and Akebia,
• 0:26
  where he helped drive significant growth through
• 0:28
  commercial execution. Today, he's leading
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  commercialization at Baron, a clinical stage company that has
• 0:34
  recently emerged from stealth with a focus on building
• 0:37
  commercial strategy from day one rather than his after thoughts.
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  In this conversation, we talk about launching high cost
• 0:43
  therapies, building teams and stealth, why commercial thinking
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  needs to start early, and what's next for Baron.
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  Pleasure to have you, Bennett. How are you?
• 0:53
  I'm doing great. How about yourself?
• 0:56
  Yes, really well, really well. It's, it's good to have you for
• 0:59
  sure. I, I just want to start with
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  with you and your background. So you spent your career
• 1:07
  building commercial functions across biotech and and pharma.
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  What originally drew you into the commercial side of of the
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  industry? You know, what actually drew me
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  into the commercial side was the ability to actually deliver
• 1:20
  innovation to folks that are suffering.
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  So much of investment goes into the initial science and drug
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  development and I really believe commercials.
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  What unlocks that final step, You know, getting the therapy
• 1:34
  actually to that patient that's suffering.
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  You know, it's often assumed that if you have a compelling
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  clinical data or different differentiated label, you know
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  adoption will naturally follow. You know, the healthcare
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  providers and patients will find you.
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  In my experience, you know, having a compelling product is
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  just table stakes. The real question is whether the
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  healthcare delivery system is actually equipped to allow your
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  product to be received. And in complex systems, whether
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  that's in the US or globally, the gap between approval and
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  access can determine whether someone benefits from innovation
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  or does not. And that's really what drives me
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  to be part of the commercial part of our business.
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  Yeah, that's a part that not many people really think about
• 2:20
  all the time. This aspects of, you know, a
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  patient is not always truly equipped to go and find the best
• 2:27
  therapy for them. And then you've got your your
• 2:31
  own expertise and experience to to really make sure those
• 2:34
  patients find it. Absolutely.
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  If you think of marketing, very fundamentally, it's an
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  information activity. We want information to occur to
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  the consumer and healthcare, there's many consumers.
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  There's a doctor that's prescribing a medication,
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  there's a payer or health system paying for the medication and
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  there's the end user who's going to benefit from that innovation.
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  So all those stakeholders are considered when we're we're
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  trying to commercialize. We don't make the presumption
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  that they understand the disease area, the innovation or even how
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  the products administered or where they can get it.
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  Yeah. And like I said in the intro,
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  you you really have worked on some major launches, including
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  one of the most expensive gene therapists in the world.
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  What? What did that experience teach
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  you about commercialization at that level?
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  There was a lot of anxiety about whether the market would
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  understand the value proposition and whether we'd become a
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  headline for wrong reasons. I can be remember being inside
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  of boardrooms and executive meetings and saying how is the
• 3:41
  market going to respond to this. And the truth be told, we did
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  become a headline at $4.25 million for Lamelda in the US It
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  was the most expensive product in the world at the time of
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  launch. But what I learned is the real
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  work wasn't necessarily convincing A payer to pay or
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  avoiding A salacious headline. It was making sure that every
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  stakeholder understood our process and rationale and felt
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  heard. It's not that they could defend
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  that price. You know, for this particular
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  condition, there's roughly 40 to 50 patients that would be
• 4:19
  diagnosed in the US every year. We knew every case would be
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  examined very closely. In fact, when we discussed the
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  price with some KOLSI heard in your full, initially they just
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  didn't understand and they had sticker shock.
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  But when we transparently disclosed what went into your
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  value assessment of the product, kind of the full value story,
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  they still had that sticker shock, yet they recognized that
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  we're really thoughtful about our approach and what went into
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  that approach. I think that simply was was a
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  win that multiple stakeholders understood that value
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  assessment. And then what that really taught
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  me is, you know, commercial success comes down to
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  relationships, transparency, making sure no stakeholders in
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  the afterthought, whether it's an advocacy group, you know, a
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  physician or a payer. So certainly a lot of learnings
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  from from that launch and that therapy.
