Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Sean Cumiskey: From Global Hedge Funds to Saving Lives Through Biotech

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Sean Cumiskey: From Global Hedge Funds to Saving Lives Through Biotech · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:11
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:14
adversity. My name is Anthony Kotaspodi,
0:17
and today's guest is Sean Comiskey.
0:19
Sean is the Head of Investor Relations at Omega Fund
0:23
Management, a global life sciences investment firm based
0:27
in Boston that supports early to late stage biotech and
0:31
healthcare ventures. Founded in 2004, Omega Funds has
0:35
raised $2.5 billion to invest in exceptional entrepreneurs
0:41
developing innovative products across multiple therapeutic
0:45
areas, including oncology, immunology, rare diseases,
0:50
medical devices, and precision medicine, aiming to help bring
0:54
groundbreaking treatments to patients worldwide.
0:58
Neshawn has a long history in investor relations and strategic
1:02
development, having held key roles at prominent hedge funds
1:05
and investment firms at How do I Say This?
1:09
Why Hang Capital? It's a it's actually, it's
1:12
actually Yeehong in. Yeehong Capital.
1:15
Management is it's Mandarin for perseverance, most people
1:19
Yeehang, but it's Yeehong. Yeehong Capital Management He
1:23
helped grow assets under management from 350 million to
1:27
over 3.5 billion. He also LED business development
1:32
and product development at Farallon Capital Management, a
1:35
$40 billion global fund, and directed global investor
1:39
relations at York Capital Management.
1:41
His previous experience encompasses senior roles in
1:44
banking and investment consulting as well as asset
1:48
management. Sean joined Omega in March 2024,
1:52
bringing his deep expertise in capital development and business
1:55
strategy to the team. Now before we get into all that
1:59
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AD back benefits.com. All right, back to our guest
2:41
today, Head of Investor in Relations at Omega Fund
2:44
Management, Sean Kaminsky. Thanks for making the time to
2:47
Share your story today. It's a pleasure to be here,
2:49
Anthony. Thank you for having me on.
2:51
Yeah. So, OK.
2:53
How did you first get your start in this world of, call it, asset
2:56
management? It was also a long time ago, I
2:59
think initially when I was an undergrad and, and was fishing
3:03
for things to do, I thought I would want to be a lawyer.
3:06
I was, I was always writing, always like to engage in
3:12
situations where there was debate and discussion and, and,
3:15
and was a good student in terms of like English and liberal arts
3:17
and, and those types of, you know, kind of skills kind of
3:19
lead you toward law school. And, but I worked for a law firm
3:23
for a summer as an undergraduate and I realized the law is not,
3:28
there's the law that you think it, you're, you might be getting
3:30
to and there's what being a lawyer really is.
3:32
And I realized that that being a lawyer was probably not, you
3:36
know, in, in, you know, in my future in terms of what I, what
3:39
I kind of like to do. Just like too much like reading
3:42
too much pouring through. Like boring case law.
3:44
Especially like big law firms, it is, you know, the associate
3:47
to, you know, the associate track is, is, is really a grind.
3:50
And we used to call it being on semi colon patrol, right?
3:52
You're just kind of reviewing documents and things all day
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long. And, and that is fine, But I
3:56
have another side of my personality, which is very much
3:59
kind of forward facing and like interact with people as opposed
4:02
to kind of documents. And so, you know, at that point
4:05
I kind of thought, well, you know, let's think maybe about,
4:07
you know, kind of finance or, or kind of something that was more
4:10
kind of money oriented, even though I didn't have much
4:11
experience in that. But I was fortunate to get into
4:14
a, a bank training program out of undergraduate.
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And then afterward was able to work in kind of the, the private
4:20
Bank of the old Chase Manhattan Bank, which is kind of managing
4:23
assets for kind of high net worth individuals and families.
4:26
And as opposed to, let's say, investment banking or, or
4:29
commercial banking, it was less transactional, more relationship
4:31
oriented. And ultimately the fees that you
4:34
generate are more in line with the value that you drive for the
4:36
client. So it was much more aligned with
4:38
kind of how I think of the world as opposed to just kind of
4:41
selling and kind of pushing product and and and being
4:43
transaction oriented. Anything wrong with that?
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But I really like kind of being on the side of the client.
4:49
And so that really kind of got me started in asset management.
4:52
OK, so before we get to what you're doing current day with
4:56
Omega Funds, let's pick out one of your career stops along the
5:01
way that you would consider to be the most formidable for you
5:05
and why. What is it that you gain from
5:07
that experience? I would say probably I was on
5:12
the investment committee and management committee at a firm
5:15
called IV Asset Management, which was a global fund of funds
5:18
manager at based in New York. So essentially we managed hedge
5:22
fund portfolios, you know, taking different hedge fund
5:25
managers and putting them into to a, you know, groups of
5:27
portfolios for insurance companies, for kind of
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sovereigns, for pension funds, etcetera.
5:32
And we had a pretty large global organization managed about 16
5:36
billion head offices in San Francisco, New York, London,
5:40
Tokyo and Hong Kong. And so it was a large complex
5:44
organization basically engaging in very, very kind of
5:48
sophisticated investment strategies in addition to the
5:51
the management and kind of, you know, business challenges that
5:54
you have across the line. And so we managed, you know, was
5:58
kind of in that 2, 2003 through 2000 kind of 11 type period
6:03
where you had significant global growth, but then you had a
6:06
financial crisis in 2008. And so it kind of taught me to
6:10
manage individual conflicting agendas, to be able to manage
6:14
clients and products in a time of growth and in a time of
6:17
stress and actually learning some important lessons along the
6:21
way in terms of what really makes leadership and what kind
6:24
of passes is leadership in in our business.
6:27
And so I was able to be involved in a lot of different
6:30
strategies, a lot of different types of asset classes and with
6:33
clients, you know, all over the world with different priorities
6:36
and different perspectives, in addition to having managed a
6:39
global team. So it was challenging on a
6:41
number of fronts and I learned a a lot of very, very important
6:44
lessons from that time. Let's pick out just one.
6:51
You know, I think there's different types of, you know, in
6:54
terms of lessons as it relates to either people or that
6:57
there's, you know, people lessons, there's business
6:59
lessons, there's kind of strategy, kind of, you know,
7:02
tactical lessons. You know, I would say during
7:05
the, the most consistent thing during that time that that I
7:08
leaned on was just transparency and candor and communication
7:13
within the organization in terms of, you know, people are
7:16
incredibly intuitive in terms of what's kind of happening,
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whether it's good or bad. And so providing, you know, the,
7:23
I would say the, the clarity and perspective that many people
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need if they're working underneath you.
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And the other thing is in times of stress, you know, if you can,
7:35
you know, kind of keep your head while others are losing theirs,
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that is a significant, you know, kind of advantage that you can
7:44
kind of take with you over time because it is very easy to get
7:47
caught up in the day-to-day, especially when things are not
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going the way that you want. And if you have that bleed into
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your, the interactions with your people or your family or, or, or
7:55
other people in your life, it can kind of start rolling
7:58
downhill pretty quickly. And so, you know, you have to
8:01
kind of step back and realize the sun will always come out
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tomorrow, even if it doesn't seem that way.
8:06
And, and in managing people in terms of being able to be candid
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with people about what is going on with the business, whether
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it's on the positive side or, or when things aren't going so
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well. Do you think you're just sort of
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wired naturally to have this perspective?
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Did you have some mentors along the way that coached you or
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maybe a course that kind of like steered you towards this thought
8:27
process? Well, when I was, when I was at
8:29
Ivy, I had, we had a, you know, a very good executive team And
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one of the things that we were all assigned as part of the
8:36
management committee, we were assigned a management coach.
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And just because it was, seemed to be a good thing.
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There were six of us that were on this committee managing a
8:44
pretty big business. And initially I thought a
8:46
management coach, you know, that's just going to tell you
8:48
basic stuff like be honest with your people or, you know, make
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sure you make sure you credit where credit is due and things
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like that. I was just very, I, I, I, I
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wasn't anti or against the concept.
