Episode 19
Networking, Collaboration, and the Dynamics of Business Growth with Padma Kodukula, Chief Business Officer at A-Alpha Bio
In this episode, we chat with Padma Kodukula, Chief Business Officer at A-Alpha Bio, a company that leverages synthetic biology and machine learning to measure, discover, predict, and engineer protein-protein interactions. Padma has guided life sciences companies to an aggregate $15B+ in capitalization, as well as numerous product launches and strategic acquisitions.
Topics we Discuss:
- Collaborations with diverse entities, from larger pharma companies to academic institutions
- The significance of networking and building connections in career transitions
- Effective communication strategies within hybrid work environments
- Insights into the process of seeking funding and essential components required for a compelling pitch
- Approaches to business growth and culture
- Get Padma's favorite book: The Present: The Gift that Makes You Happy and Successful at Work and in Life
- Get Padma's recommended book: Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman - Including 10 More Years of Business Unusual
- Check out A-Alpha Bio
- Link In with Padma!
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Transcript
Padma Khadakulla is the chief business officer at
Speaker:A-Alpha Bio, and she has a fascinating career journey. But
Speaker:what I took away from the conversation was a lot about her passion for
Speaker:mentorship and her passion for helping companies to really figure
Speaker:out how to sell themselves, whether they are selling a product
Speaker:Padma has a really interesting career history and she brought
Speaker:so many cool insights to the table. If you are someone who loves
Speaker:networking, Padma also loves networking and she really
Speaker:She has the real extrovert energy going. I
Speaker:Yes, absolutely. So anyone who's interested in being a
Speaker:chief business officer or wonder about how business development gets
Speaker:done in a biotech, this is really your episode. We
Speaker:dive pretty deep into a lot of what she does on a daily basis in
Speaker:that realm. All right, well Padma, thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker:We start all of our podcast episodes pretty
Speaker:much in the same way, which is by asking what did you want to be when you were seven?
Speaker:Yeah, when I was seven, I wanted to be a teacher. I
Speaker:was enamored, I was inspired by some of my early
Speaker:teachers. I loved school. And then as
Speaker:I moved on for high school, I
Speaker:loved education. So I wanted to learn more and
Speaker:hence my journey to do a bachelor's and then a master's and
Speaker:then a PhD. And so I wanted to study
Speaker:as long as I could, go as high as I could. And
Speaker:then I think five years of PhD ultimately got
Speaker:the realization that, okay, I've studied everything that I could
Speaker:and this was going to be a lifelong process. It doesn't have to be degrees, but
Speaker:I will be studying and learning all my life. But I
Speaker:don't think I want to do bench science as much. It's a
Speaker:very lonely field. And I came
Speaker:to the realization that I enjoy being in teams more.
Speaker:than doing my own research by the bench for years to
Speaker:come. And so I really moved right after my PhD into
Speaker:a postdoc and really moved. And back in the day in the
Speaker:1990s, that was a big deal. People did postdocs, people stayed in academia. You
Speaker:didn't move to industry. But I decided that I was going
Speaker:to move to industry and not do basic science or research
Speaker:and really jumped into project program management and
Speaker:have been teams. And then from there I moved to this step. So it's
Speaker:been a long journey, but my love for science, my love
Speaker:That's great. We hear a lot of awesome career journeys and none
Speaker:of them are linear. So I think that that's a real takeaway is,
Speaker:you know, there's a lot of things that we in our company is also like
Speaker:this. We are science adjacent, right? We're still very close to it, but we're not at the bench
Speaker:anymore. And there's so many career paths that can be like that. How
Speaker:did you end up then in business development? That does seem like a little bit
Speaker:of a shift from project management to business development. Can you walk us
Speaker:So I started again from my PhD where
Speaker:I was defending my own experiments and designing my own experiments
Speaker:to really a technical services scientist where I
Speaker:was defending other people's experiments and supporting them
Speaker:with their experiments. But there for a year really gave
Speaker:me an opportunity to see all technologies and all programs
Speaker:within the company. And then I picked one of the programs to become a program manager
Speaker:for that company. I was there for 10 years and that gave
Speaker:me a phenomenal opportunity to really take multiple
Speaker:ideas from early stage to launch. And,
Speaker:you know, I am talking research reagents, which were very quick.
Speaker:You could put them out there in six months to diagnostics, which
Speaker:took two to three years to put out there. And therapeutic, right?
Speaker:I was part of Sutent, which was just finishing
Speaker:its phase three clinical trial at Pfizer and was
Speaker:being submitted for a therapeutic product for renal cell
Speaker:carcinoma. So I was part of that team. So I really saw that trajectory. So
Speaker:I was very excited about all, I mean, you get to see the whole multitude
Speaker:of departments and functions that have to come together from marketing, to
Speaker:manufacturing, to R&D, to quantity, to everybody else
Speaker:to take a product from idea to commercial. And
Speaker:so that was all very exciting. Did that a lot, did it across multiple
Speaker:industries and multiple companies. And then I was
Speaker:fascinated with business development because you represent a
Speaker:company with the technology and you go make deals, deals were
Speaker:very fascinating for me. And I liked the
Speaker:ability to take all the science and represent the company
Speaker:for partnerships. And I was actually managing, I went from project
Speaker:management to doing Alliance management and Alliance manager
Speaker:does where I work closely with BD and once they signed the deal, they
Speaker:would put it with me and I was responsible for executing that
Speaker:deal. So that was my connection between project management to
Speaker:BD and Alliance management, you know, yeah, I
Speaker:started itching more and more to do the deals myself. Right.
