Much of the attention of the biotech industry has been focused on the city of Boston this week as the annual BIO International Convention hit town. 

BIO is the world’s largest partnering conference for the biopharma industry and thousands of innovators, out-licensors, venture capitalists, top pharma dealmakers, thought leaders and more than a few politicians gathered for three days of meetings, presentations, and networking.

In this week’s episode we meet three innovators on the floor in Boston and find out what their BIO experience has been like, how their partnering meetings have progressed, what’s surprised them, and how it feels to be in the middle of the biggest biopharma conference of the year.

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This week’s episode is brought to you by Inpart.

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0:00  The ‘Beyond Biotech’ BIO International Convention Special

01:58   Purespring Therapeutics CEO Haseeb Ahmad

14:10   Inpart Chief Business Officer Patrick Speedie

25:44  Newbiologix CEO Igor Fisch

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• The hottest biotech companies in the Boston area
• Nine tips to succeed in pharma-biotech partnerships
• The ABC of biotech partnerships

What are the most interesting questions in biotech, and is it even possible to find answers to those questions?

Alex Telford is the co-founder of Convoke and a biotech blogger from the San Francisco Bay Area. His blog post, 'Some questions about biotech that I find interesting' provoked conversations online as readers engaged with questions about topics as diverse as the impacts of regulation, the role of serendipity in drug discovery, clinical trial failure rates, and the best structure for governing large pharmaceutical companies companies.

In this episode Alex explains the work he is doing at Convoke before opening the door to his insatiable curiosity about the biotech industry.

01:17               Introducing Alex Telford

04:28              The business of biotech

09:02              Convoke and its mission

14:21               ‘Some questions about biotech that I find interesting’

16:57               Why founders should be writing and blogging

18:44               Generating good questions about biotech

20:50              AI and its role in drug discovery

26:21               Will AI mean the end of serendipitous drug discovery?

28:15               Regulatory challenges for biotech

34:17               Is the FDA a net positive or net negative for the industry?

36:56              The unanswerable questions in biotech

39:00              Digital twins in biotechnology

42:15               The next interesting questions in biotech

Interested in being a sponsor of an episode of our podcast? Discover how you can get involved here! 

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• 12 AI drug discovery companies you should know about
• Does the FDA need to tighten its grip on drug trials in the U.S.?
• 2025 predictions: Which trends are set to shape the biotech industry this year?

When biotechs start fundraising they regularly turn to the venture capital market seeking investment. The pool of VC money can be large, and part of that pool is corporate venture capital. Backed by firms keen to identify the next big thing in biotechnology, corporate VC money can be an attractive way for biotechs to raise funds privately while benefiting from the support and expertise of corporate supporters.

This week I talked with Paolo Di Giorgio and Regina Hodits of Angelini Ventures, the corporate VC arm of Angelini Industries, itself the parent company of Angelini Pharma. Paolo and Regina lay out their perspective on the current fundraising landscape, identify the trends and opportunities for innovative biotechs in Europe, and walk me though the biggest threats to the biotech investment market they see on the near horizon.

01:15               Introducing Paolo Di Giorgio

04:00               Introducing Regine Hodits

05:31               The mission of Angelini Ventures

09:55               Focus areas and investments in early stage science

14:30               The state of venture capital investment in biotech in 2025

17:48               Why biotechs should favor corporate venture capital

20:43               Why networking and expertise matter in fundraising

26:05               The therapeutic areas and modalities that are hot right now

29:19               Geographic focus for corporate venture capital

33:28               Threats on the horizon

36:36               What keeps a corporate VC investor up at night?

40:13               Keep in touch with Angelini Ventures

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Biotechnology has always been a dynamic domain, but the world of finance that provides the fuel for the fire is just as vibrant. Trying to predict where the market for biotech investment is heading is always risky but for experts like Baker McKenzie’s Roel Meers, understanding where the market is moving is where he eats.

I spoke to Roel this week to unpack just where biotech funding stands in Q2 2025, to get a feel for the sorts of M&As, IPOs, and licensing deals we should be looking for in the second half of the year. We also talk about some alternative financing options for innovators and early-stage firms.