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I just didn't see that, you know, the, the, the real need,
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which was a blind spot. And after spending time with,
9:06
you know, the, the individual management coach that I was
9:07
assigned to, they really helped me kind of look inside myself
9:12
and strengthen my good habits. I did have and kind of wean
9:17
myself off of the, of the habits or practices I had that were
9:20
probably less constructive that I just didn't see.
9:22
And so I think it kind of made me aware that you can always
9:27
receive feedback and improve, even if it's something that you
9:31
think is very, very straightforward.
9:33
And you know, being more introspective and really
9:36
assessing kind of your, your own strengths and weaknesses and
9:40
your own true interests is is very, very helpful.
9:44
And you know, that really kind of set me on the path to where I
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am now in terms I realize. What are the things that really
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make you get out of bed and they get you excited about in the
9:51
morning about your business and are you doing them everyday?
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What are the things that get you excited to get out of bed
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everyday, Sean? Well, I think, you know,
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there's, you know, in, in our business like an asset
10:02
management or hedge funds or, or venture capital or, or you know,
10:05
what people have called alternative investment
10:07
management. But really where you have kind
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of the, the most profitable firms, the most competitive
10:13
people, the most difficult markets or, or problems and the
10:17
most intelligent clients. So it's challenging in all
10:19
fronts, which is great, but there's a typically, you know,
10:22
kind of a couple of tracks that you can take.
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You know, 1 is kind of maybe just being more of a manager,
10:27
right? Managing business unit, managing
10:29
people, managing processes. The other side is really kind of
10:32
being involved with clients and products.
10:34
And we're kind of the, the rubber really hits the road on
10:36
the revenue side. And I found that I was kind of
10:38
being more kind of not through any kind of, I would say
10:44
conscious effort on my part moving more toward the
10:47
management side when I really enjoyed the client and the
10:50
product side much more. And so getting out of the things
10:53
that Get Me Out of bed or helping to drive revenue to come
10:56
up with new innovative products to work with clients, to bring
10:59
business into the firm, to keep business from leaving the firm,
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to be really being on the front lines as opposed to being in in
11:06
staff meetings all day. Now there's some people that are
11:08
phenomenal at that, right? You have to be, you have to be
11:10
really be honest about what you're good at.
11:14
And there are some people up within very large organizations
11:16
that are phenomenal at kind of surfing the bureaucracy, if you
11:19
want to say that, or kind of taming the bureaucracy and, and,
11:22
and being in meetings all day and making them productive.
11:24
I'm just not that way. I'd much rather be on the front
11:28
lines. And so it was a real kind of, I
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would say, aha moment for me in terms of where I want to spend
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my time, if I can, where I'm most effective and what are the
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things that get me, Get Me Out of bed in the morning.
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And it's really the client, the product size as opposed to being
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a full time manager, Not that I, you know, I'm opposed to
11:49
managing. I've managed teams and I, I
11:51
think I've been OK at it. But it's again, it's, it's more
11:54
of the, you know, kind of the, the front end of the business as
11:58
opposed to kind of managing the structure, if you will.
12:02
So how did the door open for you to join Omega Funds?
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So I was at a firm called Yeon Capital Management, which I had
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joined when they were about $350 million.
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I wanted to do something entrepreneurial at that time of
12:14
the business, which for reasons we can talk about later, but and
12:18
was able to grow them to, you know, kind of 3 1/2 billion.
12:20
I was the Co chief operating officer and kind of tenured
12:23
faculty, if you will, was not looking to, to, to go anywhere,
12:27
But I've always had a very kind of personal interest in biotech
12:30
and life science going back, you know, many years I've been
12:33
personally invested life science funds.
12:36
You know, I've, I've seen kind of the impact that, you know,
12:38
new medicines and therapies have on, on, on patients and I've
12:41
always been very interested in that.
12:43
And the opportunity came up at Omega when they were doing a
12:46
search to hire someone to really kind of bring a, a more senior
12:51
perspective and, and, and, you know, to the, the front end of
12:55
their business in, in life sciences.
12:57
And I was recommended, a friend of mine in, in Silicon Valley
13:01
recommended that they speak to me.
13:02
I wasn't looking to leave, but the more that I talked with
13:05
them, the more I realized that the unique set of circumstances
13:08
represented by Omega was something that may not come
13:11
around again. So I was able to kind of put
13:13
everything that I had, you know, kind of learned and practiced
13:16
over time, you know, into a firm that from the investment process
13:20
really makes a difference in, in people's lives.
13:23
So it's very much, you know, doing well by doing good.
13:27
And so that had tremendous amount of appeal to me.
13:29
And, and, and so I was, it was once I got to that decision
13:33
point, it was pretty clear that if I hadn't taken this step, I
13:36
would have always regretted it. So with this particular
13:40
opportunity, it was a friend that recommended you.
13:42
As I look back over your career path, lots of great stops along
13:46
the way. Were you headhunted for those?
13:48
Did you apply cold? Were there was also
13:51
recommendations, referrals where you knew somebody there?
13:54
It's almost 100% of the time people that I know in the
13:57
industry, you know, and you know, they're always, you know,
14:02
I, I would say when people are looking to move from, you know,
14:06
whatever job it might be, you know, there, there's either a
14:09
push or a pull, right? They're either being pushed
14:12
because they just either the internal dynamics, maybe they
14:14
don't like their boss or just there's something about the
14:16
current role that is just not, is unbearable or just that they
14:20
want to look elsewhere versus the pull where there's something
14:23
very, very attractive that they're very interested in
14:26
someplace else that lines up well with their skills and and
14:29
makes sense. I've always been kind of pulled
14:30
toward things as opposed to, Hey, I want to get promoted.
14:33
So I go to another firm that does the same thing, You know,
14:35
I'll be slightly more senior. And so really from us, from my
14:40
experience, it's just been, you know, my own industry network
14:42
and, and people that I know. And so which is very, very
14:46
important. You learn over time because in
14:48
an industry like ours, which you're only, you know, it's
14:52
truly 6° of separation, if not fewer degrees of separation that
14:55
people have. Everyone knows somebody that's
14:58
senior in our industry that has worked with you or worked for
15:00
you or or has interacted with you as a client or, you know, a,
15:04
a service provider. Everyone carries with them a, a
15:07
citizenship grade essentially. And you know, I would, I always,
15:12
you know, advise, especially kind of younger, you know,
15:15
professionals or people that ask me for advice.
15:17
You need to really, really pay attention to that in terms of
15:19
how you treat people, how you interact with the outside world,
15:23
how you deal with stress, because ultimately good
15:27
opportunities will find you when you have a high citizenship
15:31
grade and high integrity and high work ethic, They those,
15:33
those opportunities will find you.
15:34
You don't necessarily have to look for them yourself.
15:36
And there are a lot of people that have just kind of, you
15:39
know, kind of blown themselves up through certain types of
15:40
behavior that, you know, that, you know, that may not be an
15:43
indicative of who they are, but you know, it, it leaves it
15:45
leaves an, an imprint on the way people think of you.
15:47
Yeah. OK.
15:49
So let's talk more specifically breakdown what it is that you
15:52
guys do there to make a funds plain English.
15:55
So in plain English, you know we are a venture capital firm.
15:58
And so Simply put, what means is, is, is we provide capital to
16:03
start up smaller companies that in our case not investing in
16:07
technology or social media or the, the, the venture company
16:11
might be familiar with, but in companies that are developing
16:14
therapeutic solutions that we call unmet medical needs.
16:17
So essentially companies that are developing new types of
16:20
therapeutic drugs where there could be a small molecule, which
16:23
is like a pill or a biologic like an injectable or even cell
16:28
and gene therapy and then also medical devices as well.
16:32
Ultimately, we're looking to improve the standard of care and
16:38
make patients lives, you know, their outcome is better.