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  Yeah. And ultimately it was a success,
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  right? So you know you've been doing
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  the right things. It was a transformational
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  therapy that patients that didn't receive that gene therapy
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  had an almost certain, you know, death prognosis.
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  So it really transformative therapy that we wanted to
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  provide access for even a limited population and we wanted
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  to demonstrate that these types of gene therapy innovations
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  could be successfully commercialized because we knew
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  that you wouldn't have additional capital formation for
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  these type of innovations unless we were commercially successful.
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  Yeah. I mean just generally speaking
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  as well, like how do you quantify like how well what's a
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  commercial success? Obviously the, there's the
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  numbers, but you talk about like the patient size and the impact
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  and, and we'll talk about it a little bit later as well.
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  But the fact that you've come in earlier to a company like Baron
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  to really make sure it is a success and and the preparedness
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  could can start happening early on.
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  I think the typical goal posts that people think about is
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  revenue, right? How much revenue is that, you
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  know, product and a potentially, you know, have and then what's
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  the length of that revenue, right?
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  What is your patent life? What is indication expansion?
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  What is the life cycle of that, you know, product look like?
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  I think throughout my career and I, you know, tried to educate
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  boards and executive teams that look, here are the things that
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  we're going to measure that determines whether we're
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  successful for this launch. And you know, for that
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  particular launch it we had, you know, very defined KP is on the
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  patients that we found how early we were able to intervene.
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  All those ended up translating into our ability to treat those
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  patients. But it was framed under if we
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  were aligned to patients and ensure that we were driving
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  patient finding early diagnosis, we were sending the pathway for
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  for commercial success. That also translates into early
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  engagement with payers. So by the time a case came
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  through their desk, they weren't hearing about the condition, why
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  they needed to act with urgency. And all those things were were
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  drivers into, you know how we define success.
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  So it wasn't just a quarterly metric that we're reporting on.
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  We had all these things we could communicate externally about.
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  Wire launch was deemed a success.
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  Yeah, I want to move on to Baron now as well.
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  You guys have recently come out of stealth.
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  We just talk about the decision why you chose to stay in stealth
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  for so long and what it allowed you to build while while you
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  were in stealth. Yeah, these decisions are you
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  know often multi factorial. I think our case is you know
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  pretty unique. If you look at the early company
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  inception, we were still for the the common reasons right around
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  competitiveness and you know patents and early scientific
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  development. I think that situation became a
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  little bit more complex when we acquired our lead asset.
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  That lead asset had three prior sponsors.
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  It had starting stops with those prior sponsors.
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  The patient community was really worn out.
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  They were depending on this product for their their loved
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  one. And one thing that we wanted to
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  be thoughtful about is that we prioritize that relationship
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  with the community and earn that trust, you know, because of the
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  prior, you know, sponsor history, we also wanted to
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  protect our internal employees and develop that trust
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  one-on-one. So maintaining stealth gave us
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  the, you know, space to establish that your Community
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  Trust without, you know, everything being, you know, in
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  the public domain. And then coming out of stealth
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  was ultimately driven by necessity.
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  We were, you know, about to report our data, we're about to
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  go through regulatory filings. There was a need to actually
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  communicate more broadly than just with that, you know,
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  limited stakeholder community. And so it was a very intentional
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  strategy to really unstealth as we had scientific data that we
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  wanted the broader public outside of the community, the
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  KOLS, other potential positions, potential investors to know
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  about. So that's really the inflection
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  point where we announced who we are and, you know, came out to
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  the world. Yeah, and the part I actually
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  find really interesting and, and it's probably the recruiter of
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  me, right. It's like what?
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  What's it actually like to build a company and and a team while
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  you're in stealth mode? Well, I obviously went through
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  the process, you know, while we're the company's under
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  stealth and it's atypical for, you know, a commercial employee
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  to, you know, sign an NDA ahead of going into recruitment
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  process. You know, when you're public,
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  there's often metrics that people can, you know, validate
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  and you've had an investor in corporate communication story,
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  you know, in the recruiting process, you know, you're
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  building that story with the with the candidate and you're
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  sharing information and being transparent with them.
