By Dennis Ford, Founder and CEO of Life Science Nation, Creator of the RESI Conference Series
For the past ten years, Life Science Nation (LSN) has built a global partnering platform that matches scientist-entrepreneurs and fundraising CEOs with capital, licensing, and product collaboration partners. In that time, LSN has learned so much about what makes a compelling fit for our buy-side partners. I have had discussions with hundreds of investors. I always want to understand how their investment theme of seeking early-stage technology assets is balanced with the risk of going early. Unsurprisingly, it’s complicated, but it typically revolves around focusing on key attributes of the company, the science, the management team, key milestones already achieved, and the all-important data that supports that the technology is heading in the right direction.
Similarly, I have developed my own set of attributes that I personally look for when I meet the companies that are referred to me through LSN’s relationship with regional tech hubs, incubators, and accelerators or national government and state life science agencies. These are what I look for:
- The Founding Scientist – Is there a scientist with a long lineage with the key science and the technology assets inside the company? A lot of the “new” technologies are actually the latest iteration of technologies that have been worked on for decades. When the scientist that is associated with that technology is still involved either as CTO, advisory or board compacity, that helps de-risk the opportunity. Having the world-renowned expert onboard and that thread of historical continuity provides not only perspective, but credence to the validation and the translating of the technology. Even if the assets are not that old, a thorough comprehension of the history, context, and potential to show future partners that the technology is in the hands of leadership with an appropriate understanding and appreciation of what it is capable of.
- The CEO – There are a few categories of CEO that I see in many of these startups. Experience matters and which side of the house the startup CEO has been on in the past matters and will affect how the company addresses the challenges that will surface along the startup journey. Personally, I have an affinity for the CEOs who were mid-level executives in big drug or device companies, and who were responsible for managing and getting successful products out the door in the past. It is even better when one or more of those products was a blockbuster. This is the type of CEO that has been-there-done-that in a corporate play and now wants to take all that knowledge, expertise, and leverage it in a new startup. I then ask myself, “Can this CEO listen? Is he/she coachable with an ability to learn quickly and discern, accept, and apply sound feedback?”
- Management Team – I like a diverse management team with similar experience as described above that augments and complements the CEO. A CEO should not surround themselves with a team that closely resembles their own strength and skillset. A savvy CEO will build a team with relevant experience and together possess expertise in how the game is played. They understand from past corporate experience when to hold them, when to fold them, and when to pivot. A diverse professional team that has seen success in the past and now wants to take their startup to the big leagues will generate traction and get their exit.
- Milestones and Data – Show a cogent well-thought-out plan based on hitting realistic achievable milestones that will produce compelling, validating data to show that the product is on the right path and going in the right direction. CEOs and their teams gain credibility when they present this aspect honestly and correctly, and when they are not coordinated, they lose credibility, and thus a chance for partnerships. Having realistic milestones that will produce compelling validating data is crucial to partnering.
- Entrepreneurial Agency – I have been talking about entrepreneurial agency for a while now. It’s hard to describe, but you know it when you see it. It’s the vibe you get, the confidence that is exuded, the passion, the professionalism, the unbridled desire, and determination. Entrepreneurial agency gives a company mojo which, in turn, creates positive propulsion forward. I mentioned that I like to see seasoned CEOs with experience in large enterprises that are now leading startups and taking their shot. However, there remain many seats at the table for the young, dynamic CEO that has followed their passion and their love for finding a scientific solution for an unmet medical need and wants to impact the healthcare arena. There are plenty of both types of CEOs in the early-stage arena, and that is driving this golden age of life science that we are all living in.
Drum Roll Please: My companies to Watch in 2024,
Cell and tissue culture has been performed the same way for 60 years, even though this process is key for almost all segments of life science research and delivery of medicine. Thrive Bioscience’s automation of cell and tissue culture is doing for cell biology what sequencing did for genomics — providing extensive amounts of previously unavailable data and images that are comparable and actionable. Thrive has booked $13 million of orders in the last nine months, selling its family of instruments and software primarily to pharma/biotech, CROs, and medical labs. The Thrive platform vastly improves imaging, analytics, and automation capabilities that significantly improves research, medical and bioprocessing fields that create, develop, and deliver new drugs, devices, and diagnostics products to the marketplace.
FlexPerc has revolutionized the tumor treatment process with AI and robotic technology, which will be a game changer not only for the patients but will become the standard of care and a first-line treatment for lung cancer tumors needing ablation, biopsies or drug delivery. FlexPerc’s minimally invasive platform comprises of an AI-based treatment planning software, a flexible ablation device, and an interventional robotic system. This product heralds the dawning of a new age of precision, autonomous cancer intervention tools that will drastically change the surgical landscape.