16:43
And so you know, we operate, we invest in companies that are,
16:47
you know, across therapeutic areas like oncology or
16:50
immunology or the cardio metabolic space, things like
16:52
that. And also on some, some medical
16:55
devices as well. We've you know, invested in
16:57
companies that are improving kind of insulin pumps or heart
17:01
monitors for those that have at risk of studying cardiac arrest
17:04
or things like that. And so we've been quite
17:07
successful. We've developed, you know, 52
17:10
kind of FDA approved products that have improved the lives of
17:13
patients. But it is, it is, it's very
17:16
complicated. You know, think about the, the
17:18
science is very different across different disease areas and
17:21
there's very high barriers to entry into business, which is
17:24
one of the things that I like as well, which we can talk about in
17:26
terms of the difference between biotech versus others.
17:28
But essentially we're developing drugs and devices to improve the
17:30
lives of patients. Yeah, wow, that is a great
17:34
reason to get out of bed every morning, isn't it?
17:37
It's, you know, it is, it is really cool.
17:38
I think, you know, it's the, the failure rate obviously in, in,
17:41
in our business, in drug development is quite high.
17:43
You know, 90% of the, the drugs that you know, don't necessarily
17:47
make it. And that's true for a lot of
17:48
start-ups, right as well. But, and life science is
17:50
particularly high. But the very nice thing is when
17:54
our companies succeed, it is unambiguously good for humanity,
18:00
right? We're not.
18:00
And, and, and I don't want to sound like I am, you know, kind
18:04
of disparaging kind of normal kind of tech investing, but
18:08
we're not, we're not looking to industrialize mental illness or
18:11
FOMO. We're not trying to incent
18:14
consumers to spend money they have on things they don't need.
18:16
We're not, you know, trying to attract people to sports betting
18:18
platforms. And, and, you know, we're
18:20
creating kind of automated solutions that throw workers out
18:23
of work. And, and so there's a lot of
18:24
unintended consequences that comes with new technology that
18:26
we've seen. But in our case, it's
18:28
unambiguously good in terms of improving the standard of care
18:32
or developing new standards of care for a lot of really
18:35
horrible diseases. You know, for example, we have a
18:37
a company right now that's working on a treatment for
18:40
pulmonary fibrosis, which is a really horrible disease that
18:44
once you know, many cases you're diagnosed, you might have four
18:47
to five years. And the current standard of care
18:48
for some of these severe elements of the disease just
18:52
kind of manages the decline, right.
18:55
And so we have a company that actually for the first time is,
18:57
is actually has shown some evidence where they can reverse
19:00
the fibrosis and, and restore lung functioning, which again,
19:03
it's a long way to go. It's a very long path, right,
19:05
for these things to work. But that's just truly, truly
19:07
kind of cool to see. Is there an example of something
19:11
that's in the market helping folks right now that would be
19:13
fun to talk about? So there's a number of things
19:17
that we've that we've done that have been, you know, had
19:19
significant impact. So, you know, with these
19:22
companies, in many cases, like we don't, we won't take them all
19:24
the way through the clinic and approval.
19:26
Typically our job is to get them is to, to have the, the, the,
19:31
the companies develop the drug to go through maybe phase two,
19:34
phase one trials. And in many cases, those
19:36
companies will either go public as an IPO to raise funds to
19:40
further develop the therapy, or more often they will be
19:42
purchased by large pharma companies who then will take
19:45
them through the stage, you know, stage 3 development and
19:47
the regulatory approvals. What has happened?
19:49
The reason why, you know, we have firms like like ours is
19:53
that, you know, large pharma companies are not necessarily
19:58
good at developing their own drugs.
20:00
You know, they're very large bureaucratic organizations.
20:02
They can't really move as quickly.
20:03
And so 20 years ago, you know, maybe 50% of the clinical
20:08
trials, meaning that the, the trials where they're testing the
20:10
drugs in patients, we talk that in the clinic, 50% of those
20:13
clinical trials were done by small biotech companies.
20:16
Today it's 75%. And so large pharma has largely
20:20
outsourced the development and creation of new drugs to small
20:23
biotech companies, which are the the companies that we fund.
20:28
OK. What do you think sets you guys
20:30
apart? Like you know you've mentioned
20:32
the 52 impactful medical products market, the FDA
20:36
approvals. How are you guys different from
20:38
some of the other biotech and healthcare funds out there?
20:42
It's a, it's a good question. I think, you know, there's the
20:46
short answer is, is there are a lot of very good firms, you
20:48
know, in our business. I think in the way that that we
20:52
look at it as a couple different ways that would have made us
20:54
successful. It's not that the answer isn't
20:56
like, hey, we're smarter than everyone else or our scientists
20:59
or our pH DS are, are more diligent.
21:01
You know, all firms in our business have really, really
21:03
good people. You know, where we, I think,
21:06
differentiate ourselves is, you know, the name of the, the firm
21:10
is Omega, which is the last letter of the Greek alphabet.
21:13
And So what that means is we focus on what the end result is
21:16
like what is, what is the problem we're trying to solve?
21:19
Meaning that we don't necessarily say, OK, we have
21:21
some scientists coming out of a lab in, you know, Cambridge or,
21:24
or, or someplace and they have some real cool science.
21:27
They're not quite sure what the indication or disease they might
21:30
be able to cure with this, but it's very interesting.
21:32
And, and so we'll, we'll fund this kind of science experiment.
21:35
We don't really do that because we want to know what the actual
21:37
product is going to be like. What are we trying to solve for?
21:40
The other thing is that we work as a team.
21:43
Many venture firms are not firms per say.
21:47
They're more, as I would describe it, a loosely aligned
21:51
confederation of interest, meaning that you have one
21:53
partner, 1 senior investment person working with three or
21:55
four associates maybe. And that team basically does
21:58
everything for that portfolio company.
22:00
You know, the transaction, the financing, they're on the board,
22:03
they advise the company. And you can do that in, in tech
22:07
or software investing, but in biotech, it's very, very
22:11
complicated. Not only is it the initial proof
22:13
of concept or the, the Phase 1, you know, kind of phase one data
22:17
that trials that you're running, it's also the regulatory
22:20
interface, it's financing the company.
22:22
There's the clinical trial strategy.
22:24
Once you get into the clinic and the patients, how you design the
22:26
trials, where you do the trials. There's the chemistry
22:29
manufacturing controls, we call CMC, which is, you know, once
22:33
you've proven a company, a compact and work in the clinic,
22:35
you've got to be able to manufacture it at a scale enough
22:37
for, to, for phase three trials. So there's a whole bunch of
22:40
things that are very, very important and typically not one
22:42
person knows everyone or everything.
22:45
And so the way we work is, it is as a team, we will bring in the
22:49
various Omega experts from across the firm, no matter whose
22:52
deal it is to make sure we have the best outcome for the
22:55
company. And so because of that, our
22:57
portfolio companies are supported by our entire
22:59
organization because the way that we're all compensated is on
23:03
the the portfolio, how well the portfolio does.
23:05
So we all have the best incentive to make sure that we
23:07
have the best outcome for each company.
23:10
And so we're able to work across the firm and across disciplines
23:12
in a way that helps the company get through the clinic more
23:16
efficiently and more effectively.
23:18
And so I think when you think about combine the product first
23:20
approach and so the 52 products is a huge number for a firm of
23:24
our size. And the fact that we're able to
23:26
work as a team across the firm makes a real difference in terms
23:30
of our investment outcomes. I want to hear a little bit
23:36
more, we'll come back to what you're doing at Omega, but it's
23:40
just keeps rattling around in my head what you did in, in terms
23:43
of at your previous role growing assets from 350 million to 3.5
23:49
billion, What were the key ingredients in building that
23:54
investor trust to ensure that kind of growth?
23:58
Well, first thing is, you know, they're, they're you have to
24:01
have kind of quality of relationships and, and that it
24:06
goes, again, it goes back to the citizenship grade.
24:08
So there's, there's a number of things that have to kind of
24:10
interface, because ultimately you need to be able to translate
24:13
kind of what you're doing in a way that is attractive to those
24:17
investors that have interest in the area that you know, that
24:20
that, that your firm invests. But ultimately, you know, one of
24:23
the one of the key things, and this is something that I always
24:25
kind of again, emphasize to, to younger professionals is kind of
24:28
your citizenship grade. You know, I work at some very
24:30
kind of large, well known firms and when I took a, a kind of
24:34
detour to work for Yi Hung, which was a, a, a smaller asset
24:37
manager, there's always the question it will investors, did
24:41
they respect you or did they respect the seat that you're in?