Speaker:Rather than execute on a deal that was done. And so the
Speaker:And so now you are the chief business officer at A-Alpha Bio.
Speaker:Can you walk us through what like maybe a day in
Speaker:the life looks like in that job? I'm sure every day is different, but
Speaker:on a standard-ish day, how would you describe what you do?
Speaker:We wear multiple hats, I wear multiple hats at A
Speaker:Alpha Bio, and it's all about value creation
Speaker:for early stage companies. And you do that
Speaker:with science. And so I am very involved with the
Speaker:chief technology officer, with the R&D scientists to
Speaker:really understand what science we are doing, to explore where
Speaker:else we need to go. And so I'll sit in many R&D meetings
Speaker:to soak in the science, to give them feedback on what the
Speaker:market needs and where are we going down
Speaker:rabbit holes and what is very relevant. I also do
Speaker:a lot of outside like market intelligence, business intelligence
Speaker:to know what are my competitors doing? What deals were signed today?
Speaker:I certainly link it in quite a bit to understand all the science
Speaker:and all deals that I made. So that's market intelligence, business intelligence.
Speaker:And then I'm always connecting with my BD partners in
Speaker:pharma companies, small biotech companies. Maybe at any point
Speaker:in time, I'm looking at 40, 50 companies that
Speaker:I want to connect with. And so part of my day
Speaker:is also, you know, reaching out to some of these, responding to
Speaker:them. We may have multiple early stage discussions, which
Speaker:are always ongoing. So a lot of follow ups, right? I'm
Speaker:connecting with R&D to get new staff, connecting with my external
Speaker:BD folk. planning meetings, strategically planning
Speaker:areas and planning meetings. So I would say my
Speaker:day is usually meetings. I would say three, four
Speaker:meetings, a lot of thinking and strategizing for
Speaker:the future. Do that and lots of follow ups. Stuff that
Speaker:you know maybe they need to be pinned one more time they were supposed to get me
Speaker:something and right or planning for so I
Speaker:like it because it's actually I would say equal parts strategy
Speaker:and equal parts implementation that's awesome so.
Speaker:Can you give us a high-level overview of A-Alpha Bio? I
Speaker:am so enamored by the synthetic biospace. And so if you could tell
Speaker:So we are a spin-out of University of Washington Institute
Speaker:for Protein Design, and we have a wet lab platform and
Speaker:a dry lab platform. The wet lab is a yeast platform,
Speaker:a synthetic biology platform, where we can measure
Speaker:quantitatively millions of protein-protein interactions
Speaker:in a single experiment. And this is, again,
Speaker:the synthetic biology that allows you two weeks or
Speaker:less to look at such a large scale of protein interactions.
Speaker:And then we can take all that data, put it into machine learning,
Speaker:our dry lab platform to train machine learning
Speaker:models, validate them and use them to predict
Speaker:additional biologics or protein structures
Speaker:or protein sequences. So yeah, and you can do
Speaker:multiple iterations of the wet lab and the dry lab. And
Speaker:we have our own internal, and so we work in two spaces, two
Speaker:major areas. One is biologics, which includes antibodies,
Speaker:which includes immunocytokines, and we have an internal pipeline
Speaker:for immunocytokines. And we also work in
Speaker:another area called targeted protein degradation or TPD.
