Latest / The BioHub - by Avetix / Episode 159 - Derek Adams - Chief Executive Officer at Stellular Bio

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Episode 159 - Derek Adams - Chief Executive Officer at Stellular Bio · The BioHub - by Avetix

0:06
So welcome back to another episode of the Bio Hub.
0:08
Today we're thrilled to welcome on Derek Adams, who's a seasoned
0:11
biotech executive with deep expertise in cell and gene
0:14
therapy manufacturing, CMC strategy and company building.
0:18
Derek is the CEO of Cellular Bio, who are leading the
0:21
advancements of PRB therapies specifically designed to treat
0:25
complex conditions of the eye surface, such as severe dry eye
0:29
associated with autoimmune disorders like Sjogren's
0:32
syndrome. So join us today as we'll
0:34
discuss cellulars, latest fundraising round, cellulars
0:38
approach and what makes it different to traditional
0:40
biologics and existing regenerative therapies, as well
0:44
as Derek's perspective on the Oculus Surface disease and
0:47
regenerative medicine space. So Derek, thanks so much for
0:50
coming on. How are you?
0:53
I'm very well. Thank you very much for having
0:54
me on. I'm excited.
0:56
Yeah, look, it's a pleasure. So let's just dive into a little
1:00
bit about your journey, your story through the field.
1:02
So you've spent much of your career at the intersection of
1:05
science, engineering and manufacturing.
1:08
Can you walk us through your journey through the field?
1:12
Certainly I, I actually started my career with a PhD in chemical
1:17
engineering and really focused my, my academic, my academic
1:23
efforts on the, the idea of just solving important problems.
1:27
That's what engineers do. And I was really and still am
1:31
very passionate about finding important problems to solve from
1:35
there. I actually joined Merck and
1:37
company in, in the US, it's called Merck and company in the,
1:41
in the UK and, and other places. I think it's MSD and it's a
1:47
large pharmaceutical company. And I was working actually on
1:50
the manufacturing of vaccines, particularly live virus
1:54
vaccines, which are complex biologic products.
1:58
And so I learned a lot about the, the manufacturing
2:02
challenges of complex biologic products while I was there.
2:06
I, I actually kind of did my career in an interesting reverse
2:10
order. So I started very late stage, so
2:13
established commercial product and dealing with the challenges
2:17
of a a routine manufacturing environment and getting and
2:22
getting product released and, and out to patients on a very
2:27
regular basis. That presents a whole bunch of
2:29
very interesting challenges. And so I spent a lot of time
2:32
learning about the, the details of manufacturing and the
2:36
importance of, of both the science of what we do, but also
2:39
the operational aspects of getting things done.
2:44
From there, I, I then moved to Alexion Pharmaceuticals.
2:47
And at the time it was still a fairly small company with a
2:52
product that was about to be approved in the next year or
2:55
two. From joining, I, I actually was
3:00
able to see the, the commercialization of a product
3:03
and to, to be kind of on the front lines of establishing
3:07
manufacturing for a, a global product that was very important
3:13
for patients. There was also a focus on rare
3:16
disease. And so that was a, a new aspect
3:20
of, of being able to provide a supply to a patient population
3:24
that that might be very small, but is, is benefiting
3:27
humongously from our products. And so those challenges and
3:30
those problems to solve have been very formative in, in my
3:35
career and very exciting to learn.
3:37
So I, I kind of grew up a lot at Alexion through, through many
3:41
things. Ultimately I was leading a
3:44
manufacturing facility and then and then leading some, some
3:49
global technical operations organizations.
3:52
And so after about 10 years there, I, I moved to now even
3:57
earlier phase companies. So I started at a effectively a
4:00
startup company in the Boston area.
4:04
It was, it was called a Pivo Biosciences that then very
4:07
quickly merged with Evello Biosciences and was focused on
4:12
using live biotherapeutic products to to solve some
4:16
important challenges in, in human health.
4:20
And particularly we're looking at both cancer and autoimmune
4:26
issues that could be potentially mitigated by, by the interaction
4:31
of live biotherapeutic products, live bugs basically in the gut
4:36
performing a lot of very interesting mechanisms to, to
4:39
alleviate those conditions. So I was there for, for a short
4:43
time in sort of the, that was sort of the microbiome space,
4:46
another complicated, challenging space that, that was very
4:51
inspiring. But then I had the opportunity
4:54
to actually work on something that was even more inspiring to
4:58
me, which is the cell and gene therapies at Bluebird Bio.