24:43
Meaning that, let's say, you know, to make it more, you know,
24:47
concrete or, or, or a better example for the, you know, kind
24:50
of the, the person on the street, Let's say you're, you're
24:53
an executive at Alphabet or, or Meta or one of these large tech
24:57
companies. And you know, you everybody, of
25:00
course, you're business partners and your clients, you know, kind
25:03
of will, will, will have some sort of difference just because
25:06
of the, the power of the company itself.
25:07
Then you go do something that's much smaller.
25:09
Are you going to still have that kind of respect outside the
25:12
organization that you were at versus when you were at the,
25:15
the, the big platform? And so the key thing for many
25:18
people is they will work at a very large, successful firm and
25:21
think they want to do something more entrepreneurial, go to a
25:23
smaller asset management firm. They can't replicate the success
25:26
because they didn't have the quite the the citizenship
25:29
development they might they should have when they're at the
25:31
larger firm. And so for me, it was being able
25:35
to lean on those relationships that I've built over time to be
25:38
able to properly represent what we're doing at Yihan, which was
25:41
complicated, more Asia focus, a little bit more opaque than many
25:46
folks were used to. And being able to explain that
25:48
in a way that would, you know, be aligned with kind of those
25:52
investors that had an interest in investing in that part of the
25:54
world. So a lot of it is translating a,
25:57
a more complicated, you know, investment thesis or investment
26:00
concept in a way that is actionable to potential
26:04
investors. While, you know, again, leaning
26:07
on that, that that relationship and that trust because many
26:10
people had dealt with me before and other firms and knew that I
26:13
wasn't going to just look to just, you know, kind of say
26:18
whatever I needed to say to, to get them interested in, in, in,
26:21
in the fund we're running at EON.
26:23
So how well do you understand the tech side of the companies
26:29
that you're investing in versus, I mean, it strikes me that
26:31
you're clearly a smart guy, you understand the investment
26:34
strategy side of it, but how well do you understand the the
26:39
tech side of what you guys are investing in?
26:42
And how much do your investors, your LP's understand about the
26:47
tech side and is that really important?
26:50
It's a good question and and and and very relevant.
26:54
As I think about my career, I've always been.
26:55
I've always gravitated toward complexity.
26:58
Things that are more complicated might be a little more difficult
27:00
to understand at first blush. Because when you're in investor
27:04
relations or fundraising or, or or kind of client facing role,
27:08
the ability to translate kind of complicated concepts and
27:13
situations in a way that is understandable and actionable
27:18
and and truthful right to to investors is a significant
27:23
advantage. And I've always kind of
27:25
gravitated to those more complicated situations because
27:28
it allows me to stand out a bit more.
27:29
I guess you would say, think about kind of where you, you
27:32
know, kind of really have have excelled in the past.
27:34
And so the previous terms I worked at were all kind of
27:36
global multi asset firms, very complicated businesses, which
27:40
were great platforms. And for someone like myself that
27:43
likes to learn about a lot and, and, and, and be able to
27:45
synthesize that, synthesize that, excuse me for, you know,
27:49
kind of investors. And so when we think about what
27:52
we're doing here at Omega in terms of life science and
27:55
biotechnology, it's very complicated.
27:57
And, you know, you really need to be able to meet the investors
28:00
where they are. You know, if they have interest
28:03
in kind of medical science but maybe aren't as deep in oncology
28:06
or what we're doing with specific companies, you need to
28:08
be able to make sure you can translate that for them in a way
28:11
that makes it understandable. Likewise, for those that are
28:14
really, really deep in the science, you need to be able to
28:16
make sure that you can meet them where they are.
28:18
And if they kind of outstrip what I know, because I don't
28:22
know everything, you need to be able to make sure that you pair
28:24
them with the right people to firm that can get them the
28:26
answer they need. And so that becomes very
28:28
important because you need to kind of vary that level of
28:32
information depending on on who you're with.
28:34
We have clients that are many types, you know, wealthy
28:37
families that are look to invest to make an impact in other
28:40
impact oriented investors. It's what we do in Healthcare is
28:43
is extremely important to them, but they're not healthcare
28:45
experts. We also have a lot of medical
28:49
foundations and hospitals that are investors.
28:52
They know the science and you know, we also have a, a few kind
28:55
of pharma companies and, and, and other kind of pharmaceutical
28:59
entities that are also investors and they're truly expert in
29:02
those cases. I will, I'm really just the
29:04
major deed of the firm. I will facilitate those
29:07
conversations with the really, really deep experts in those
29:09
fields. I'm not trying to, to hold
29:12
myself out as a PhD in neuroscience because I'm not,
29:15
but we have plenty of them here and I make sure I'll be able to
29:18
call on them when needed, which is also very, very important in
29:20
our roles. You need to be able to extract
29:23
the expertise in the firm and place in front of the client
29:25
when it's necessary in a manner that is, you know, very, very
29:30
efficient and and seamless. So you guys are not currently
29:35
raising a fund, but as I understand it, you recently
29:39
closed 1 Omega 8. Tell us about that.
29:42
What did you raise, what was the target?
29:46
So our target. Was 600 million, we raised just
29:49
under 650, so 647. And so that was just about the
29:53
same size that we raised back in 2021 and 2021, if you recall.
29:58
It's kind of the, the peak of the kind of COVID everything
30:02
bubble, right? Everything was going up and,
30:04
and, and raising capital there was, you know what, what wasn't
30:07
as difficult. But in the intervening three to
30:10
five years and you've seen this across venture, private equity,
30:13
LBO, you know, biotech fundraising has, has come down
30:18
quite a bit. And part of that is because
30:20
limited partners or the investors have not received the
30:23
distributions that they would expect from their private equity
30:27
investments, meaning the cash realizations haven't come back
30:29
to them, whether it's via IP, OS or M&A transactions, etcetera.
30:34
And so as a result, biotech fundraising was down about 70%
30:38
from the peak in 2021. So for us, it's #1 being able to
30:45
make sure that we have these very, very kind of solid
30:48
relationships with our clients. That means communicating with
30:50
them through both good times and bad.
30:52
And when things aren't necessarily moving in the
30:54
direction you want, being just, you know, candid about that and
30:56
and giving them a real honest look at what's happening in the
30:59
portfolios, because at the end of the day, they're all
31:02
professional investors. They just need to know that, you
31:05
know, you're aware of what's happening and that you can
31:07
communicate kind of the both the pluses and minuses of what's of
31:09
what's going on. But more importantly, we were
31:11
able to deliver what we call DPI, which is the essentially
31:16
cash returns to investors. So during the kind of three-year
31:20
period where, you know, January 2022 to middle of last year
31:25
where a lot of investors weren't receiving, you know, cash
31:28
distributions from their venture firms, you know, we distributed
31:30
almost $900 million of of of capital back to our LP's.
31:34
We had 14 M&A transactions 6 / a billion and we had like 9 IPOs
31:39
in a period where no one is really doing anything.
31:41
And the reason why is it's not 'cause, you know, again, we, you
31:44
know, and that really stand out that, that that stands out.
31:47
And so we were able to, you know, it was real, the real
31:49
proof of concept. Because at the end of the day,
31:51
when you are able to invest in or you have a product or a
31:57
therapy where it's a device or or a drug that has the data that
32:03
indicates that it's going to be effective against a significant
32:06
unmet medical need in any of these disease areas that has
32:09
value in any environment. And the reason why is most of
32:14
our exits, over half have been M and A transactions to pharma
32:17
because we develop drugs that work and pharmaceutical
32:21
companies, as you know, always have patent expirations and loss
32:24
of exclusivity. So they need to replace their
32:25
pipelines with newer drugs. And as I mentioned earlier, they
32:29
outsource a lot of that to small biotech companies.
32:31
So they're always serial acquirers.
32:33
So they're, they're I guess in demand curve is inelastic as it
32:37
relates to acquiring new assets as long as you have the data.
32:41
So it doesn't. The great thing about our
32:42
business is that it doesn't matter what's happening with
32:45
interest rates as much or what's happening in the macro economy
32:49
or with Ukraine and Russia or things like that.