Speaker:And there we are doing a novel target discovery
Speaker:and that can be used for small molecules. So we have signed
Speaker:deals in both of these in molecular glues, as they
Speaker:And when you're doing deals and thinking about partnerships, so
Speaker:I'm assuming these are with mostly bigger companies. Are they with
Speaker:academic institutions? Kind of what's the makeup of your deals and
Speaker:Mostly bigger companies, bigger pharma companies, the
Speaker:deals we have done. We've also worked with academic or
Speaker:nonprofit institutions, like we have worked with the Bill and Melinda Gates
Speaker:Foundation. We are currently working with Lawrence Livermore
Speaker:National Laboratory, but Big Pharma. We are also very
Speaker:interested in working with biotechs and, you know, same-sized
Speaker:companies. I mean, they have synergistic complementary technologies
Speaker:and we can work together to co-develop something. So
Speaker:we are pretty open with the type of partners that
Speaker:So on a personal note, I'm really interested in your answer to
Speaker:this. One of the things that we talk about sometimes is networking and
Speaker:the importance of networking. And I feel as though a large portion of your job
Speaker:has to be just putting yourself out there and networking with
Speaker:a variety of stakeholders. Does this come naturally to
Speaker:you or is this a skill that you've honed over time or have you always just
Speaker:been like, I'm totally cool to meet everyone. It's fine. Because
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah. It comes naturally to me and
Speaker:which was one of the reasons I felt I couldn't sit
Speaker:at the bench and do my own research. I was more
Speaker:a people's person i wanted to be part of teams and so right
Speaker:after my phd it was a conscious decision because of my
Speaker:personality to move and be in such an extrovert and
Speaker:enjoy so much being in teams and companies so networking
Speaker:comes very naturally i get a lot of energy going into a
Speaker:room not knowing anyone and you know shaking hands introducing
Speaker:myself and making 15, 20, 30 friends, new
Speaker:contacts, and then following up with them. And my project management skills
Speaker:over 10 years have really taught me how you want follow
Speaker:up and get organized. So networking comes
Speaker:Well, I think that's a great way to phrase it though. You come out with like 15 to
Speaker:20 friends. That's like the best way to think about going into a networking event, but
Speaker:you're just like making new friends. Everyone thinks of it as like, oh, it's a business thing,
Speaker:And I really truly also believe in building relationships. You
Speaker:don't go into a room because you want to make a deal. You go in there to
Speaker:have fun and to make friends and to give and
Speaker:to want to help them. Right. And then along the process,
Speaker:there are so many contacts and we have been in touch for two, three
Speaker:years and nothing has come out from there. No deal has
Speaker:come out. And then now I also, you know, again,
Speaker:with being coached and, you know, I now find I
Speaker:really look to see how can I help these people, you know, maybe the 30 minute
Speaker:call or, you know, something else I can do, make, help
Speaker:them connect to somebody else. And who knows, you know, all good you
Speaker:Yeah, I think that's a fantastic point. We have a candidate education
Speaker:platform where we help candidates with either transitioning into biotech
Speaker:or getting that next job. And we did a little ask a recruiter event yesterday.
Speaker:It was all about networking. And so I have two follow
Speaker:on questions for that. I am not an extrovert. I'm actually
Speaker:quite introverted. The definition of that for people who maybe don't
Speaker:know is exactly what you said. You get energy from going into those rooms.
Speaker:I come out really drained. It's not that I don't enjoy myself, but it's
Speaker:a bit of an energy suck for me, but just like myself out to go into
Speaker:those rooms. It is hard for me still. And so I remember when
Speaker:I finished my PhD and I started this consulting firm, I knew I had to
Speaker:network. So my secret weapon was I joined
Speaker:Women in Bio and I volunteered to be a chair of one
Speaker:of the committees because that gave me almost a platform where
Speaker:I had to network, but I had a reason. I had an agenda, right? We were planning
Speaker:events and we were doing all these things, so I had to reach out. So I see
Speaker:that you're involved with Women in Bio too. It's a fantastic organization. Do
Speaker:you find that your networking is easier because of that and having that bit of a platform?
Speaker:Yeah, no, platforms are very, very helpful. And I love Women
Speaker:in Bio. You know, I'm the SoCal chair for the Executive Women
Speaker:in Bio. And I completely agree with you.
Speaker:I'm also part of Boost by BioBreak. There again, we come in
Speaker:with a common purpose, common theme, and
Speaker:networking is easy, much, much easy there. And,
Speaker:you know, similarly, when we go into, you know, receptions or whatever,
Speaker:Genentech, let's say, is bringing together you know, all their
Speaker:partners, everyone together, it becomes easier because you
Speaker:have a common life sciences talk. So certainly
Speaker:the platforms make it so much easier for networking. The
Speaker:big thing is to put yourself out there to become members of
Speaker:And there are just, they're fantastic. You do have to sort of live in
Speaker:a hub where for some of these, there are some online ones, but Women
Speaker:in Bio particularly, there's a lot of in-person events and they're sort of in those
Speaker:science hubs, but Fantastic group. And so
Speaker:my second follow on was about you're coming at
Speaker:this from a place of service, not from a place of what can
Speaker:this person do for me, but how can I be the facilitator? And
Speaker:we talked about that a bit yesterday too. So can you outline, you
Speaker:know, you said making connections for people, having calls with people,
Speaker:what are the sort of ways that you offer up your service during
Speaker:People know my trajectory and where I have gone. So I will
Speaker:have a lot of young women who are like, wow, I like the career transitions
Speaker:you have made. Can I talk to you for like 30 minutes, like
Speaker:more mentoring type of a thing. So career mentoring, whatever,
Speaker:I have done that. On the business side, people will usually say,
Speaker:all right, can you make a connection? I'm trying to reach so and so person in this
Speaker:company. And so, you know, that's a connection that I would do. On
Speaker:the strictly BD side, people will also say, you know, I'm trying
Speaker:to do this deal. And, you know, how do you navigate terms for
Speaker:this deal? And without revealing anything confidential, I can
Speaker:still have a good conversation with them. So multiple different
Speaker:areas in which, you know, you really can. I'm
Speaker:aligning with a lot of people now for women
Speaker:who are looking for board roles. And say, okay, how do
Speaker:you navigate that? And I have gotten from people who
Speaker:are way more experienced and veterans and, you
Speaker:know, and as I go through and understand this process, I
Speaker:am happy to share the same on that topic for women who
Speaker:are just joining their journey. So multiple
Speaker:ways that you can totally give something. You
Speaker:just have to talk for 10 minutes and you can figure out, all right, this is what's
Speaker:in common. And then open up a little bit more and you will
Speaker:know what they need. And then, you know, you focus on that. And
Speaker:certainly I'll always put myself out there and say, okay, this is what I
Speaker:am looking for. Or I'm not able to get access to so and so company
Speaker:or how did you do that? So it's. A little research to
Speaker:see, all right, where they have gone, how they have gone. LinkedIn is
Speaker:a beautiful resource. And then take it from there. The
Speaker:follow-ons are good, you know, take time for a coffee, happy
Speaker:hour, whatever we need to do. We're all busy, but hopefully more in-person
Speaker:If not, Zoom is always good. I love a good in-person meeting.