5:03
The products that Bluebird was was building were some of the
5:08
most amazing products I've ever seen.
5:09
They actually are close to functional cures of, of
5:13
devastating diseases. And other than the vaccines that
5:17
I worked on early on, which I believe vaccines and preventing
5:20
disease is probably the pinnacle of medicine, working on these,
5:24
these curative therapies, I mean, you can't help but be
5:28
tremendously inspired to do that.
5:29
So I, I, I really dove in and applied all the problem solving
5:36
I could at, at Bluebird to try to build an organization that,
5:40
that could commercialize up to 4 cell and gene therapy products
5:46
for patients almost simultaneously, which was a,
5:49
which was a big challenge. And, and there I learned a lot
5:53
about how to build organizations with an amazing culture.
5:57
Bluebird had just a legendary culture of not just a great
6:03
science, but also amazing people that really worked well
6:06
together. And so I learned a lot of that
6:09
to to apply to future roles and add Bluebird after roughly just
6:16
after COVID, we started to to see that the products we were
6:20
developing had to be split into two different business units and
6:23
then ultimately into two different companies.
6:25
So severe genetic disease products versus oncology
6:29
products and oncology business is very different than a severe
6:31
genetic disease business. The organization that I was, I
6:35
was building and and supporting, we supported both of those.
6:38
And so I had to kind of divide that organization in half and we
6:42
successfully divided that and we had amazing talent leading those
6:45
organizations. So I kind of worked myself out
6:48
of a job on, on on that front. And so ended up looking at a new
6:54
role at a company was called Platelet Biogenesis at the time
6:59
or Platelet Bio. And then ultimately we renamed
7:01
it to Cellular Bio. Nice.
7:05
And you mentioned some of the companies there that you've been
7:07
involved with some some super innovative companies.
7:10
What was it specifically about Stellular bio that made you feel
7:16
like this was a compelling opportunity and and the right
7:19
one in the next step of your career?
7:21
I'm sure you were looking at a bunch of different companies,
7:24
but what was it particularly about Stellular that drew you
7:27
in? Good question.
7:29
So like I said, at the time, it was a company called Platelet
7:32
Bio or Platelet Biogenesis, and it was a company that's
7:35
developing a, a very interesting platform for artificial
7:41
platelets from stem cells. So induced pluripotent stem
7:46
cells, cultured stem cells that then we use to, to create
7:51
artificial platelets, which is, is kind of an amazing thing to
7:56
try to recreate cells that are used in, in, in so many
8:01
important functions in our own bodies.
8:03
To try to recreate those in the lab is is quite an amazing feat.
8:07
So that was super compelling. In addition, I actually just
8:10
really thought the team was amazing and I thought that this
8:14
was a group of people that I wanted to be a part of and
8:18
wanted to help. I joined Platelet Biogenesis
8:21
actually as chief operating officer in the summer of 2021.
8:28
And so that was an opportunity to, to, to help grow also the,
8:32
the, the manufacturing of platelets like that, in addition
8:36
to helping overall operating a company, which was, which was
8:41
great. We shortly thereafter actually
8:46
had a, a significant downsizing as happens in, in the biotech
8:51
world run into some, some financial challenges you've got
8:55
to, to restructure. And so at that time, then I, I
8:59
became the CEO of, of plate the Biogenesis, which we then
9:03
quickly changed to the name to cellular bio to reflect that we
9:07
actually changed the focus of the platform.
9:10
Rather than trying to do artificial platelets, we
9:13
actually are now producing a, a product that we call platelet
9:18
inspired regenerative biologic or PRB, as you mentioned in the,
9:23
the intro. So the PRB therapies, platelet
9:26
inspired regenerative biologic, it's a, a mixture of the growth
9:32
factors and cytokines that come from the platelets that we can
9:35
produce. But rather than trying to
9:37
actually recreate the platelets themselves, we're using the
9:41
factors in platelets that actually are providing those
9:44
regenerative benefits to patients.
9:48
And that is also very inspiring to me.
9:50
So regenerative medicine comes right out of cell and gene
9:52
therapy. It's all about trying to harness
9:55
the biology and in our own bodies to actually provide
10:00
repair functions and, and restore health.