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  But they don't have the publicly sourced information to kind of
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  do their your own research or, or diligence in terms of, you
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  know, building company scale and building operations.
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  It's no different than any other place that I've been in terms
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  of, hey, we need to build infrastructure, we need to build
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  processes and bring in the talent at scale as we get ready
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  for a commercial launch. So might feel different at least
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  early days when we're still stealth from a candidate
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  experience not having that opportunity to look in the
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  public domain and see what you've released and what you've
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  what's in your investor or corporate DAC.
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  But actually from a company formation perspective, you know
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  you're we're doing the same types of activities as we're
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  going from clinical stage to commercial stage.
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  Yeah. And in terms of like finding
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  people to come and work with you guys at Baroness, I suppose it
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  shuts off a couple of avenues. I like a job advert, you know,
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  like things like that. So, so most of it is either I
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  guess through people like me, but also through your own
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  networks and, and things like that.
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  Yeah, We've relied a lot on our internal talent acquisition,
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  folks like you Max who've been instrumental at finding top tier
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  talent and then our own internal networks.
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  You know, one thing that I think we've done a great job of is
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  hiring, you know, great talent and great talent tends to
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  attract other great talent. So when people see the people on
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  our leadership team, the people that we've brought into our
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  organization, that gives credibility to candidates about
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  the type of company that we're building.
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  That is so, so true. Yeah.
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  And then there's this. The the other part that's quite
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  interesting about Barron is, is bringing in commercial thinking
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  early. What, what, what?
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  Well, why do you think that is so important?
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  I'm obviously biased stakeholder here, but you know, a lot of
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  companies talk about how they'll bring commercial insights into
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  the R&D process, you know earlier and design AA product
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  with you know, market condition in mind.
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  In reality it's it's very hard to do in typical, you know,
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  biotech capital formation, you're often really driving
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  towards R&D efficiency trying to get to the next clinical
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  milestone. You know, many that might be
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  listening to this will say, well, we've got market size and
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  price, what else do we need at this stage?
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  People really care about our scientific story.
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  I think what's really compelling about how we're thinking about
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  this is we're not just looking at what we need for regulatory
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  approval, but we're trying to weave in advocacy insights early
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  on. What kind of endpoints matter to
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  the patients, what is meaningful to them in addition to KOL and
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  payer feedback, I think you also have to balance those insights,
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  right? Like when does one insight take
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  precedence over another? But ideally drug, good drug
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  development should begin by saying what's in the competitive
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  pipeline? What are the approved labels?
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  How are we going to be differentiated from those
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  labels? And it's what we're doing
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  clinically meaningful to the healthcare providers that will
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  prescribe this, the patients that will take this, the payers
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  that will reimburse this. And if we can't answer
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  unequivocally yes or a degree to yes that gives us commercial
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  confidence, then we should re evaluate that within our
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  portfolio and pipeline strategy. That's so true.
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  Yeah. I mean, so you're, you're
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  getting pretty involved in the development and the way they're
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  thinking about that kind. Of stuff, absolutely.
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  You know, I sit with our portfolio and strategy team even
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  as we look at indication expansion and other conditions
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  and provide that commercial lens early on.
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  You know, I don't want to get away of the science or the
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  innovation, but want to put that lens of what does this actually
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  feel like for a patient that's suffering from this disease?
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  How do they, you know, get therapies today?
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  What are they actually looking for?
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  You know, if part of the condition is, you know, motor
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  dysfunction and they become non ambulatory, can we prevent that?
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  And how long can we extend that? And how valuable is to that to
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  them? You know, some of those things
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  seem straightforward, but until you've, you know, walked in the
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  life of a patient and you know, some of us have, but some of us
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  haven't. So like truly understanding yet
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  and bringing that insight into how we design our clinical
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  development program is really paramount to how we want to be
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  different than other companies. What's it like as a commercial
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  guy working with the drug development team?