Speaker:I think I'm somewhere in between the two of you. I find a good event is
Speaker:like just rejuvenating enough. I can't do them all the time, but
Speaker:I do love getting out there to network a little bit. So I see so many
Speaker:people who have been or they are active on boards, and
Speaker:if someone wants to join a board, how do they go about that? What is
Speaker:It depends, public company boards versus private company boards. I
Speaker:can speak more for private company boards, but a lot of
Speaker:it really comes from your network, right? What skillsets you have,
Speaker:what are they looking for? What's the synergy? That is always
Speaker:important. And after that, they're looking for people within
Speaker:their network to see what value they can bring. So
Speaker:it's always your experience and what you have to offer.
Speaker:and how it is applicable to what they need.
Speaker:And, you know, as early stage companies move through their journey,
Speaker:even in the first three, four years, you know, their needs change dramatically.
Speaker:So at some point in time, maybe you're looking for connections for GetBC funding.
Speaker:Then you're looking for connections to get some partnerships done. You
Speaker:need connections or you need ability to go back and forth.
Speaker:You need a founding board to talk about your technology and
Speaker:what products you want to put, like, you know, your roadmap, your technology roadmap.
Speaker:So it depends on what the company needs and then they
Speaker:will put a skills matrix and say, okay, these are the skills
Speaker:that I am looking for. And then they look for board
Speaker:members and some use consultants and recruiters, but many a
Speaker:time from what I have heard, it's usually through your
Speaker:network. And again, your network can be, you know, your first level,
Speaker:second level, you know, you know, everybody within like three levels or four levels anyway.
Speaker:With that, how have the needs of boards changed today
Speaker:versus just a few years ago? I know we've gone through a lot of changes
Speaker:globally and also with funding. Now, what are you
Speaker:Boards certainly have changed, you know, certainly
Speaker:with the diversity. There is a lot of recognition for diversity and
Speaker:this is gender, age, ethnic groups, race,
Speaker:all of those. So definitely diversity wise i'm
Speaker:in public company boards have even mandated that they need so many
Speaker:women representatives and other diversity classes included
Speaker:for private company boards so there's enough research and
Speaker:enough studies out there to show that if you have a divorce board
Speaker:it's a more productive and efficient board. I see a huge increase
Speaker:also in independent board members. So you
Speaker:obviously have your company executors, your founders, co-founders who
Speaker:hold board seats, your investors who will hold board
Speaker:seats, and both of them have vested interests for what they want
Speaker:to do. And so there is a big role for independent board members
Speaker:to really bring in a complete outside perspective. And
Speaker:then the value of the board and
Speaker:you know how they can really bring the whole board
Speaker:governance from what I see and hear has
Speaker:been formalized a lot more right. Boards used
Speaker:to run for. meetings once every quarter
Speaker:or whatever, now they are more diligent. The expectations from
Speaker:board members is more. The way board meetings
Speaker:are run are different and very methodical and very
Speaker:efficient to get the maximum value out of it. So I believe because
Speaker:of diversity, because of independent board members and
Speaker:just the way board meetings are held, boards
Speaker:Kind of switching back into talking about sort of the more day-to-day aspects
Speaker:of your job. I'm curious about how you market a
Speaker:bioscience company when you are pitching to investors. Do
Speaker:you have any tips or tricks that you could share with everyone about
Speaker:some key things people should know about when they are ready to get to the point of selling
Speaker:Yes, it's all about the science, right? So it is, what's
Speaker:the technology? You may not have a product, right? You're too early to have a product,
Speaker:but what's the science? And it's all about the product and
Speaker:the market fit. So what is your product? You're hammered.
Speaker:And what are you going to solve? Right? And so the product market
Speaker:fit and showing that is super, super important for the investors. At
Speaker:the very earliest stages, at the seed round. This is
Speaker:my technology. Here is the competition. Here is how I'm better
Speaker:differentiated compared to the competition. And this is
Speaker:what I'm going to do. This is a problem in the world that I'm going to solve.
Speaker:Right. And I'm making a diagnostic that will, you
Speaker:know, detect something earlier or detect something at
Speaker:a different stage. Or I have a research technology that
Speaker:will enable all these big pharma companies to discover this
Speaker:or, you know, sooner or faster or something like that. So you
Speaker:need to have your value prop, right? Very, very clear.