10:05
And so the, the products that that, that we're evaluating
10:09
these regenerative medicine products from, from PRB can be
10:11
used in a wide variety of places, very much like what is
10:15
being done in the regenerative medicine field today with
10:19
platelet rich plasma or just the your own serum or even platelet
10:25
lysates are being used for a wide variety of things.
10:28
And happy to talk about that, that field we get there, but we
10:33
evaluated a wide variety of different potential indications
10:39
with really important problems for us to try to solve.
10:42
And we settled on Sjogren's disease, dry eye as our initial
10:48
indication. It's a condition, as you
10:51
mentioned, it's an autoimmune disease that actually starts
10:54
attacking the, the, the lacrimal glands and the salivary glands.
10:58
So, so really affecting tear production and saliva production
11:04
in in the mouth, among many other things that this this
11:07
disease actually targets. It presents in, in most
11:11
generally it's, it's women in, in their sort of later adult
11:17
life that starts with quite severe dry eye.
11:23
And that dry eye is the, the manifestation of the disease
11:27
that is, is probably the most prevalent for Sjogren's patients
11:31
and one of the most, I guess, challenging for, for patients to
11:38
deal with. In addition to the fact that
11:40
there are just not a great set of therapies out there that,
11:44
that provide relief to patients. There are a lot of them, but
11:47
there aren't that many that are able to provide really good
11:51
relief for patients and certainly none that provide
11:53
universal relief for patients. So they're generally trying
11:56
everything under the sun to try to to get relief from their dry
12:00
eye. And so we believe that the the
12:04
current use of platelet rich plasma and autologous serum,
12:09
these blood products that ophthalmologists are actually
12:12
using to treat patients with with dry eye and particularly
12:17
Sjogren's patients with dry eye. We believe that that actually
12:21
has promise, but there are a lot of challenges with that.
12:23
And so we're actually producing PRB, which is kind of an off the
12:28
shelf version of those kinds of products.
12:31
That's a a well characterized reproducible pharmaceutical
12:34
product that's off the shelf, doesn't depend on donor
12:37
material, doesn't depend on the patient providing it's their own
12:40
material to be able to, to get relief.
12:43
So we're, we're, we're now focused on eye drops of this PRB
12:50
and our, our lead candidate, the STLR 2O one we call it is, is
12:55
being prepared for the clinic. We expect to be able to file an
12:59
Ind by the end of the year. So that's, it's sort of where
13:02
we're driving and it's, it's actually a culmination of years
13:06
of effort and, and building off of the, the amazing work that
13:11
that plate the bio had been doing and that the team has done
13:14
in the last four years to, to get us here.
13:16
Yeah, amazing. And you, you went into the the
13:19
platform a little bit there and how it's built, built around
13:21
platelet derived regenerative bio biologics.
13:25
Can you just give us a bit of a run through like what makes this
13:28
approach tradition of fundament fundamentally different from
13:31
both traditional biologics and existing therapies that are out
13:35
there? And when you think about like
13:37
differentiation with what you guys are doing, what do you
13:40
believe is cellular's biggest scientific or translational
13:43
advantage today versus versus maybe maybe others in the field?
13:48
Great question. So yes, it's a complicated
13:51
product and it's it, it's a little bit complicated to
13:54
explain, but as I mentioned it starts from cultured IPSC.
13:59
So induced pluripotent stem cells, these cells can actually
14:02
be driven to produce many different types of cells,
14:06
almost, almost almost any cell type that you can imagine in the
14:10
body. We start with those cells and we
14:13
differentiate them to megakaryocytes.
14:16
Megakaryocytes are the cells that produce platelets in your
14:20
body. So that's where cell, where
14:21
platelets come from. And so these megakaryocytes that
14:25
we produce, we actually call them megakaryocytes like cells,
14:27
because we're producing them in culture.
14:30
They carry all of the, the growth factors and cytokines
14:33
that are packaged into platelets.
14:35
And so we actually extract those products directly from the, the
14:39
megacharyo sites. So we create a biologic product,
14:43
meaning it's, it's a cell free but complex mixture of
14:48
biological material, most particularly the the proteins
14:54
from the cells, the cytokines and, and and growth factors that
15:00
are extracted into a, a sterile eye drop formulation.