32:52
As long as we're able to develop these types of successful
32:56
therapeutics that has value in any market, particularly to
32:59
pharma. And we saw that in the last 2
33:01
1/2 years, given the amount of kind of exits and liquidity
33:04
we're able to generate for our investors.
33:05
So you include, you know, you, you tack on the fact that we're
33:09
a very credible organization that we communicate very clearly
33:12
with our investors. We're always looking to educate.
33:15
We're able to distribute capital and return cash to our investors
33:20
in a time when no one else was. All of those factors enabled us
33:23
to to raise additional capital, especially with newer investors
33:27
that were new to Omega. And so as it was a combination
33:30
of things that enable us to be successful.
33:32
But but we're we're, we're quite happy the way it turned out.
33:35
So typically the way a company gets valued is here's the
33:42
revenue, right? And depending on what field
33:44
you're in, here's sort of a multiple of what your EBITDA is,
33:48
for example. It strikes me though that in the
33:53
area that you play in that maybe there's a different type of
33:57
formula that's used. And tell me if I'm right or
34:00
wrong here, because perhaps the company, they've got this great
34:03
product, maybe they're starting to sell it, maybe they aren't
34:07
selling it yet, but they know that it works.
34:09
And so revenue numbers don't really assign the true value to
34:13
it. Yes, that is, that is true.
34:19
You know, I, I would say that one of the ways, if you look, if
34:23
you think about our, our, our, our companies, you know, we, we
34:27
invest in, you know, they're, they're cash burning science
34:30
experiments ultimately is what they are, right?
34:33
They, they, they have no revenues, right.
34:35
They're burning cash and it's, and it's expensive to get a, a
34:38
new drug in, in into the clinic, you know, and that's, that's on
34:41
the drug side separately from the device side.
34:43
So medical devices do have revenues.
34:45
So if you're on the device side, it's it's very much like a a
34:50
typical company that you would value right, kind of multiple of
34:52
sales. You see the traction they're
34:53
getting in the market, you know, profit margins, etcetera,
34:56
because they're they're commercial stage companies.
34:58
So that that's more kind of the traditional valuation metrics
35:02
applied to those companies. But for the therapeutic and the
35:04
device companies, you know, the valuation is really going to be
35:07
based on, you know, kind of the, the maturity of the company in
35:13
terms of how early it is. Is it phase one?
35:15
Is it Phase 2 is about to go into phase three.
35:18
The type of indication? Is it a very, very large disease
35:22
area that has significant, you know, kind of, you know,
35:26
commercial potential or is it something that's very more niche
35:30
like kind of rare disease? And also, you know, kind of what
35:34
ultimately the in many cases for the pharma companies, what the
35:37
acquirers are willing to pay, which may not be related to the
35:41
stage of the company at all, but their view of the attractiveness
35:45
of the asset vis A vis their current portfolio of companies.
35:47
So the valuation on the private side of the, of the, of the
35:51
therapeutic companies is, is much more an art, you know, than
35:54
a science. And it's much more related to
35:55
the data and the indication. How good is the data?
35:58
How much does it improve the standard of care?
36:00
Or is it a first in class, best in class therapy against
36:03
something that is, you know, a pernicious and, and kind of
36:06
widespread type of disease? And so, you know, when you think
36:10
about, you know, we don't think about like Tams or things like
36:12
that in terms of, you know, 'cause ultimately for the, the,
36:16
the, the, you know, the, the, the potential market for what we
36:20
do is every person on the planet, cause everyone gets
36:22
sick, unfortunately. But within certain disease areas
36:25
like large oncology or immunology, there's these very
36:27
large indications like pulmonary fibrosis that I mentioned that
36:31
are, you know, have significant commercial potential if you're
36:34
able to develop a therapy. And so the pharma companies will
36:37
evaluate on that. And if you're going public, they
36:39
will also tend to look at what the potential application of
36:43
this, of this, of this drug is going to be a blockbuster, over
36:46
a billion dollars in sales. What do they think that may
36:48
reach once they reach the phase two, phase three approval?
36:50
So there's a lot of art and science in the valuation of
36:53
these companies as opposed to just pure metrics that you might
36:55
see in other other, other instances.
36:58
Makes sense. Sean, tell us about how you.
37:02
Sorry, what was that? I said I hope I made sense.
37:04
I don't know. I don't know.
37:06
I'm with you. I'm with you.
37:07
Yeah. You know, I mean, some
37:08
businesses are pretty cut and dry where it's like, you know, I
37:11
used to be in the E com space for a while and you know, for a
37:14
while those multiples were pretty low.
37:16
And then they moved up during COVID when everybody wanted an E
37:19
com business. And now they've they've come
37:21
back down. SAS businesses have, you know,
37:24
their own typical multiple manufacturing.
37:27
And so yeah, just trying to get an idea of how this space works.
37:29
And so it's, you know, what I'm hearing you say is on the device
37:32
side of things. Yeah, there there's sort of more
37:35
of that more traditional formula on a biologic on you know, some
37:39
kind of a medication. It's a bit different, right.
37:42
It's like how good's the because it's not gone to market yet in
37:45
this case is that. True.
37:47
Exactly. Exactly like how good, how good
37:48
is the data, how robust is is is the data and what is the
37:53
indication that you know that you are are are you know how
37:58
large is, is the problem. So, you know, there's, there's a
38:00
company that we incubated about four years ago, almost five
38:05
years ago called Scorpion Therapeutics, which was in the
38:08
oncology space. So this is a company that we
38:09
incubated ourselves. We took the manager team from,
38:12
you know, they had a white, they had a white sheet of paper.
38:14
They wanted to go after certain types of, of hard to cure breast
38:17
cancers. And so we funded them and helped
38:20
build the company, build a commercial organization for
38:22
them. And they were in the clinic, you
38:25
know, testing within patients within three years, which is
38:27
very, very quick. And then at the beginning of
38:29
last year, they were acquired by their lead asset was acquired by
38:33
Eli Lilly for 1.5 billion upfront and another potential 1
38:37
billion in milestone payments. Because the data that they
38:42
showed against this type of breast cancer was so promising
38:45
that, that Lily stepped up and, and, and, and bought the, the
38:49
assets for a significant amount of money.
38:51
And there's also milestone payments involved, which I
38:53
mentioned earlier. So when we sell a company to,
38:56
let's say, let's say we develop a, a pill for, you know, let's
38:59
say in this case, or, or a therapeutic for, for cancer or
39:02
something, and we sell it to, you know, Anthony Therapeutics,
39:06
right? You will give us a many times
39:07
there's a cash upfront payment, which could be significant.
39:10
There's also milestone payments, meaning that as long as the
39:12
drug, if it gets, if it gets, you know, passes phase three
39:15
trials, we get another milestone.
39:17
If it gets approved by the FDA, we get another milestone
39:19
payment. So there's milestone payments
39:20
down down the road as drugs hit certain sales targets or certain
39:24
regulatory approvals. Let's shift gears just a little
39:29
bit. I want to hear about how no, I
39:32
want to come back to this because here's The thing is you
39:35
guys are developing so many really cool technologies, right?
39:39
And these things come out and then you've got this called
39:43
doctors all over the the country, all over the world who
39:46
are busy, you know, up to their elbows and their day-to-day
39:49
practice. And they don't know about, for
39:52
example, this new breast cancer treatment that, you know, is
39:55
very effective against certain very difficult to treat types of
39:59
breast cancer. You know, call it small town
40:03
Ohio, you know, you know, farm country Iowa, where no
40:08
disrespect to the doctor, but just hasn't hit his radar yet or
40:12
her radar yet. Like how do you sort of bridge
40:14
that gap? How do you?
40:16
And this probably is less your role, right, and more the role
40:19
of like, whoever's kind of acquiring, you know, what it is
40:22
that you guys have helped to develop.
40:23
But it's just something I've always wondered about.
40:26
Like, how do you sort of think about bridging that gap to
40:29
here's the latest breakthrough and, you know, how do we
40:32
actually tell the world about it?