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  Is there a little bit of bite back or is this just
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  understanding? I suppose it's a bit of both,
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  especially when you first came in.
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  Yeah. You know, there's mutual respect
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  and it probably kind of alludes back to, you know, I was saying
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  earlier, we brought in great people and great people's not
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  just because they're subject matter experts.
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  They're great people because they're collaborative.
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  They've been part of great companies.
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  They know what it takes to develop.
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  You know, they're world class at drug development.
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  Hopefully they define me as world class and
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  commercialization. And there's that shared mutual
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  respect. So initially, you know, they're
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  really trying to set up their theoretical hypothesis, what
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  they need to do to move it to the next, you know, milestone.
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  And I'm not trying to muddy the waters, but I'm trying to give
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  them consideration of, you know, we're not just trying to de risk
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  this for, you know, clinical development.
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  We're also trying to de risk this for commercial success.
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  And how should we define that and make sure that we're, you
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  know, assigning those development milestones to those
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  inflection points? Yeah, I think it'd be good now
• 16:41
  actually for you just just to describe Baron.
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  So for those people who don't know who you guys are, what,
• 16:46
  what are you doing and what you're trying to achieve?
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  I mean, what we've disclosed thus far is that we're a public
• 16:54
  benefit corporation that might mean a lot of different things
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  to different people. In reality, it's that we have
• 17:01
  stakeholders that are other than shareholders that are you know,
• 17:05
  factored into our decision making, you know, as the
• 17:08
  organization we are a a platform company.
• 17:12
  Our lead asset is Agrobated X that we're in the regulatory
• 17:16
  process in the US for potential, you know approval this year
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  that's going to be our our first commercial asset.
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  Our core platform is based on the same kind of mechanism of
• 17:32
  action that this first asset is devolved on and we're
• 17:35
  considering both rare disease and you know, large disease
• 17:41
  areas for, you know, further development.
• 17:44
  We haven't disclosed our full pipeline or platform, but
• 17:48
  that's, you know, barren in a nutshell.
• 17:50
  Yeah, love that. The other part I find really
• 17:55
  interesting about you guys as well is, is your founder and and
• 17:58
  chairman. He comes from like he came from
• 18:01
  outside traditional biotech, right?
• 18:03
  You know, his background is more tech and and finance.
• 18:05
  How how was that influence the way you you guys have been
• 18:08
  built? I think it's given us a blank
• 18:12
  canvas to say how would we create a great company here
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  without the normal heuristic of this is how we always do it in
• 18:21
  in biotech. I think additionally, you know,
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  he has, you know, had a lot of successful in investments in
• 18:30
  biotech. So part of his prior funding
• 18:34
  was, you know, seeing what it took for a company to be great,
• 18:37
  understanding what science was promising.
• 18:42
  So I think he has the perspective of I've seen 1000
• 18:46
  pitches over the course of my, you know, decade or more of, of
• 18:50
  being an investor. What stood out about those
• 18:53
  management teams? What stood out about those
• 18:55
  science, that science, what predicted winners or losers?
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  And he's got great pattern recognition and he's taking that
• 19:04
  pattern recognition as as he is now, you know, founder, CEO, you
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  know, how do I operationalize that?
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  And from the the winners that I've seen from my investment
• 19:14
  placements, what are the learnings that I have that I can
• 19:18
  apply to this company formation? Yeah, he's just a outstanding
• 19:22
  entrepreneur, basically. He's world class, yeah, that's
• 19:27
  why I joined him. Just super successful and yeah,
• 19:31
  whatever he touches turns to gold, right?
• 19:34
  I don't know if he's got quite the Midas touch, but he's got a,
• 19:39
  you know, exceptional track record.
• 19:42
  And I'm really glad that he's been.
