Molecule to Market: Inside the outsourcing space

Breathing life into high potential medicines

 

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Alok Tayi, Founder and CEO at Vibe Bio.

 

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Alok, covering:

 

• The personal story that motivated and inspired Alok to create a rare disease platform focused entirely on creating an ecosystem focused on high potential medicines.
• Lessons from ‘the grind’ of raising over $100m in capital, and why you need a ‘Minimal Viable Investor’ (MVI)
• The macro impact of Covid-19 in highlighting the importance of medicines - and why this is a time for optimism, innovation and technology in biotech.
• The catch-22 of inflection points for biotechs and how that impacts access to capital. And whether AI could play a pivotal role.
• How CDMOs and CROs need to evolve away from just the fee-for-service model to explore longer-term, partnership-led alternatives.

 

Alok has 15 years of experience as a scientist and 12 as a serial entrepreneur. After completing postdoctoral work at Harvard University with George Whitesides, Alok started two pharma SaaS companies, PreScouter and TetraScience, which employ several hundred people combined and have more than four hundred customers. He also launched and led the life sciences division of Egnyte, a cloud content governance company based in California, and grew the business to a 60-person team and eight-figure run rate.

 

Alok founded Vibe Bio after his daughter was hospitalized at birth and he learned first-hand that the biggest obstacle to developing treatments isn’t finding potential therapies — it’s funding them. Vibe Bio is helping patients in similar situations overcome that obstacle by scaling the development of treatments for rare disorders sustainably for the first time. He holds a B.S. from Cornell and a Ph.D. from Northwestern, both in Materials Science & Engineering.

 

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

 

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

 

Molecule to Market is on the move...

In this special episode of Molecule to Market, instead of going inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with your host, Raman Sehgal, you'll hear a special announcement about the show moving to Toronto!

The announcement reveals why our show sponsor, ramarketing is opening a new office in Canada and what this means for your favorite podcast and host.

Listen to the short episode to hear:

 

• About the drivers behind ramarketing's decision to establish a second office in North America
• Why the agency selected Toronto, or T'rono as the locals say
• Discover what the move means for Raman and his family, in addition to the ramarketing team and future talent acquisition
• The benefits of locating to one of the most diverse cities in the world
• How ramarketing and Molecule to Market plan to tap into the thriving life science ecosystem and 'Pill Hill' located in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA)

 

The announcement is a real milestone for ramarketing as a business and for Molecule to Market.

 

The show hopes the move will provide access to even more incredible guests! Giving our host access to more people to outreach and hopefully attracting new people - listeners, followers and guests.

 

So, from late August onwards, you'll be hearing from Molecule to Market in a new location. We'll keep our loyal listeners informed of how the move is going and what life is like for Raman, his family and our team in Toronto.

Until then....take care. Thank you for listening!

 

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues, and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

 

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international mark

 

Barbara’s journey into Biopharma

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Barbara Morgan, Global Vice-President of Pharma and Biotechnology at Kerry.

 

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Barbara, covering:

• Believing in herself and being brave enough to leave a company that felt like family in a job that she loved
• Why Pharma has proved itself to be indispensable, while the biopharma slowdown is just a blip
• The difference between mentors and sponsors, and why you need a blend of both
• Lessons for mastering M&A assessment and integration for prioritizing impact

 

Barbara Morgan is Global Vice-President, Pharma, and Biotechnology at Kerry. Prior to that she worked at LLS Health (part of Lubrizol) from 2014 until 2021 and was named General Manager in 2018.

 

With a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of Pennsylvania (US), Dr Morgan has more than 15 years of experience in the Life Science industry, covering pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, and medical devices.  She has published numerous articles in peer-reviewed journals and holds patents, including one on the treatment of cancer stem cells.

 

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues, and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

 

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

The CDMO CEO that doesn’t sugarcoat

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Marcel Velterop, CEO and Member of the Board at Primopus.