01:09                      Introducing Roel Meers

02:18                     Corporate finance and the life sciences

04:53                      Brussels, Europe, and beyond: Baker McKenzie’s global footprint

06:21                      Navigating life science regulations and regulators

10:33                      De-risking biotech investments in uncertain times

11:57                      How investors are minimizing risk in 2025

13:35                      Funding trends for biotechs in emerging hubs, including Benelux

15:58                      The deal types that will dominate 2025

17:35                      The therapeutic areas where deals are being done

19:16                      Trends in biotech in Europe, in North America, and in the Asia-Pacific

20:36                      Macroeconomics and biotechnology finance

22:54                      De-risking deals by lowering upfronts, increasing milestones

26:38                      What to consider when choosing alternative financing options

30:35                      When should biotechs bring in outside finance experts

33:47                      Looking beyond 2025 – what’s coming, and why

36:38                      How European biotechs can position themselves for funding success

Interested in being a sponsor of an episode of our podcast? Discover how you can get involved here! 

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• 2025 biotech funding tracker: recent highlights
• The ABC of biotech startup funding
• Top biotech grants and campaigns

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is already changing how people research, communicate, and interact, but its biggest impacts on biotech are still to come.

Cradle is a Dutch-Swiss biotech startup founded in 2021 that has developed a web-based software platform leveraging GenAI to accelerate protein design and optimization, aiding scientists in biotechnology R&D. Cradle’s technology integrates AI with wet lab experimentation, doubling the speed of most projects compared to industry benchmarks.

In this episode I talk to Cradle co-founder Elise de Reus to discover how their software platform is putting the ‘tech’ into biotech, and learn how some of the biggest names in pharma R&D are coming to rely on Cradle to accelerate their experimentation and get therapies to patients faster. 

01:30                      A passion for biotech from a young age

03:20                     First experiences in the industry

07:23                      Cradle and its mission

09:08                     Generative AI at Cradle

10:27                      Partnering and collaborations

13:37                      Taking generative AI into the wet lab

14:43                      A techbio company, not a biotech company

17:36                      “Photoshop for proteins”

18:29                      Use case: animal free food

20:17                      Use case: medicines

23:56                      Use case: sustainable materials

25:12                      The Cradle business model

28:17                      Technical challenges

29:48                      Regulatory challenges

31:44                      Where AI will have the greatest impact

33:29                      The most exciting things to come

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• 12 AI drug discovery companies you should know about
• How AI is shaping clinical research and trials

There are cell therapies, gene therapies, and biologics – and then there is Immusoft. 

Immusoft sits at the nexus point of some of the most innovative approaches in biopharma, and their Immune System Programming platform is unique in its capacity to address the rare disease, MPS I. 

This week we talk with Immusoft CEO Sean Ainsworth to learn more about his journey in biotechnology, the work that Immusoft is doing in B-cell reprogramming and unpack some of the positive results that the company recently shared at the WORLD Symposium.

01:08                      Early interests in biotechnology

03:21                      First experiences in biotech entrepreneurship

04:29                      Startup exits and liquidity events

07:32                      Influences and mentors

08:43                      Immusoft and its mission

09:28                      Programming B-cells

13:08                      Disease targets

14:55                      Encountering and overcoming technical challenges

15:53                      MPS I

17:38                      Differentiation for MPS I patients

19:42                      WORLD Symposium 2025

20:23                      What’s next in the clinic

21:25                      Urgency vs safety 

24:26                      At the nexus of cell therapy, gene therapy, and biologics

27:20                      Manufacturing, scaling, and funding

30:31                      Next on the horizon for Immusoft

Interested in being a sponsor of an episode of our podcast? Discover how you can get involved here! 

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• Rare Disease Day: seven drugs awaiting approval in 2025
• 10 biotech companies making a difference in rare diseases

Flagship Pioneering doesn't go out to find the next big thing in biotech when investing their billions in fund capital - instead, they take a different route.

Flagship Pioneering has founded more than 100 companies in the life sciences worth in total an estimated $75 billion. With a proven model for biotech startup success and a culture designed to surface new and interesting ideas, Flagship offers a different approach to biotech funding that is paying off time and again.

In this episode I talk with Lovisa Afzelius, a General Partner at Flagship, uncover the ways in which Flagship is shaking up the biotech funding model, and come to understand the reasons why others will have a hard time imitating its success.

This episode is brought to you by Jubilant Biosys.

01:52                      Meet Lovisa Afzelius

03:37                      Learning lessons in big pharma

04:56                      From top pharma to startup biotech

07:23                      Two different worlds and ways of thinking

08:29                      Flagship Pioneering

13:39                      Finding the right people

18:13                      Deploying capital to create value

21:06                      Expanding into new markets

21:55                      How does the Flagship model identify disruptors so well?

24:20                      Why don’t others emulate the Flagship model?