15:07
We're not the only ones doing something kind of like this, but
15:10
we're actually pretty novel in that we're taking the lysate of
15:13
of our mega carry sites directly into a formulation for for
15:21
ophthalmological use. And so the the the platform is,
15:29
is is complex in the biology, relatively simple in execution.
15:34
And one of the things that actually is an advantage for us
15:36
is that given that we're starting with cultured cells,
15:40
not donor cells, we have the ability to scale this process to
15:44
to very large scale and be able to take advantage of those that
15:49
economy of scale to actually have a product that is of a
15:52
reasonable price that can compete in a large market like
15:56
dry eye. So Sjogren's disease dry eye is
15:58
an area of high unmet need and we're going to do everything we
16:03
can to help those patients and and evaluate our product there.
16:06
But if it works in children's dry eye, we do expect that it it
16:10
should work in the broader dry eye marketplace.
16:13
Dry eye is a kind of a complex disease.
16:16
It sounds simple, but it can actually affect in the US alone
16:23
is about 20 million people that have some form of this, of which
16:26
4 million have a form that is what we call moderate to severe
16:31
that has the potential of really damaging the surface of the eye
16:34
and it can come from many different places.
16:36
So Sjogren's disease is 1 potential cause of that.
16:39
There are other causes, environmental factors, getting
16:43
eye surgery like LASIK can cause it, GBHD can cause it.
16:46
There's a lot of different causes, but we believe our
16:49
product can actually work in all of those areas.
16:51
And so by expanding that patient population, by growing that it's
16:54
a, it's obviously a very large market that we want to attack.
16:58
It's also a very challenging competitive market.
17:01
There are large players out there in that market that we are
17:06
both admiring and talking with that, that have done a lot of
17:11
great things for dry eye patients and who are are really
17:16
making this, this this market a a continually increasing bar of
17:22
of efficacy for for patients. And so we we do believe that
17:28
we'll have both that efficacy and the ability to compete in a
17:31
price competitive market like like dry eye.
17:36
And so that's that's one of the things certainly as an engineer
17:39
and as a manufacturing person, I really actually am excited about
17:44
manufacturing as an advantage to be able to produce our product,
17:49
a very complex product, but in an economical way.
17:52
Nice. And just to like, so who are the
17:56
companies that are doing sort of similar work to you guys?
17:59
I never like to use the word competitors because I think
18:01
ultimately what you're doing, it's for the patients.
18:02
But who are the similar sort of companies that are in I guess
18:06
the same space as you? I know you have obviously bigger
18:08
players, big farmers, I know Genentech, a bigger
18:11
ophthalmology, but who are the sort of smaller companies that
18:14
you guys are sort of in the same space as?
18:18
I wouldn't say it's a, it's uncharted.
18:20
There are a lot of, of companies that are looking at trying to
18:24
solve dry eye and certainly help treat dry eye patients through
18:28
very novel ways. And so there's a lot of, a lot
18:32
of products out there that are, that are being used for, for dry
18:37
eye. The, the, the big players that
18:41
you mentioned, right, Bausch and Lomb and, and Alcon and AbbVie,
18:48
they're, they're large players that actually have important
18:51
products in their, their, their stable of products for, for dry
18:56
eye. Some of the smaller companies
19:00
have been working on some, some unique things.
19:03
And so I know company Aldera is, is awaiting FDA approval for
19:10
their, I think they call it a reactive aldehyde species
19:16
inhibitor or something for, for treating dry eye, which is a, a
19:20
unique mechanism. There are several other
19:22
companies out there with, with kind of biologic products like
19:25
a, you know, an antibody kind of approach or a single growth
19:29
factor approach. There are a few companies that
19:33
are trying to attack the problem very much like we are with this
19:38
basket of growth factors, which this what I call
19:41
polypharmacology, this, this use of hundreds of active substances
19:46
that can be doing hundreds or thousands of different things
19:48
simultaneously, much like what platelets do when they, when
19:52
they attack a wound in your body, they're not just doing one
19:55
thing. There's, there's hundreds of
19:57
mechanisms at play simultaneously.
20:00
And then we think that's important for for good healing
20:03
of the disease. And so there are a few companies
20:06
out there and I know that they they are getting some, some very
20:12
compelling data and some, some, some of the, the patients that
20:17
they have treated I think have been very well served by that.