40:34
Yeah, I mean, a lot of a lot of times the, you know, the data
40:36
for like companies, especially on the, on the, you know, some
40:39
of the trial data is published, right?
40:41
They're published in, you know, in the Journal of American
40:43
Medical Association or, or, or New England Journal of Medicine,
40:46
things like that, right. There's a lot of, you know, as,
40:48
as things, as, as therapies are developed, there's a lot of the
40:52
science and the and the clinicals are published.
40:54
There's also a lot. And so there's a lot of you
40:56
know, and all doctors mostly will be, you know, if they read
40:58
these journals and and we'll have a sense of what for
41:00
certain, you know, if they're a cardiologist or, and they're
41:03
looking at maybe, you know, kind of diseases that, you know,
41:06
drugs that lower, let's say cholesterol or things like that,
41:08
or they're, you know, an oncologist, you know, certain
41:11
types of oncology. They're aware of that.
41:13
Some of the drugs that are entering trials, in many cases
41:16
they may in for the leading, you know, kind of academic medical
41:19
centers, you know, they may be participating in the trials
41:21
themselves, you know, their patients.
41:23
But there are a lot of very kind of specialized conferences where
41:28
a lot of the private companies and even the large farmer will
41:30
present results for, you know, phase one, phase two, phase
41:33
three studies for certain types of indications.
41:35
So within the community, they're, they're you when things
41:37
are working or there's positive results or you know, kind of
41:41
landmark studies that are being done, there's quite a bit of, of
41:45
awareness. Ultimately when a drug is
41:49
approved and the labeling in the FDA is, is has signed off on
41:53
everything. And that really at that point is
41:55
really, like I said, ultimately it's usually the pharma company
41:57
or it could be the, if the company's gone public and
42:00
they're publicly traded, the stand alone company themselves
42:03
to make sure that they can properly market and educate the
42:06
end consumer, you know, the, the, the primary care physicians
42:09
or the, OR the, the patient communities in many cases about
42:13
these new therapies. Yeah.
42:16
And that bless us, right? Because we're not, we're not,
42:17
we're not in the business of kind of marketing
42:19
commercialized. We're just a small kind of
42:20
venture capital. Yeah, we're, we're, we're there
42:22
to get the science up and running and get the, and get
42:25
the, the drug through the clinical trial process
42:28
successfully. And then typically there's, you
42:31
know, the, the, whether the company goes public and takes
42:33
the, the commercialization on their own or they're purchased
42:36
by like a Merck or Lilly or, or Sanofi or somebody that will
42:40
then bring it into house, finish the phase three trials,
42:42
interface with the regulator and, and, and have the
42:44
commercial half behind it. You know, we talked earlier,
42:48
Sean, about how the fact that you're working at a company that
42:53
the, the whole goal is to do good, right, and to improve the
42:56
quality and the length of people's lives, help them
43:01
through their medical challenges.
43:03
But not too long ago in your own life, there was a big challenge
43:08
that arose for you personally that, you know, kind of bled
43:12
over into the professional space.
43:14
I'd like to explore that. I'd like to hear more about that
43:16
and how you got through that and what it meant for you.
43:19
Yeah, sure, sure. I mean, I was in San Francisco
43:23
and working for a company called Farallon Capital Management,
43:27
which does, you know, kind of a large multi strategy hedge fund
43:30
will also some private asset strategies.
43:32
Very well respected has been around for a very long time.
43:35
One of the, I would say one of the blue chip firms in in our
43:37
industry and was in position to take a senior leadership role at
43:42
the firm. Assuming that, you know, I I was
43:44
able to, you know, execute and, and and and do well, etcetera.
43:48
And my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer and that was in
43:53
the beginning of 20, kind of beginning mid 2015.
43:59
And you know, I had two young children at the time who were
44:05
in, and one was in elementary school, 1 was in middle school.
44:08
You know, Farallon is a phenomenal firm, but this
44:10
industry is, is not for the faint of heart.
44:12
You, you have to kind of be all in.
44:14
That's one of the reasons I like, you know, venture capital,
44:16
hedge funds, you know, private equity, those types of, of, of
44:19
businesses because it really is kind of the sharp end of the
44:22
spear, so to speak, in, in asset management.
44:24
And you need to be kind of all in 100%.
44:27
You can't be half and half. And so I was trying to do well
44:31
at Fairlawn, but also support my wife and, and, and, and kids
44:34
and, and I was not doing particularly well at each, you
44:40
know, I, I, I thought I could, but I was dropping the ball, you
44:44
know, in, in both places. And I realized that, you know,
44:49
it's, you only go around, you know, maybe once, depending on
44:53
your religious beliefs, maybe you're being incarnated.
44:55
But, you know, in this lifetime, you really have, have one kind
44:58
of ride around the merry go round and, and family was, was,
45:02
is, is, was the most important. So I, I, I left Fairlawn and
45:06
took an entire year off to help my wife recover, support the
45:10
kids. I did a lot of nonprofit work
45:12
and kind of got back into the, the real world, so to speak,
45:15
which was, I think, you know, very, very grounding 'cause we
45:17
kind of lose track of ourselves. And in this, the, the world of
45:20
war and venture hedge funds, what have you.
45:23
And, you know, I talk to people about it and they say, hey,
45:27
that's, you know, that's an admirable thing to do, you know,
45:30
and yes, but you know, I should have done it earlier.
45:35
I, I, I like everyone else. I thought I could do it all.
45:38
And then I just hit a brick wall and it became painful, painfully
45:41
obvious. That's something I had to give.
45:43
And that thing was certainly not my family.
45:45
So I took a full year off in 2016, did a lot of, like I said,
45:50
you know, tutoring and, and, and educational work, which I've
45:53
always been a, a, you know, kind of a fan of.
45:56
And then when I decided I wanted to go back to work, I was
45:59
fortunate that again, the citizenship element, a lot of
46:01
firms, you know, reached out to me and, and, you know, for
46:04
opportunities. And did I want to go back to
46:08
kind of a complicated high headache, high friction type of
46:11
job in these large firms? Or did I want to do something
46:14
more entrepreneurial? And that's when I decided to
46:17
join Yeehung, which was a very small firm at the time.
46:19
And I said, if I want to put to, you know, put to work everything
46:22
I've learned and be solely responsible for a lot of the
46:25
business decisions, this is the time to do it.
46:27
And I was fortunate that a lot of my former investors and
46:29
people I know were very receptive to what we were doing
46:32
again, because of the citizenship angle that I had in
46:34
the past. And and so, you know, it was, it
46:38
was, it was stressful 'cause I, you know, you don't know if
46:40
you're gonna go back to work or if people are wanna hire you
46:44
after, you know, you've been out for a year and, you know, and
46:47
you sit around and say, wow, you know, am I ever gonna be able to
46:50
do what I love or am I gonna find the right job?
46:52
And you know, why did I leave? But you know why you leave?
46:55
You had to and so all those things kind of run through, run
46:59
through your head. And although it did turn out
47:02
well, certainly, you know, it was, it was a, it was a learning
47:06
experience and, and you know, it just kind of just forces you
47:09
again to pay attention to what really, really matters.
47:11
And we all kind of give lip service to that.
47:13
But until you're really in that situation, it it, it, it just
47:17
becomes much more meaningful. So as you were heading into
47:21
this, you find out that your wife has breast cancer.
47:25
From the diagnosis, from what they could tell, what was the
47:30
general prognosis? I mean, there's no guarantees,
47:33
right? It could look pretty treatable
47:34
and then turns out it's not or or vice versa.
47:37
But what what was sort of the feeling?
47:39
What was the sense in that moment?
47:41
We had a, we had a, just because of some, you know, kind of
47:47
biological and kind of genetic history my wife had, she was
47:49
always going in to, to, to, to, to, to get tested.
47:53
And, and so when we were living in New York City, when I was
47:57
working for York, when we decided we needed, we thought
48:00
maybe having our kids in California instead of Manhattan
48:02
would be a a bit better for them.
48:05
When I joined Fairlawn and we were fortunate to go into San
48:07
Francisco, that UCSF did one additional test on my wife that
48:12
actually caught the cancer relatively early.