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Marcel, covering:

• Tips for technical people looking to transition and navigate into a commercial career path
• Why the CDMO business is not for the faint-hearted given the brutal focus on execution and results
• Insights from a lifetime of doing business in India and the key components of a successful tech transfer across multi-national sites
• How oligonucleotides have gone from niche to mainstream, and why an oligos platform presents a major new tool in the healthcare toolbox

Marcel holds a masters degree in chemical engineering from Delft University of Technology and started his career at DSM where he spent 14 years in various roles of growing responsibility. He then joined Dr Reddy’s Laboratories CPS, a CDMO, and subsequently worked for large Indian providers like Sai Life Sciences and Jubilant Biosys. He gained extensive international experience during his 4 years in the US and now over 15 years in Switzerland and aims to work with cultural differences globally and build productive collaborations.

He found purpose in the pharma industry and helping drive innovation as a service provider in the CDMO and CRO industries. During the Covid times, an opportunity presented itself to work for a large India CDMO, who had acquired a GMP API plant just outside Basel, Switzerland. As CEO of Primopus he is building a hybrid business model with complex RSMs and intermediates supplied out of the Swiss site with full backward integration from the large capacity available in India at its parent company.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

Wheeler CDMO Avengers...assemble!

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Jesse McCool, Co-Founder and CEO at Wheeler Bio.

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Jesse, covering:

• His journey from the Lonza bench to the boardroom as CEO of Cytovance CEO before becoming a founder
• Building a CDMO from a blank canvas via a pit stop of C19 testing
• What makes Oklahoma City an attractive place to do business with its mixed blend of life science, tech and biomanufacturing expertise
• How Wheeler’s hub and spoke satellite business model and platform is changing the CDMO business model

Jesse McCool is the Co-Founder and CEO of Wheeler Bio, an agile, small-batch biologics drug substance manufacturer focused on addressing unmet needs in the translational space. He has over 20 years of biologics development and manufacturing experience in biotech and CDMO environments. He previously held executive and technical positions at Cytovance Biologics, Lonza, Lallemand/Mascoma, Dartmouth, and Clean Harbors.

He joined Cytovance Biologics in 2013 to build out and lead the process development organization. The company was acquired by Hepalink in 2015 after which he was named Director, Chief Technical Officer and eventually, Chief Executive Officer. Jesse left Hepalink following the successful HK IPO in 2020 ($500MM USD) to join OKC-based venture studio, Echo Investment Capital, as Entrepreneur-In-Residence. He co-founded and launched Wheeler Bio in 2021.

He also serves on the Governor’s Council for Workforce and Economic Development (State Commerce) and works on numerous workforce development initiatives in the biomanufacturing sector. Jesse earned a Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and completed his postdoctoral work at Dartmouth (Hanover, NH) and Delft University of Technology (The Netherlands). In addition to his industry experience, Jesse is an established public speaker, researcher, and peer-reviewed journal author and contributor.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

The future is bright, the future is CGT

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Lung-I Cheng, Vice President of Cell & Gene Therapy at AmerisourceBergen.

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Lung-I, covering:

• His take on the different models of healthcare he has seen globally, and the value they do and don’t deliver to patients
• The access, and infrastructural challenges of CGT products and ways to bring the cost of goods down
• Why CGT is the therapy of the future... but why we must remember it’s not the only modality out there
• What the future looks like for CGT and exploring what happens when we have a treatment that can treat a lot more patients

Lung-I Cheng, Ph.D., is Vice President, Cell and Gene Therapy, leading AmerisourceBergen’s Cell and Gene Therapy (CGT) service line. In his role, he advances AmerisourceBergen’s CGT strategy with a focus on expanding the company’s portfolio of services to better support CGT innovators throughout the commercialization journey.

Before joining AmerisourceBergen, he spent a decade in biopharma, most recently serving as the head of Global Value & Access for Cell Therapies, Pipeline, and Business Development at Takeda.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

The biopharma boss on a mission against mental health disorders

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Shawn Singh, Chief Executive Officer and Director at Vistagen Therapeutics.