25:36                      Building a culture of ‘yes, and…’

27:47                      Learning from the companies that don’t succeed

30:49                      Artificial intelligence and biology

35:19                      Lessons from business that never found market fit

37:29                      The future for Flagship

39:55                      The importance of diversity in biotech

Interested in being a sponsor of an episode of our podcast? Discover how you can get involved here! 

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To dive deeper into the topic:

• The ABC of biotech startup funding
• Meet the ‘biotech mafia’: how specialized biotech VC firms are dominating industry funding once again
• 2025 biotech funding tracker: recent highlights

Are TCR-NK treatments the next big thing in cell therapies for cancer patients?

As biotechs and pharma companies continue to innovate to address patient needs in oncology, T-cell receptor therapies, or TCR-Ts, are attracting significant interest and investment. There are already some promising results for TCR-Ts tackling solid tumors – but one Norwegian biotech is taking a slightly different track.

This week, we sit down with Namir Hassan, CEO of Zelluna, a company with a mission to eliminate solid cancers by pioneering the development of T cell receptor guided natural killer, or TCR-NK, cell therapies.

01:45                      Introducing Namir Hassan

03:37                      Working at Immunocore

04:40                      Lessons learned

06:56                      Joining Zelluna as CSO

08:44                      Becoming Zelluna CEO

10:20                      Taking a biotech company public

12:54                      TCR-T and TCR-NK therapies

15:30                      Targets for TCR-NK therapies

16:38                      Comparing TCR-NK to alternatives

20:16                      Early success

21:58                      An off-the-shelf-solution for cancer patients

24:16                      Manufacturing and scaling

25:13                      Partnering with top pharma, accelerating innovation

27:05                      Milestones ahead for Zelluna

28:52                      The landscape of TCR therapies in oncology

31:38                      A final word

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• Future of cancer treatment: what will therapy look like in 2034?
• Trends in cancer therapeutics to look forward to in 2025
• Oncology R&D trends and breakthrough innovations

AI is driving innovation across industries, including biotech, but where is its influence felt most and what opportunities for future impact are emerging?

David del Bourgo is the co-founder and CEO of WhiteLab Genomics, an innovative biotech that is leveraging the power of AI to accelerate drug discovery and development from its Paris, Boston, and Montreal bases. In this episode he explains how WhiteLab uses AI technologies to identify targets and engineer vectors, but also offers a wider view of how and where AI is impacting the biotech industry generally.

01:04               Introducing David del Bourgo

04:06               The WhiteLab Genomics mission

10:54               AI in biotech: what’s working now

14:07               AI in biotech: emerging applications

15:58               Regulating AI in biotech and in general

17:21               Acceleration and cost savings thanks to AI

19:09               AI’s impact on accuracy and precision

21:07               The trade-off with AI in biotech

22:38               Why top pharma companies aren’t building their own AI tools

24:43               AI and biomanufacturing

26:58               AI in biotech and pharma operations

28:40               The next impacts of AI in biotech

30:38               Accelerating regulatory review with AI

32:24               Emerging AI techniques in biotech

33:59               The pace of AI innovation

35:21               The next challenge for AI in biotech

36:10               A word for the AI skeptics 

Interested in being a sponsor of an episode of our podcast? Discover how you can get involved here! 

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To dive deeper into the topic: 

• 12 AI drug discovery companies you should know about
• The AI boom in cancer: Game-changer or just hype?
• Are we in an AI bubble? Biotech AI startups’ value plummet and leads to restructuration

From llamas and camels to humans worldwide. Nanobodies are enjoying success in the clinic and experts are hailing these camelid-derived biologics as one of the next big things in immunotherapy.

Kristian Reich is co-founder and CSO of MoonLake Immunotherapeutics. After a long and distinguished career as a clinician and researcher, Kristian helped to launch MoonLake in 2021 and quickly helped move their lead candidate to the clinic. Now, on the verge of Phase III trials, he joins 'Beyond Biotech' to talk nanobodies, innovation, serendipitous science, and the power that comes from never stopping to dream.

01:04               Meet Kristian Reich

05:26               Excited by the science of nanobodies

07:13               MoonLake’s mission

13:12               Milestones at MoonLake

15:24               Introduction to nanobodies

17:55               Serendipitous science

19:46               How nanobodies work

23:18               Global prevelance of immune conditions

24:31               The impact on patients

27:09               Nanobodies in the clinic

31:19               Manufacturing challenges, regulatory challenges

34:04               Working with top pharma

35:55               The future of nanobodies

37:42               The future of MoonLake

39:10               Don’t stop dreaming

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