48:16
So we knew there's always kind of a risk that this would
48:18
happen. It just kind of, you know, and,
48:20
and then it in fact did. And had she been diagnosed with
48:27
this type of cancer 15 years ago or even 10 years ago, the
48:32
outcome may not have been good, but she was.
48:34
There's a drug on the market called Herceptin, which was
48:36
developed by Genentech that was very, very effective against her
48:41
type of cancer. So we knew that the prognosis
48:44
was, was good, But, but the road, you know, the road is, is
48:50
a challenge you want with, there's no, you know, there's
48:52
just varying degrees of difficult when you deal with
48:53
cancer. So the chemotherapy and all of
48:55
those types of things, you know, the course of treatment and the
48:59
radiation, the surgery, you know, it's, it's really a, a, a,
49:01
a bit of a, a, a long road and a challenging road.
49:04
And certainly I, I give all due credit to my wife, who is much
49:07
more mentally tough than, than, than I was and, and, and held up
49:11
much better than I did during that whole time.
49:14
But but again, as, as you know, when I was interviewing at
49:17
Omega, you know, I met one of our executive partners was one
49:21
of the was at Genentech at the time they developed perceptive,
49:24
you know, which saved my wife's life, you know, so, you know,
49:27
it, it being at Omega kind of brought things back full circle.
49:30
But, you know, we were very fortunate that we were
49:33
conservative with our finances and we didn't necessarily, you
49:36
know, I didn't have to have to work for a certain period of
49:38
time. So I had the luxury of being
49:40
able to take it, take time off. A lot of people don't, you know,
49:43
a lot of people have dealing with family illnesses, whether
49:46
it's, you know, it's, it's, you know, with the children or
49:48
spouses or, or parents, and they don't have a luxury of, of
49:51
taking the time that I did it. So we were very, very fortunate
49:55
in that respect. But it it definitely, like I
49:57
said, it just brought a lot of things into, into very sharp
49:59
focus that I, you know, I had always acknowledged.
50:03
But you know, it becomes much more real in in the moment.
50:05
Was there was there any hesitation making that move,
50:07
stepping away from work for a year?
50:11
Initially, I, I, I fought it because I, I, it was pretty
50:14
clear that I needed to step away and I just was stubborn.
50:17
You know, I thought I could, I thought I could, you know,
50:19
handle everything and, and, and be Superman and all that stuff.
50:22
But, you know, look, we're all human.
50:25
We all have, we all have our, we all have our, we all have our,
50:27
our, our breaking points. And, and, and I certainly said
50:30
it was, you know, kind of hit mine and it became pretty
50:32
obvious that, that I needed to leave.
50:34
I was a little concerned, you know, when I left.
50:36
It's like, would people Remember Me?
50:38
Would I be able to, when I decided if I wanted to go back
50:40
in the industry, would I be able to get a job or, you know, would
50:43
I, you know, what, what, what does that look like?
50:45
And, you know, those were, those are things that you think about,
50:49
you know, during that time. But like I said, it did work out
50:51
well, fortunately. But you know, it was it, it, it,
50:55
it, it is, you know, it, it's, it's an uncertain time, right?
50:58
And you know, for many of us, our identity is our job in many
51:02
cases, especially in this industry.
51:04
And so I, I think I've been a little fortunate that, you know,
51:07
my job has always been what I do.
51:09
It's not who I am and so, but Even so it was, it was hard kind
51:13
of leaving a very prestigious firm in a high profile role to
51:16
just kind of hang out. And you know, I'm glad that you
51:20
said it exactly the way that you said it because for so many high
51:23
performers, entrepreneurs, executives, etcetera and and I
51:28
and I am guilty of this. I'm raising my hand myself.
51:31
I very much identify who I am with what I do right.
51:34
And in those times where I've changed what it was I was doing
51:38
or I had exited something and didn't know what the next thing
51:42
was. It's very unsettling.
51:45
It's very confusing, disturbing. Like where do I sort of fit in?
51:50
Like I, I was anchored to who I was over here in this job, in
51:54
this role, in this company. And now that's gone and it and
51:58
it does feel like part of the your identity has dissolved.
52:01
Sure, no, I, I, I 100%. And because you know, some of us
52:06
when you're, when you're, when you throw so much of yourself
52:09
into your professional life, which in many cases you kind of
52:11
have to do. And, and especially in the
52:12
industries that that, that you mentioned and, and the one that
52:15
I'm in, it's, you know, you can't be 50% there, 80% there.
52:18
You have to be kind of 110% there all the time.
52:21
And stepping back from that, it's like, OK, so now who am I
52:24
exactly? And you know, what is, what is
52:26
my identity? And, and like I said, I've
52:28
always been fortunate that I've always kind of divorced a little
52:31
bit who I am versus what I do. But it was still a challenge,
52:34
you know, because they don't have an, an identity per say.
52:36
And, and I give full credit to my wife, who, you know, turned
52:40
me toward, you know, doing much more volunteer work, which I
52:44
plan to do. But she kind of, you know, kind
52:46
of directed me there. I've always been interested in
52:47
education and tutoring and things like that.
52:49
And so I was able to kind of channel that to be able to give
52:53
some back to people. As I say, in the in the real
52:55
economy, we, you know, I have this, you know, I live in a fake
52:59
economy of like hedge funds and private equity and, and venture
53:02
capital and, and, you know, start-ups, whatever.
53:05
That's kind of the, the fake economy, the real economy is
53:07
what most people go through on a day-to-day basis.
53:09
And you know, in many cases, you know, we kind of lose a touch of
53:13
that a little bit. And so kind of being pulled back
53:18
into that in terms of kind of what is really kind of going on
53:21
outside of the world that you're in and you realize you are in a
53:24
bit of a bubble. And so and and so it, it does
53:28
force, you know, some some some grounding on you if you don't
53:31
have it already. Sean, what's your superpower?
53:37
You know, I dread that question because, you know, I, I, I don't
53:41
know if I have an answer. I think it and as, as I, as I
53:44
think about it, I, I think what has enabled me to excel in the,
53:50
in the rules that I have had and is that I am much more of a
53:57
multi disciplinary thinker, meaning that I am very, very
54:03
broadly curious. And then I'm able to take kind
54:06
of what are very kind of complicated, like I said,
54:09
situations, strategies, what have you, and synthesize that in
54:12
a way that also builds upon kind of like business strategy and
54:16
business imperatives within these organizations that I work.
54:18
So you take a lot of different elements from whether it's just
54:21
not of the financial, the narrative, the storytelling, the
54:24
numbers, you know, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the
54:28
sizzle and the steak, so to speak.
54:30
And to be able to work with people from a long, long, long,
54:37
long list of, of disciplines that exist within these firms to
54:40
kind of make the 1 + 1 = 3. And I don't, I can't really
54:43
distill that into, into one word or phrase, but I think that has
54:46
served me, you know, served me very well.
54:49
I don't know if that's a superpower.
54:50
I have no idea. But that is historically what
54:52
is, you know, what is distinguished I've been able to
54:55
do. How about something fun you like
54:57
to do outside of work, Sean? You know what, I love the
55:02
outdoors, you know, hiking and, and you know why my, my mother
55:07
growing up in Northern California was a card carrying
55:09
member of the Sierra Club. You know, so I like to, I like
55:11
to, to get out, I like to be outside and in the outdoors.
55:13
And, and so places like Boston or San Francisco, great for that
55:16
because you can, you can get out pretty, you know, pretty easily
55:19
where, as opposed to when he lived in Manhattan, it was, it
55:21
was much more of a battle to, to, to get out to, to, to where,
55:24
you know, where, where there's a little bit of nature.
55:26
But I do love to be out in the outdoors.
55:30
I do love to, to travel. I travel a lot for work, but
55:33
it's very sterile. Work travels sterile, right?
55:35
You're, you're playing car, hotel, meeting restaurant, hotel
55:40
playing back, right? Whereas I like to do a lot of
55:43
kind of cultural kind of tourism with my wife and seeing the
55:46
world, so to speak. And I do, I read a lot.