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Shawn, covering:

• What life is like running a public company and how that is impacted depending upon the season of the capital markets
• The ups, downs and pivots of a biopharmaceutical company that’s led it down a mission of transforming the treatment landscape for individuals living with anxiety, depression, and other central nervous system (CNS) disorders
• How the pandemic has magnified mental health issues and their prevalence among young people, and why finding a radically social transformative treatment is needed
• Why collaboration is key when developing several drug candidates and how partnerships can happen at any stage of the lifecycle
• His views on CROs, CDMOs, what is essential to outsource in the vendor universe... and the most critical asset to a biotech boss

Shawn is an experienced public company Chief Executive Officer and Director. He has over 30 years of experience working with private and public biotechnology, medical device, and pharmaceutical companies, a venture capital firm, and a profitable contract research and development organization (CRO), serving in numerous senior management roles.

He’s an attorney and a member of the California State Bar with a Juris Doctor from the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

From semiconductors to life sciences

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Wayne Woodard, CEO at Argonaut Manufacturing Services.

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Wayne, covering:

• How a career in the famously outsourced semiconductor industry benefited his route into the outsourced life science space
• The basic thesis that led to the start-up of Argonaut and the deliberate intention to ‘skate to where the puck will be’
• Wayne’s aim (and achievement) of creating something special that would also help people and pay forward
• Key considerations and benefits of being located on the West Coast of the USA... including wine

With 35 years of management experience in operations, supply chain and general management, Wayne Woodard’s primary focus (in three different industries) has been on building global operations capabilities with particular emphasis on working with external manufacturing services companies.

Before founding Argonaut, Wayne most recently worked at Thermo Fisher/Life Technologies through its Ion Torrent acquisition. He previously worked at Affymetrix, Electroglas and Ridge Technologies. Wayne began his career in manufacturing at Sun Microsystems. Wayne focuses intensely on execution and detail, which is why he also bottles his own wine.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

The CRO scientist turned entrepreneur

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Richard Weaver, Founder and Managing Director at Drug Discovery Solutions.

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Richard, covering:

• How his curiosity to learn at AZ led him to realizing he was an entrepreneur
• The opportunistic start-up story and impressive growth journey of XenoGesis up to the eventual, successful sale to Sygnature Discovery in 2020
• Lessons learned and milestone moments of a scientific entrepreneur
• Why biotechs are here to stay... outsourcing is here to stay... but why offshoring is not

Richard is Founder and Managing Director of Drug Discovery Solutions Limited. Previously CEO and founder of XenoGesis, he grew and led the successful sale of the business to Sygnature Discovery in 2020. Prior to that, he spent 14 years at AstraZeneca.

He is an expert of all aspects of R&D including Due Diligence of companies/assets. Specialist in Drug Metabolism & Pharmacokinetics (DMPK) from Hit Identification (HI) to Candidate Drug (CD) nomination and pre-clinical development.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.

CDMO poacher turned biotech gamekeeper

In this episode of Molecule to Market, you’ll go inside the outsourcing space of the global drug development sector with Vishnu Dwadasi, Director of Manufacturing at Ashvattha Therapeutics Inc.

 

Your host, Raman Sehgal, discusses the pharmaceutical and biotechnology supply chain with Vishnu, covering:

• Lessons learned from 15 years in CDMOs and consulting, before joining a start-up drug development company
• What he’s learned from working with and managing CDMOs all over the world
• Why many CDMOs are behind the eight-ball... fancy marketing meets chaotic operations
• The challenge of scaling up through phases as a drug sponsor, and the evolving needs when it comes to outsourcing
• Major frustrations as a client in a post-covid world and the one area every CDMO needs to invest in moving forward

 

Vishnu Dwadasi is currently a Director of Manufacturing at a biopharmaceutical start-up company, Ashvattha Therapeutics, leading drug programs from pre-clinical to commercialization.

Vishnu brings over a decade of experience in life sciences with a unique background in pharmaceutical operations, consulting, and business development. He has developed extensive experience shepherding complex drug development programs from early clinical development to full-scale commercial manufacturing and distribution. Along with his drug development experience, Vishnu has gained expertise in operations and implementing technology solutions for life sciences companies.

Vishnu earned an MBA from Duke University and a B.S. in Health Sciences from Purdue University.

Please subscribe, tell your industry colleagues and join us in celebrating and promoting the value and importance of the global life science outsourcing space. We’d also appreciate a positive rating!

Molecule to Market is sponsored and funded by ramarketing, an international marketing, design, digital and content agency helping companies differentiate, get noticed and grow in life sciences.