Speaker:And the value prop will ride on your technology. It
Speaker:will ride on your differentiation and what problem you're
Speaker:going to solve. So I think those are the critical. And then
Speaker:after that, of course, how much money you're going to raise, how you're going to use
Speaker:that money, how long it's going to take you. Really a very good execution
Speaker:plan. And what point will you reach before you need
Speaker:more funding? What will we deliver? What milestones will
Speaker:you hit from a science perspective, you know, from taking
Speaker:product testing, whatever your milestones before you made the next
Speaker:round of funding. Investors do not want, and they want to see
Speaker:very crystal clear these things. They do not want
Speaker:to see markets where you say, oh, this market size is
Speaker:like a trillion people. They want grounded and
Speaker:well thought of, backed up by research, backed up
Speaker:by studies, backed up by data. So key
Speaker:slides, but what your science can do, how you're going
Speaker:to make it a product, what you're going to solve, how much money you
Speaker:need, and what you're going to do with the money. So
Speaker:deep, deep clarity. Deep clarity. Yeah. And
Speaker:you want to go multiple, multiple iterations. Your first one
Speaker:is never going to be the best one. I have known business plans
Speaker:and investor decks, which have started with a one idea and
Speaker:completely moved over upon discussing with a
Speaker:few investors because they were trying to solve a
Speaker:wrong problem. You know, your science hasn't changed, but what you
Speaker:were trying to, you know, direct it towards was not
Speaker:the best one. And upon feedback, consistent feedback, You know,
Speaker:what we were thinking was not really right. We got to do this. And
Speaker:then it immediately makes sense. And, you know, and so
Speaker:I would suggest going to a few investors that you do not, your very
Speaker:first slide decks to go to investors you don't expect to make deal.
Speaker:I wouldn't want to go to the ones that you are expecting because that
Speaker:Well, that's really good advice, though, to anyone listening to this. Like, don't be disheartened
Speaker:that your first ones are kind of not great, but also maybe don't pitch them to like
Speaker:I wouldn't say don't pitch it to your dream team and certainly don't
Speaker:be disappointed because you'll be kissing a lot of frogs.
Speaker:We've interviewed quite a few people who look at DEX from VC
Speaker:folks to consultants that work on the strategy side. And
Speaker:the universal complaint is that slide decks
Speaker:are pretty much always terrible when they start out. And it's so important because
Speaker:that's really the thing that has to tell your story. Yeah,
Speaker:you might get the luxury of standing up and telling your story alongside your
Speaker:deck, but a lot of the time it needs to stand alone. It needs to stand on
Speaker:And I would also say, and I know that's what co-founders that
Speaker:I work with at A Alpha Bio and also previous companies have,
Speaker:is Surround yourself with mentors, surround yourself with
Speaker:advisors, you know, scientific advisors, business advisors, legal
Speaker:advisors, any type of advisors that you can surround yourself
Speaker:because that will, it's such a steep learning curve
Speaker:and it is so worth it, right? Because you will continue,
Speaker:you'll learn a lot. And so I think advisors, I mean, I live and
Speaker:die by mentors and always my entire career.
Speaker:I have, I'm going to have two, three, up to six mentors at a
Speaker:When you talk about, you're gonna have to kiss some frogs and expect
Speaker:that the first ones aren't going to be great. I think the really important thing here
Speaker:is that you've had a really successful career and you've done some absolutely
Speaker:incredible things, but everyone does have some failures, right?
Speaker:I mean, it happens to the absolute best of us. So do you have any
Speaker:Yes, I think unless again there are epic failures
Speaker:maybe but most of the failures will teach you right
Speaker:you come out of it. I mean I have had places or
Speaker:roles that I wasn't super excited about and
Speaker:I hated it during the time but when I came out of it. I
Speaker:felt I would go back and do that again to
Speaker:learn what I learned and to better understand for myself what
Speaker:I like and what I don't like. Right. So I think anything is
Speaker:really failure, failure, but you make the best judgment at
Speaker:the time that you are in. But every failure teaches
Speaker:you so much more on how to navigate.
Speaker:You just have to go through it. That's what I tell my kids.
Speaker:You just have to go through it, come out on the other side, and
Speaker:That's right. Full of hard knocks, always.
Speaker:It's so true. So when you're thinking about collaborations
Speaker:and business partnerships and mentors and things like that, where
Speaker:are you thinking about getting those and what stage are you
Speaker:thinking about getting those mentors and collaborators in
Speaker:your startup journey? So if you have a really, really new startup, when's
Speaker:So you are starting from day one that you incorporated a
Speaker:company or even before. Right. So you are you have a technology coming
Speaker:out of academia. You are already looking at collaborators
Speaker:and partners. Now you haven't had a dedicated business development
Speaker:person at that time, but you as the co-founder, and I can say
Speaker:that for our co-founder and CEO who had the
Speaker:beady hat, and he continues to have the beady hat together with me at
Speaker:this time, but you are thinking collaborations and
Speaker:mentors even before you are thinking of incorporating the
Speaker:company. Then you need to decide how much
Speaker:is collaborations and VD part of your company strategy.