Ternalys‘ novel SAGUARO platform provides a simple yet elegant way to simultaneously deliver multiple microRNAs on a biologically flexible scaffold (a “microRNA construct”), replenishing cancer cells with microRNAs that are present in normal cells and thereby reversing the defensive epigenetic changes. In our work to date, we have demonstrated the ability to synergistically enhance existing therapies and, by doing so, potentially alter the outcomes for many intractable cancers. Ternalys’ lead compound, TT-003, is focused on the difficult and highly underserved area of glioblastoma. We believe that TT-003 has the potential to progress rapidly into clinical development and provide meaningful clinical results because of its unique capability as “miRNA replacement therapy” for multiple miRNAs.
CARI Health is developing a wearable remote medication monitor that enables personalized dosing and adherence monitoring to increase medication adherence. The platform monitors medications in the interstitial fluid in real time via a novel, patent pending electrochemical sensor. The sensor can detect many medications, but CARI will prove the platform capability first with methadone, a medication used to treat opioid addiction.
Cardathea’s non-invasive, electric field imaging system helps cardiologists more quickly and accurately implant cardiac pacemaker “leads,” saving procedure time and improving clinical outcomes. In the U.S. alone, physicians implant ~16,000 pacemakers and ~12,500 ICDs each month. By enabling the broad adoption of cardiac conduction system pacing, our system would enable significant market share gains by an acquiring cardiac pacing system company. The pacemaker system market is $4.2B WW.
BST is a biotech startup dedicated to addressing the pressing global brain disease crisis. At BST, we are developing an innovative AI-powered human brain organoid platform to develop groundbreaking therapies that halt, prevent, or reverse synaptic network dysfunction and neurodegeneration. The challenges of Central Nervous System (CNS) drug discovery are formidable, marked by an incomplete understanding of the diverse nature of brain disease biology and the absence of reliable animal models that accurately predict human efficacy. To overcome these challenges, we are developing a CNS drug discovery engine by applying a precision medicine approach focused on human genetics, human brain organoids, clinically translatable screening endpoints, advanced data analytics, and network medicine.
Prapela is an award winning pediatric medical device startup working with clinicians to help improve the treatment of newborns with specific medical conditions – especially those where breathing and heart rate are a concern. Over a decade ago, clinicians and scientists developed a unique vibrating pad to help newborns breathe, relax and sleep. At Prapela, we’re working to make this breakthrough available to help infants and their caregivers everywhere. Our extremely gentle vibration moves randomly within a very narrow range of up & down movement and speed. It’s based on a field of science called Stochastic Resonance which explains that biological processes (like breathing and heart rate) can be improved with random stimulation. For more information, visit prapela.com
Biomark Ocology is a translationally enabled cancer therapeutics company. We are developing potential first-in-class medicines for solid tumor indications with mechanisms of action and target validation focused on whole systems biology. We believe that this approach, akin to the discovery of immune checkpoint inhibition targets, will enable the next step-function change in solid tumor efficacy and move previously overlooked but valuable targets forward. To derisk these programs, we are developing a multi-omics predictive biomarker platform measuring >1000 plasma biomarkers. We use machine learning cluster analysis to find systemic differences in responders and nonresponders in a heterogenous patient population. This will enable host-based predictive biomarkers to complement tumor-based strategies to select the right cancer drug for the right patient.
Convergence Medical Pty is a Brisbane based medical device company, focused on the advancing arthroscopy with design and development of the world’s first arthroscopic robot (the V01 – Arthroscopic Surgical Robot). We exist to address the significant problems in arthroscopic surgery, improving the lives of the 50 million patients treated every year and the 30 thousand surgeons who perform these operations. The V01 is developed to change practice by providing ridged stability and robotic precision, power by an immersive and intuitive interface making operations simpler and more efficient. These innovations are designed to help the 70% of surgeons who perform these procedures and regularly experience significant muscular skeletal pain, the 30% of surgeons forced to retire early, the third of surgeons that state they don’t feel confident with their abilities and the 40% of patients which have observable damage during an operation.
It all started in nature with bio-inspiration from an amazing marine animal known as the Sandcastle Worm. Headquartered in Lowell, the company includes an extensive team of scientists, engineers, and clinicians who have reverse engineered a mineral-organic compound into a patented bioadhesive with an extensive platform of bone repair applications. A MassChallenge start-up accelerator alum, RevBio has won over 10 grants, received multiple patents, and is conducting its first-in-human clinical trial on its biomimetic bone adhesive.
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