20:21
So I know of a company Cambium Bio that that started in, I
20:27
think in, in Georgia, but has done a, a lot of work with a a
20:31
donor derived platelet lysate product, which is very similar
20:35
to what we're doing. And they, they actually have
20:38
treated quite a few patients in dry eye and seen some very
20:42
interesting results and are really working toward a phase
20:45
three study there, which I think will be very important for
20:49
patients. I've seen a company, company
20:52
called Calabio which which unfortunately they, they were
20:56
evaluating their product, which is a secretome from, from
21:02
mesenchymal stem cells or MSCS. A secret home is just all the
21:05
proteins that are just secreted from the cells, not just what we
21:09
do. We just take it from the cells
21:10
directly that that product was being evaluated for a corneal
21:16
injury disease, but also had the potential to to be looked at in,
21:21
in dry eye as well. And so that was another
21:24
polypharmacology kind of product that, that was very interesting
21:28
that, that, that we were following closely and, and hope
21:32
that they're able to, you know, continue doing great things for
21:36
patients with their, with their product.
21:37
I, I, I love seeing the activity in the field and, and really
21:41
want, you know, I want everybody to succeed here because I want
21:44
patients to succeed, certainly want us to succeed.
21:48
The primary competitor that we consider is not really a
21:52
competitor at all. It's the the the procedures that
21:57
are done by a lot of ophthalmologists now who are
22:02
finding that the the traditional and generic therapies that are
22:05
out there for dry eye are not helping their patients.
22:08
And so they're recommending their patients use autologous
22:11
blood products like platelet rich plasma or PRP or this
22:17
autologous serum serum tears, it's called or even a, a lysate
22:22
of platelets that they call plasma rich in growth factors.
22:25
It's basically platelets are the person's own blood, the
22:28
patient's own blood that is processed and and given back to
22:31
them in eye drop form. And this is actually a fairly
22:36
widespread practice among ophthalmologists.
22:39
However, it is not standardized at all.
22:41
There's no, there's no one agreed upon way to do this.
22:46
And so it actually is is hard to figure out how much is being
22:50
done and exactly how it's being done.
22:52
It's not well tracked, but there's a lot of data out there.
22:56
There's a lot of very interesting anecdotal data I've
22:59
seen and then there's published clinical data with particularly
23:03
even Sjogren's patients getting benefit from these autologous
23:07
blood products. And we believe that we're
23:11
delivering the same benefit, but in a superior product with a lot
23:15
of advantages for patients and for for for ophthalmologists and
23:19
payers. That that we believe that this
23:22
translational proof that we believe the the, the blood
23:28
products actually show that if we can do the same thing that
23:32
we're actually going to be able to to deliver the same benefit
23:35
in a package that will be beneficial to patients and to
23:40
the the healthcare system overall.
23:43
Nice. And just going to another
23:45
milestone that you guys achieved recently was a financing round
23:49
that you guys had closed. So massive congratulations on
23:51
that. I know how difficult it's been.
23:54
Just just talk us through like the capital that you've just
23:56
brought in, what, what does that unlock for you guys and why is
23:59
this moment so important for the company looking ahead?
24:03
And then how do you think about balancing sort of near term
24:06
clinical execution with the the long longer term vision for the
24:09
platform? Oh, that's a great, that's a
24:12
great question. The the journey over the last
24:15
four years has been very, very productive internally, but very
24:22
difficult externally. The the funding environment for
24:27
companies such as Cellular Bio companies that have a, you know,
24:32
perhaps a platform that can be applied many different places,
24:34
but not yet in the clinic that needs to get to clinical data to
24:40
to sort of demonstrate value of the platform have not been of
24:45
interest for a lot of a lot of investors to fund in this in
24:51
this environment. It's been a real challenge.
24:53
And so one of the things that that we learned and, and really
24:57
had to, to take the heart is the extreme focus of, of a company
25:03
and the, the real serious capital efficiency we had to
25:08
have of having a, a very small team, a very clear and defined
25:13
strategy, a single asset with a, an entire company behind that
25:18
asset, just getting to the clinic and not getting
25:21
distracted by too many other things.
25:23
That's the thing that we had to learn.
25:24
And that's actually what has got us as far as we have with the
25:28
capital that we had. And then now closing this last
25:31
round, this raise, the series one raise is going to allow us
25:36
to get to the Ind to get us to the ability to then have the
25:43
ability to have the, the, the, the paperwork and the approval
25:46
ready to, to, to, to get into the clinic.