Speaker:Are you going 100% partnerships or
Speaker:are you doing internal development and part partnerships or
Speaker:are you not going to do partnerships and really focus on select therapeutics
Speaker:or products you want to build internally. And I'm talking more about a platform
Speaker:company. Then majority of the people will come in
Speaker:prior to a series A or right after a seed round, sometime
Speaker:between seed round and a series A. That's when
Speaker:a dedicated BD person can come. But BD efforts are
Speaker:starting way before you even started a company. Because BD collaborations
Speaker:will do a couple of things. One, they will de-risk. your platform, right?
Speaker:So they're doing one work. It's an outside party. They will validate your
Speaker:platform, right? They will give you the awareness you need. You
Speaker:can publish together, you can do press release. So they do so
Speaker:much that you could be drinking your own Kool-Aid for
Speaker:10 years, right? So that's what collaboration is. And of course, they
Speaker:bring in revenue, which is always good. So Beedi starts
Speaker:Yeah, that's really interesting. I don't think a lot of founders coming out of academia
Speaker:really are thinking in that way. So it's really good to hear that
Speaker:articulated in that way, because people think of business development
Speaker:as like a really late stage thing a lot of the time, but it's
Speaker:so true. You talked about alliance managers earlier on,
Speaker:and that is a career path that a lot of scientists don't really
Speaker:know about. But that sort of gets you exposure to that partnership aspect.
Speaker:More academics actually really should think about what are the partnership aspects
Speaker:That is so true because they really think if I do cool science,
Speaker:they will come. But that's not true. You know, you
Speaker:can do cool science, but you do have to talk about your science. You
Speaker:have to build those networks and those relationships before
Speaker:they will come. You have to wear the two hats. You have to keep doing
Speaker:your science as you know, we say, you know, you have to build
Speaker:your plane, you have to fly your plane, you have to sell your plane, got to do them
Speaker:Well, let's pull that thread though for anyone who's listening, who might be like,
Speaker:wow, that actually sounds really cool. Like I'm a scientist and I think business
Speaker:development sounds neat, but like, how do I get there? What would be the
Speaker:best steps for someone to maybe start exploring or to take if
Speaker:I love scientists going into B.D. and more and more so
Speaker:in life sciences, you would see most of the people in
Speaker:B.D. come from a science background. So I have a Ph.D. I
Speaker:have an MBA. I think I consider my Ph.D. more valuable than
Speaker:the MBA. And because I interact with scientists on
Speaker:both the sides, you know, in here, as I develop the value proposition on
Speaker:the other side, as I understand the needs of my partners. So
Speaker:for all scientists, it is to take your science and
Speaker:socialize that with potential collaborators. And this
Speaker:may be academic collaborators. These may be VCs. These may be pharma
Speaker:companies. There may be other biotech companies. There are so many ways to
Speaker:make a deal. But it all starts with you talking about your
Speaker:science and your ideas with the partner. and
Speaker:then understanding what they need. Many
Speaker:a time, the science we do comes from ideas or
Speaker:needs that the pharma partner want. You call it the voice of the
Speaker:customer. So it is super, super important for the scientists
Speaker:not only to do the science and communicate what
Speaker:they're looking to do with the outside world, but
Speaker:also to have those discussions to really understand what
Speaker:is it that the companies need, the collaborators need, And
Speaker:then see, oh, can I change something here to address
Speaker:that need? Right. And if I do that, can
Speaker:I make a partnership or a collaboration or a deal with this
Speaker:particular company? You have to go both ways. Super important.
Speaker:And as you're thinking about building your team internally, whether
Speaker:it's in BD or your adjacent verticals, are you
Speaker:looking for those scientists that are kind of up and coming? How
Speaker:Yes, I do like scientists. It's easier. They
Speaker:spend so many years. They know the science. It's easy for them, even
Speaker:if it's not the same field that they did their work in, for them to quickly pick
Speaker:up technology and science. But mostly I'm also looking
Speaker:for, do they have the drive? Do they have the, you know, fire on the belly? Currently
Speaker:I have alliance management that reports to me. I also have communications,
Speaker:scientific and marketing communications reporting to me. And both these
Speaker:teams are very driven in science and are
Speaker:Is Engel Fabio, are you fully remote or hybrid or are
Speaker:So we are based in Seattle and we
Speaker:have a large team that comes to work five days
Speaker:a week, you know, because they're involved in lab work and we
Speaker:have a portion of our company that does hybrid work. So
Speaker:many of them would come in at least three days a week. And
Speaker:usually Wednesdays are our day where pretty much the whole company comes
Speaker:together. We have lots of internal meetings, everything, happy
Speaker:hours and all of that happen on Wednesdays because majority
Speaker:of the team will be there on Wednesdays. And then we have few, a
Speaker:very small fraction of employees who are remote and
Speaker:they will come in at least twice a year, if not more. I
Speaker:love that we have two onsite events, one
Speaker:in January and one in July when we
Speaker:get entire company together for a whole week. And
Speaker:we celebrate, we strategize, we develop objectives.
Speaker:Oh, I love our culture here. We like to talk about communication on
Speaker:this show a little bit as well. And so you said your communication
Speaker:team reports into you, so that's kind of perfect. But with the teams
Speaker:that are hybrid, on-site, remote, all of those things, do you have
Speaker:any communication strategies that have worked particularly well for internal communications?