55:50
I think that's something that is becoming, you know, ever more
55:55
scarce just in terms of how society is and kind of how easy
55:58
it is to, you know, to pretension spans to wander.
56:01
You know, I find reading is one of the best ways to just
56:07
distinguish yourself. You know what?
56:09
Do you like to read? I read, I mean, I mean, there's
56:13
a lot of stuff that I read for, for work.
56:15
And one of the great things about our business is like the,
56:17
the science continues to advance.
56:19
And so we need to kind of stay on top of things.
56:20
Even if I'm not a scientist. There's a lot of things that we
56:22
read kind of a publication standpoint, but there's a lot
56:25
of, I read a lot of kind of, I try to spread my, my reading,
56:30
my, my personal reading between something that's more work
56:33
related or economics or markets or, or kind of related to what I
56:36
do, something that's maybe fun, kind of like a murder mystery or
56:39
who knows, right? Or you know, or some like
56:42
historical fiction. So, but you know, you do need to
56:46
take the time and, and space away from the day-to-day, put
56:49
your devices to the side. I do this on Sundays and, and,
56:52
and read, whether it's the Economist or some of the news
56:54
publications related to biotech, you know, some of the current
56:57
investment memos and decks from our portfolio companies.
57:00
That's all information that you need to have to, to be able to
57:03
retrieve. And many people will, you know,
57:05
feed it into ChatGPT. But you can do that for certain
57:07
things, but it's not the same as being able to retrieve it on
57:10
your own. I was going to ask actually, do
57:13
you? Still read completely read all
57:16
of these articles, all these decks, etcetera.
57:18
Or are you feeding a lot of them into AI and asking for summary
57:22
so that you can ultimately consume and synthesize more
57:25
data? It depends if it's something.
57:29
That is very, very lengthy on something that is kind of a
57:32
little bit of ancillary interest, but not, not super
57:35
important in many cases. I, I can get an AI summary and
57:38
then decide if it's something that I really want to delve
57:40
into, right? I don't, I, I use it as, as, as
57:43
a, you know, as, you know, some of the, the AI tools as a source
57:50
of, you know, kind of support, but not necessarily
57:52
illumination. And what I mean is that it'll,
57:55
it'll help me direct where I want to spend more time as
57:58
opposed to using it as a shortcut to take away time.
58:01
If that's, if that makes, if that makes sense.
58:03
I'm going to use it as a shortcut to learning.
58:05
I use, I use it as a shortcut to what I want to learn more about.
58:08
Gotcha, get some summaries. On things that you're not sure
58:12
about, if it's worth investing the extra time.
58:14
And then from the summary, you can determine, oh, these two
58:18
things out of these five, this is what I want to dive deeper
58:21
into and I'm going to go and consume it the old fashioned
58:23
way. Exactly.
58:24
And and just, I'm just old fashioned I guess in.
58:26
Terms of I, I just find I retain things if I'm, if I'm actually
58:29
reading it on my own. And that's a a muscle that you
58:31
need to, especially today, you need to kind of work really,
58:34
really hard to maintain because there's so many things that are
58:37
just, you know, competing for your attention.
58:38
There's a lot of very surface, how to say kind of surface
58:43
knowledge out there. But again, in in our business
58:46
and especially, you know, when you're more of a specialist and
58:49
you're dealing with more comic complex kind of complicated
58:52
concepts, you you need to, to, to, to dive in on your own.
58:56
Yeah, for sure, Sean. I've just got one more question
58:59
for you today, but before I ask it, I want to do 3 quick things.
59:03
First of all, if you want to get in touch with Sean Kaminsky
59:05
today, he's given us his e-mail address to hand out to you.
59:08
It is SC at omegafunds.com. SC at omegafunds.com and we'll
59:14
have that in the show notes too. Also, as a reminder, if you want
59:18
to get more employees access to benefits that won't hurt them
59:21
financially and carries a financial upside for the
59:23
company, reach out to us at Add Back benefits.com.
59:27
Finally, if you will take just a moment to leave us a comment or
59:30
review on your favorite podcast app, you will hold a special
59:33
place in my heart forever. Thank you so much.
59:36
So last question for you, Shawna, you're from now you and
59:38
I reconnect and you're celebrating something really
59:41
big. What's that big thing you hope
59:43
to be celebrating one year from today?
59:47
That's a good question, I think. You know, from the, the thing we
59:51
recently celebrated as as a family was my wife's kind of,
59:55
you know, 10 year marker for, you know, breast cancer
59:57
survival, which is which once you've on it, the, the, the
1:00:01
past, the 10 year window for treatment, you know, your odds
1:00:04
of being of a becoming, you know, being in remission are,
1:00:07
are, are much, much, much higher.
1:00:10
And so that was very, that was the anniversary that we were
1:00:12
looking for, but. You know, from, as I think about
1:00:16
kind of over the over the next year and it's probably like a
1:00:18
maybe a year and a half from now.
1:00:19
What I really want to be able to do is, is you know from our,
1:00:24
where we're raising Fund 9 on the professional side.
1:00:27
And you know, if we can slightly increase the size from fund 8 if
1:00:31
we want to and make it a much more seamless, less laborious
1:00:36
process, cause fundraising is, is a grind.
1:00:40
You know, I will, I would be thrilled to have that happen,
1:00:42
Which means that it's really just the residual of all the
1:00:45
restructuring and process engineering that we've done in
1:00:47
the past years will have been effective.
1:00:51
Say more about that some of this process.
1:00:53
Engineering that you guys have done the restructuring to make
1:00:56
things more efficient on the fundraising, yeah, I mean it's a
1:00:58
lot of it is, you know, many people think.
1:01:00
Fundraising is just kind of running around helter skelter
1:01:03
and meeting with investors that might be interested in pitching
1:01:05
them on your fund, etcetera. And, And, and in some ways that
1:01:09
that is true. But, but really, you know, I
1:01:13
come not from originally being, you know, kind of a, an asset
1:01:16
raiser or, or, or or client person.
1:01:18
I, I come from like the product and investment side early in my
1:01:20
career. And so I'm very process
1:01:22
oriented. And so, you know, you really
1:01:24
can't manage what you can't measure.
1:01:26
And so that means, you know, optimizing, you know, the CRM
1:01:30
experience, a lot of CRMS out there that are not so great, but
1:01:33
being able to make sure you're pushing the limits of what they
1:01:35
can do for you, that you're automating things as much as
1:01:37
possible, that you're taking the, the human element out in
1:01:40
many cases, because that just invites, you know, kind of user
1:01:43
error in many cases, making things kind of scalable, you
1:01:47
know, measurable. And from a, you know, kind of
1:01:50
marketplace or strategic standpoint, having a real
1:01:53
strategic plan in terms of what you're going to do, how you're
1:01:56
going to do it, how you're going to measure yourself against
1:01:58
that. And that goes with maybe certain
1:02:00
client segments, whether it's like, say, the hospitals or, or
1:02:04
medical foundations or pension funds or sovereign wealth funds
1:02:07
or family offices. Now I'm fortunate that I'm, I
1:02:09
work with all those types of clients and kind of conversant
1:02:11
in their own specific dialect, I guess if you will, and then
1:02:15
building the, the team and process around the firm that can
1:02:18
make that work. And again, it's the 1 + 1 = 3.
1:02:21
You want to make sure that you put the firm in the best
1:02:23
position to succeed whenever you are, whenever you're going out
1:02:26
to, to meet an investor. And a lot of that has to happen
1:02:29
behind the scenes prior to even getting to the meeting.
1:02:34
Sean Kaminsky. From Omega Fund Management, I
1:02:37
want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time
1:02:39
and your story with us today. I really appreciate it.
1:02:43
No, thank you very much. It's, it's been a pleasure and
1:02:45
I, I hope. I was able to to provide some
1:02:48
interesting commentary on what we do, but I guess you know, the
1:02:51
audience will decide that I've already decided the judgement is
1:02:54
in. You did well.
1:02:56
Thank you, Sean. That's very kind of you.
1:02:57
Thank you, folks. That's a wrap on another.
1:03:00
Episode of the Inspired Stories. Podcast, thanks for learning
1:03:02
with us today.