25:50
And we'll, we'll raise another bit of money to be able to get
25:54
to the first clinical data. And all of that path has been as
25:59
streamlined as possible. That's just one of the things
26:02
that we've learned throughout the years is it just cannot
26:05
have, cannot have distractions and it has to be very, very
26:11
clear and linear all the way through to get to that next
26:14
value inflection point. And so this raise actually gets
26:17
us to a big milestone of, of I&D and the the next value
26:22
inflection point of getting clinical data will really unlock
26:25
a lot of opportunity to, to grow the platform in many different
26:30
dimensions. One of the dimensions that that
26:32
I mentioned before of, of manufacturing and scaling is
26:35
something I really want to work on right now.
26:38
I really want to be able to spend time on the, you know, the
26:43
five or six obvious things that I know we can work on and the 30
26:47
or so things that I haven't even thought of yet to improve the
26:50
process and, and to scale it for commercialization.
26:54
I really want to be able to focus on that, but there's no
26:56
point in doing that right now. I don't have the capital to, to
26:59
focus on that. And I've had to be very
27:01
disciplined and, and, and clear about where we're headed and,
27:06
and what it takes to get there and just that.
27:10
And, and that's been one of the most difficult lessons and, and
27:17
actually clearest lessons that I've learned in the last four
27:22
years with this, this capital environment.
27:25
And, and really happy that this, you know, this raise is getting
27:28
us to the, this, this execution milestone of, of Ind.
27:33
That's, that's very exciting. And then I believe that we'll
27:36
just continue the journey from there, get some amazing clinical
27:39
data and then that unlocks a very bright future for for the
27:44
company and for patients. Yeah, 100%.
27:46
Well, congratulations on that again, because I hate all the
27:49
time from companies how difficult it is to raise at the
27:51
moment. So yeah, congratulations on that
27:55
and thank you. If you just look generally at
27:58
the Oculus, Surface Disease and Regenerative Medicine space at
28:02
the moment, how do you see the field changing and where do you
28:06
think Stellular fits in within that evolution?
28:10
Oh, good, good question. So as I mentioned, it's a very
28:13
dynamic and, and, and competitive market.
28:18
Dry eye patients out there try every possible thing they can to
28:24
try to get relief. And those who have moderate to
28:26
severe dry eye are, are, are looking for, for any solution
28:32
that actually works. And so there's a lot of
28:35
companies that are trying to develop some some novel
28:37
treatments to help these patients.
28:40
And, and you know, obviously we're one of them.
28:43
There are a lot of different ways that you might be able to
28:46
solve the these problems for patients, both providing relief
28:51
from the symptoms of dry eye or even improving some of the signs
28:54
and repairing some of the damage on the cornea.
28:57
There's different ways to do that.
28:59
And so I see a lot of products out there that are are trying
29:03
these different mechanisms, which is which is amazing.
29:07
Our differentiation here is is really trying almost all
29:11
mechanisms at the same time. This polypharmacology approach
29:15
this, this complex biologic product in an eye drop form to
29:21
be able to attack the the problem from many, many
29:26
dimensions simultaneously. That's, that's kind of that is,
29:30
is one of the, the, what I believe is the advantages of
29:34
our, our, our therapy and how that we're distinguished from a
29:38
lot of the other products that are out there that are, are
29:40
generally traditional drug development, single mechanism,
29:43
single target with, with good hypothesis of how it actually
29:48
solve, solve the problem for patients.
29:51
I believe that our slightly more holistic approach is something
29:55
that will be compelling and interesting in this very
30:00
competitive market. And so look forward to to
30:03
getting the clinical data and then being able to really get
30:07
out there and, and compete on its merits with a lot of these
30:12
companies and, and hope that, you know, at the end of the day,
30:16
patients are the ones who actually benefit from that.
30:19
Yeah, definitely. And just back to financing
30:22
fundraising again, you, you've obviously raised capital across
30:25
very different market cycles. Just given how difficult the the
30:29
capital markets have been these last few years.
30:31
What lessons from from that will most influence how you build and
30:35
finance cellular going forward? And similarly, what advice would
30:40
you give to first time biotech founders, biotech CEOs that are
30:44
navigating platform stories in a more disciplined investment
30:47
environment as well? Great question.