Speaker:Yeah. And again, we are very proud of the culture we are
Speaker:building at A Alpha and how we want to continue to
Speaker:maintain this culture. We have weekly all hands meeting. So,
Speaker:you know, our CEO will drive it and we go over our values.
Speaker:We give kudos to people when they want to give a shout
Speaker:out to somebody for living up some of the values. We have
Speaker:announcements for birthdays. We have any business updates that
Speaker:we want to do. Once a month we have objectives, how
Speaker:we are progressing across our company and department objectives.
Speaker:We call those OKR meetings. So we have the weekly meetings, we
Speaker:have the monthly business meetings. We also do
Speaker:social events to get everybody together, you know,
Speaker:and communicate happy hours once a month. Internal communication Slack
Speaker:is a great tool. We use that and we have so many channels and
Speaker:we, you know, as we grow so quickly, right. You know,
Speaker:we were like, I was employee number 15 or something like that two
Speaker:years ago and we have 50 people. So we have grown quickly.
Speaker:So the communication is very key and it's very intentional, right? You
Speaker:That's fantastic. So for investors, like I know we talked about being super
Speaker:clear and everything, but I guess one of the things is like, could you take us through
Speaker:kind of like what that sometimes looks like from start to finish? Like you
Speaker:do your initial pitch and then, you know, what happens from there?
Speaker:I think people, you know, we talk about a lot, but I don't think we provide a ton of
Speaker:clarity into like what really goes on behind the scenes when you're structuring a
Speaker:Yeah. So for a VC, for funding, you know,
Speaker:different from like a partnership deal, which are, which are different agreements, but
Speaker:you first need to know your plan, how much money you need. And
Speaker:this is down to putting your entire budget together. Let's say you're
Speaker:going to take 24 months to go from point A to point B, right.
Speaker:And you want money in point A and you'll get to point B. You
Speaker:really need to know, and this is called use of funds. And you really
Speaker:need to put a very detailed plan to know how
Speaker:much money you need and how you're going to spend it and
Speaker:where you're going to get. And so that is like your background Excel that
Speaker:drives the dollar value that you are looking to raise. And
Speaker:so you need to have that, you know, and then you put it
Speaker:down in deliverables and say, OK, I need so much money
Speaker:to get to these three milestones. And
Speaker:so you do your science, you talk about the market, you
Speaker:talk about how great you are from a market differentiation
Speaker:and all that piece. You talk where your competitors are and how you're
Speaker:good. Then when it comes to money, you have done
Speaker:your homework. to know, to keep your lights on,
Speaker:to everything, you know, your research budget, to
Speaker:how many people you're going to hire and what they're going to cost, what levels. It's
Speaker:a very, very detailed way by which you have estimated
Speaker:how much money you need. Obviously you're going to put some buffer
Speaker:to that because things change and then you get your
Speaker:number to say, I need so much money for me to get
Speaker:from point A to point B. And what I'm going to deliver to
Speaker:you, if you fund me with this, is I'm going to be at this stage. I'll
Speaker:have an alpha version, or I'll have a beta version, or I will sign
Speaker:two partnerships where they will have validated, you
Speaker:know, my technology, or I will have finished this animal studies,
Speaker:right, to take this candidates so much further. So
Speaker:depending on whichever area, be it diagnostics, research technologies, or
Speaker:therapeutics, there are very clear milestones
Speaker:that you need to move to, to know what you're going
Speaker:to do. And all investors know, because they are sitting in either one
Speaker:of these portals, right? They're either in funding platform and
Speaker:research technologies, or they're into diagnostics, or they're after therapeutics
Speaker:or they are about, you know, services or whatever it may be,
Speaker:they know exactly what this pipeline of
Speaker:events looks like. And you have to be as good there
Speaker:and speak their language. So if you say, I need five million dollars and
Speaker:It's really interesting. I think a lot of people graduate from their
Speaker:PhD and they have a great idea and they
Speaker:want to found a company, but what does that roadmap look like? And without
Speaker:experts to help you understand all
Speaker:of those different costs, what we see often is that there are
Speaker:some incubators that are attached to schools often, like MIT
Speaker:has a pretty well-known one and they'll give a bolus of funding, but not
Speaker:a lot of parameters around that. And so we've got first
Speaker:time founders sometimes that are a bit adrift and they think I have
Speaker:all this money and it's like, well, that's not very much money. We have to actually really
Speaker:plan out what is your next step and you need to have that in place. So I
Speaker:think experts, you know, like you and folks that can really understand
Speaker:how we craft this message, how do you get that budget, all
Speaker:of those things. That's so essential at the early stage. It is
Speaker:I'm proud of several universities who have commercial
Speaker:arms with amazing business advisors. I know UW does,
Speaker:right? Who can help you with that? They have programs and
Speaker:there's creative destruction labs who has multiple sites. I
Speaker:mean, I sit there as a business advisor. There are
Speaker:resources. You have to go out and, you know, seek
Speaker:many of these business advisors and take your Excel
Speaker:and then say, does it making sense? Is it making sense before you go to
Speaker:Yeah, it's such a path. It is, it is really interesting. And the,
Speaker:the number of hats you have to learn to wear as a biotech founder, it's
Speaker:It is amazing. Yeah, it is staggering. It's an amazing, amazing
Speaker:growth curve. I have a lot of respect. And a little bit
Speaker:of envy that I was never that co-founder.