• 19:44
  He found this organization and, you know, carried it through
• 19:49
  through, you know, we're six years old now and we hope to be
• 19:53
  around 100 years from now. Yeah, because it's different in
• 19:56
  a bunch of ways. You know, tech is, well, if you
• 20:00
  talk about the commercial aspect, you get there quicker,
• 20:02
  right? Whereas biotech is a lot of
• 20:04
  money, a lot of time, a lot of effort and potentially higher
• 20:08
  rewards. But it's just.
• 20:10
  I suppose that way of thinking is quite different.
• 20:14
  Yeah, I think the only thing we've really stole from tech is
• 20:16
  like Sam and Tam and ARR like the the normal way to evaluate
• 20:23
  those companies. You know, very often our Tam is
• 20:26
  like epidemiology and market size, right.
• 20:28
  More your Sam strategy might be what's, what's the diagnosed
• 20:34
  population versus the total population in the, you know,
• 20:38
  estimated in, in prevalence and like how do we get to that
• 20:41
  quicker? So there's some of those
• 20:43
  heuristics, we call them different things in, in biotech,
• 20:47
  but you know, obviously their product development cycles are a
• 20:50
  lot different than ours. So we have the course correct
• 20:52
  and that has different capital requirements.
• 20:54
  Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I love, I love hearing
• 20:57
  about you guys and it's been awesome to have you on.
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  I think part of the the charge coming out of stealth and and
• 21:05
  getting you guys to be a bit more known, right?
• 21:08
  Absolutely. Yeah, it's been a pleasure.
• 21:11
  Brings us to my final question, which is always the same.
• 21:14
  So I hope you've had a bit of time to think about this.
• 21:16
  By the way, Bennett, it's if you could have dinner with any
• 21:19
  scientist or innovator, past or present, who, who would it be
• 21:23
  and and why? I think, you know, even when you
• 21:27
  gave me this question initially and I know you've asked other
• 21:30
  guests this, the first name that popped up in my mind was, you
• 21:34
  know, Henry Tamir, who your audience may or may not know.
• 21:38
  As you know, the founder of Genzyme and its Ceoi just have
• 21:42
  tremendous respect for him and what he did with with Genzyme
• 21:47
  and rare disease commercialization.
• 21:49
  He their success basically demonstrated that rare disease
• 21:54
  commercialization could occur and LED to a lot of investment
• 21:59
  and capital formation that allowed a lot of FDA proof
• 22:03
  therapies that you see today to be thought of possible because
• 22:08
  of, you know, the model that you know, Henry outlined.
• 22:11
  The other thing that I found impressive about him is, you
• 22:15
  know, he, it was said in his book that he was mentoring close
• 22:19
  to 46 other CE OS at the time of his passing in 2017.
• 22:24
  I just think it's remarkable that somebody that had that much
• 22:27
  amount of success put so much into his foundation and actually
• 22:31
  mentoring future leaders and that's cultivated the Genzyme
• 22:36
  culture that was very, you know, patient focused and aligned to
• 22:40
  patients early on. I think he's cultivated that and
• 22:44
  a lot of the leaders that had the direct ability to work with
• 22:47
  him and those that he was mentoring.
• 22:50
  That's awesome. That's the story.
• 22:51
  I didn't. I didn't really know to be
• 22:53
  honest. So you might have to Fact Check
• 22:55
  me on the exact number, but it was, you know, over 40 CE OS
• 23:00
  that he had or was actively mentoring at the time.
• 23:03
  That's amazing. That's crazy.
• 23:06
  He stayed busy all to the end and always gave back to to other
• 23:10
  folks, which is just remarkable demonstration of leadership.
• 23:13
  Yeah, I love the answer. I love that.
• 23:16
  Thanks so much for coming on, Bennett.
• 23:18
  It's been a pleasure. Max, the pleasure was mine.
• 23:21
  Thank you for everything that you do and really appreciated
• 23:24
  the discussion. And and look, please like and
• 23:27
  subscribe to the Bio Hub and thank you so much again,
• 23:29
  Bennett. Take care, Max.