30:51
So I'd mentioned some of the lessons I learned about capital
30:54
efficiency in these real down markets.
30:57
You have to be crystal clear about your path to creating some
31:01
kind of value. And one of the things that it
31:05
took me a while to learn. So as a, as a technical person,
31:07
as an, as an engineer, I'm very focused on on what can the
31:11
product do and, and how will these things work and how you
31:15
know the interesting things that we can, the interesting problems
31:17
we can solve technically. But I had to learn that
31:20
investors, their primary goal is to make money for their, their
31:24
limited partners, right. So that's, they, they need to
31:28
see how all this is going to translate into additional value
31:32
so that they invest in something that's going to be worth more
31:36
over time. It sounds super trite and, and,
31:38
and very simple, but it's a, it's an important thing to, for
31:46
all CE OS to, to learn is that investors are there to make
31:49
money. And so you need to present the
31:51
story in terms of how they're going to make money.
31:57
And so I talk a lot about the patience and, and, and I'm
31:59
really, really believe that that our products are, are going to
32:05
do great things for patients. And I believe it, you know, and
32:10
actually it's, it's one of the most motivating things for me,
32:12
why I do what I do. I don't do it just for money.
32:16
I do it because I believe this is a an amazing thing to do.
32:19
And I'm sure that many other CE OS are doing exactly the same
32:22
way that they believe either the technology's really going to
32:25
revolutionize something that patients really are suffering
32:28
and then they need, they need different options.
32:31
And that, you know, you believe that, that you have something
32:34
that's going to, to be a game changer that's going to work.
32:37
That is really important. And we all have to have that
32:39
passion and belief and invite investors in to believe with us
32:44
on that. But ultimately we have to show
32:46
how we're actually creating value.
32:48
And that drives toward conversations of what's the
32:50
commercial market going to look like?
32:52
What is that value actually going to be is, is our patients
32:57
actually going to use it, Our payers actually going to pay for
32:59
this? This is actually going to be
33:00
something where you can have enough margin to actually
33:02
sustain a business. All those things you have to
33:04
think about way earlier on then then maybe a lot of certainly
33:08
founders might think and you've got to paint a picture of that
33:12
future. Even if it's not fully written,
33:15
you at least have to show the, the potential paths to creating
33:20
that great value. And that's the biggest thing
33:22
that I've learned and, and, and I continue to try to learn it
33:25
and, and, and sharpen that is, is to really paint that, that
33:29
future picture of value to, to investors, value to the market
33:35
and, and, and the healthcare system ultimately for investors
33:41
that care about, are they going to make money?
33:43
And, and you can't shy away from that part of it.
33:45
And, and that, that for some of us, you know, very passionate
33:49
about the, the, the, the, the, the altruistic aspects of kind
33:56
of what we do, me needs to actually be tempered with, well,
34:00
somebody's going to pay for this and they actually do need to, to
34:03
make a profit. That's kind of the system that
34:05
we're in. And so you just have to be
34:06
comfortable with that. Yeah.
34:09
And just just to go into your background again, so you, you
34:11
were obviously in manufacturing roles predominantly prior to
34:14
having operating roles and then CEO roles.
34:16
Was that quite an easy transition for you naturally to
34:19
then go out, go out and fundraise and talk to investors?
34:23
Is that something that took a little bit more time for you to
34:25
pick up or was that quite a natural thing that you quite
34:28
completely could do? Was it was not natural.
34:34
So as an engineer, I spent a lot of time priding myself with
34:38
telling people the truth of, of where things stood right and
34:43
being very clear about and clear eyed about a technical situation
34:47
and not deluding ourselves about anything and not focusing on
34:53
trying to tell, you know, tell people that that you okay, this
34:59
is going to be, this is going to be amazing.
35:02
It's much more of a okay, this is a challenging problem.
35:04
I think we can solve this problem and it's a different way
35:08
of looking at things. The biggest thing that I, I
35:11
realized that I had an amazing leadership coach and she's
35:14
helped me a lot through this of, of transforming that, that truth
35:21
telling engineer in me into somebody we called the believer
35:25
in chief, right? You have to be as a CEOAA
35:31
painter of a compelling vision and the vision isn't necessarily
35:35
100% going to come true. You just, there's too many
35:38
unknowns, but you have to obtained A compelling vision and
35:42
a reason for people to believe with you that this is important
35:46
work. And that requires a different
35:48
set of muscles and different way of thinking than traditional
35:51
engineering. You have to think about
35:53
possibilities rather than strip everything down to its essence
35:58
of of very clear variables. You actually have to a little
36:03
bit hand wave some of the technical challenges and realize
36:06
I don't know how we're going to solve all of these things.