Speaker:I sit right behind the co-founders always and I enjoy my
Speaker:role. I love my role. But I have so much respect for co-founders coming
Speaker:out of academia with their PhD thesis and
Speaker:Well, I'm curious, you had to talk about a couple of contributions that
Speaker:you're the most proud of and things that you think have just been the coolest things
Speaker:Yeah. A lot of it was, you know, I'm
Speaker:more excited about my work in early stage companies than
Speaker:at the Pfizer or the big life technologies. One
Speaker:of my very earlier companies was BD, huge company, but
Speaker:there was part of portfolio management where we went into
Speaker:a whole new area and wanted to launch like 250 research
Speaker:reagents. And so I'm very excited. This was many, many years
Speaker:ago. We scoured the literature, we made a deal
Speaker:to get access to those antibodies. They were very
Speaker:novel. We did the R&D we needed to do, put it
Speaker:into manufacturing production. That was all my project management role. And
Speaker:within six to nine months, we had 215 novel
Speaker:antibodies we put on the market. for research. This was for research used
Speaker:to enable pharma and all that. So that was one of my very earliest
Speaker:projects I still speak very fondly about. At
Speaker:Precision Nanosystems, where I was, I am very
Speaker:proud of being able to get about $40 million
Speaker:in funding from the government of Canada. And this was part of
Speaker:the COVID pandemic. Canada was looking
Speaker:for more you know, in-country establishment and to
Speaker:nurture technology. So we did two separate deals with
Speaker:the government of Canada. One to build a manufacturing facility. The
Speaker:other one was to move a particular technology and product forward.
Speaker:So I was very excited to be able to secure that funding. And at
Speaker:Alfa Bario, I'm very excited to have been able to do three
Speaker:big partnerships in this market environment with big pharma,
Speaker:Yeah, this is a tough market. I would definitely be proud of that too. Well,
Speaker:we have a few closing questions. So we always like
Speaker:to kind of bring the career question full circle. You've done
Speaker:some awesome things. And so what's left for you to accomplish?
Speaker:I love business development. I really do. I like working with co-founders,
Speaker:enabling technology, roadmap, strategy, and
Speaker:building company value. Love this. I don't think I'll ever go
Speaker:back to Big Pharma ever. To work. And going forward,
Speaker:I think I'm looking forward more to give. And as
Speaker:an advisor, right, as a mentor, I'm
Speaker:certainly interested in board service. right, for, again, early stage
Speaker:companies. So I think next journey, while I continue my
Speaker:work, I'm really looking for some board roles. And I can see
Speaker:myself there where I can really enable and impact so
Speaker:Well, everyone who listened to the show knows that this question is coming because
Speaker:we ask it to every person. It's my favorite question. What
Speaker:is your favorite book or a book that you think everyone should read? My
Speaker:I'm going to sell two books, one that I would like everybody to read, and
Speaker:the other one is my personal favorite, which is also a good book to
Speaker:read. The book I read this last year, and it is Let My
Speaker:People Go Surfing. And this is the book by Von
Speaker:Schwingart. I think he's the founder of Patagonia.
Speaker:I love the book. Loved the book and just his career
Speaker:trajectory and just the way a reluctant
Speaker:business person as they call him. And he just went
Speaker:on to make the biggest sustainable
Speaker:company from something he needed for himself as
Speaker:he wanted to go mountain climbing. And so phenomenal book,
Speaker:really, really loved how he passionate about adventure
Speaker:and what he wanted to do. And then he needed the tools, which nobody had. So
Speaker:he started a company to do it. Then he expanded for all
Speaker:the adventurous stuff that he liked to do and then go beyond and
Speaker:then made a massively profitable company and then donated
Speaker:it all to foundation and said, this is all for the good of earth.
Speaker:I am so impressed. I love that book and I've been following him
Speaker:since. So that's one book. The book that I really do
Speaker:recommend for everyone, which is also one of my personal favorites, it's
Speaker:called The Present. It's an old book. It's an easy
Speaker:read. I cannot even remember the name of the author, but you can look it up. It's just
Speaker:called The Present. It's a phenomenal book of
Speaker:how you want to think yourself about, you know, the past, the present,
Speaker:the future. So it's an easy read, like a 30 minute read, but
Speaker:it's a book I keep going back to every time I'm feeling no
Speaker:or anytime I want a little motivation. I
Speaker:know the whole book, but I still enjoy going
Speaker:through the book and just how beautifully it's written. So beautiful book.
Speaker:Oh, those are awesome suggestions. I haven't heard of either one of those and
Speaker:Where can people reach out to you if they want to learn more or
Speaker:I'm always on LinkedIn. It's my newspaper in the morning. Um,
Speaker:I live in San Diego. Uh, you know, my, the company is
Speaker:in Seattle, so I'm in all the networking thing,
Speaker:but easiest way is just hit me up on LinkedIn and I
Speaker:Awesome. Well, thank you so much. This was so much fun. I learned