36:09
I believe that we can. I believe we're going to build a
36:11
team that can actually do that. And I feel comfortable that we
36:14
are going to be able to meet these challenges head on.
36:19
I recognize that there's risk in everything that we do.
36:21
Maybe this doesn't work in the clinic.
36:23
Maybe the clinical data are are equivocal.
36:26
Maybe it's amazing, but we have trouble trouble actually scaling
36:30
it. Those kinds of challenges, I
36:31
know they're out there. I know that that they're going
36:35
to be really important when we hit them, but they're also
36:38
things that I don't necessarily want to lead with when I talk
36:41
about here's what I believe that our product can do or our
36:44
company can do. And that's one of the most
36:48
important lessons I had to learn and had to switch my engineer
36:52
brain into a little bit more of a, a sales brain, which had been
36:59
an anathema through my whole career.
37:01
Most of the time I wasn't trying to sell people on anything.
37:05
I was trying to actually, you know, see things the way they
37:07
were. But it's important to be that
37:10
that way and it's important for how things work in in our
37:13
industry. Yeah, 100%.
37:16
And this is a question that we always finish with on the Bio
37:19
Hub as well. If you were to have dinner with
37:22
with any free people, past or present, who would it be and
37:25
why? It doesn't necessarily need to
37:27
be biotech innovators, although it can be if you like.
37:30
But yeah, free people you'd like to have for for dinner.
37:34
Oh, of course, yeah. So that's interesting.
37:36
So. So I've been reading a lot of of
37:42
the history of physics lately for just my own fun purposes
37:45
and, and seeing how how things have evolved and, and a person
37:49
that actually I would really love to invite to dinner is
37:51
somebody is James Clerk Maxwell. He he derived some some just
37:57
really elegant equations for electromagnet magnetism, which
38:01
has nothing to do with biotech and has nothing to do with what
38:04
I'm doing, but is is fundamental to a lot of modern physics.
38:09
But I don't know a whole lot of about him.
38:11
And he had a had a fairly humble life and they, it seemed
38:15
genuinely a a person who is just focused on on seeing the world
38:21
the way it was. And I and I, I'd really love to
38:23
be able to talk to somebody like that.
38:25
Even Einstein said he stood on the shoulders of of James
38:27
Maxwell. So I, I think that would, that
38:29
would be somebody I'd really be interested in in having dinner
38:33
with. I, I'd actually really would
38:38
like to actually have dinner with Martin Luther King Junior.
38:41
That would be just such an amazing experience and an
38:45
amazing conversation to have with somebody who fundamentally
38:50
changed things in such a big way.
38:52
But in, in what I could see is sort of the right way, even
38:57
though, you know, he ended up getting getting murdered because
39:00
of it. He was so passionate and, and
39:03
such an amazing leader and so clear spoken that I wish I could
39:08
learn how to speak like that, that inspirational and clear,
39:12
clear way of, of getting people behind something.
39:16
Boy, I'd love to do that, do that and also kind of, you know,
39:20
just understand the, the, the challenges you went through
39:22
there, which were immense. I, I know.
39:25
And then lastly, I think, and this is something that has
39:29
nothing to do with biotech either, but very important to
39:32
me, I'd love to actually have dinner with with my grandmother
39:36
who passed away over a decade ago.
39:39
But she was such an amazing person, sort of a matriarch of
39:44
our family. I really enjoyed talking with
39:48
her and I really, really would enjoy talking with her again.
39:51
That would that would really make my evening if I could do
39:53
that. Yeah.
39:55
But look, three amazing answers there and thanks again for
39:58
coming on and helping us out with this.
39:59
It sounds like what you're building at Stoweolar is is
40:02
super impressive. Congratulations on the fund and
40:05
again and I'm looking forward to seeing the next milestones that
40:08
that you guys achieve over the next year, year or two.
40:11
So yeah, Derek, it was a pleasure to have you on and and
40:14
thanks again for helping us out with this.
40:15
It was a pleasure. Thank you very much.
40:17
I appreciate it.