Careers in Discovery

"It's not success that drives the cohesion of a team, it's facing a challenge together and having a shared commitment to solving that challenge that really builds the relationships. Once you see how a person faces difficulty you can understand them much better - that understanding builds trust and a sense that you're in it together. That then drives success."

Lisa Patel is the CEO of Istesso, a company striding into the unknown frontiers of immunometabolism to discovery new treatments for autoimmune conditions.

Lisa joined us to talk about her career so far, what it's really like moving from big Pharma into a startup, and the dynamics of high-performance teams.

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"I'm still learning....it's a steep learning curve, especially since my training is all in science. When you become a CEO, it's not just about the science or good data, but about selling your vision, being inspirational and telling the story of why you're doing what you're doing."

Bakul Gupta is the CEO of ImmTune Therapies, a Biotech company pioneering in vivo generation of cell and gene therapies.

Bakul joined us to talk about her career to date, tackling the affordability problem of advanced medicines, the challenges of business development during a pandemic and why who you sit next to might just change the course of your career.

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"The pandemic hit and I found myself stuck back in my childhood room in Lisbon, and I thought, why not [start a company]? Then I realised that it had legs, I was really enjoying it and I could see it being successful, so I fully immersed myself in it."

Pedro Correia de Sampaio is the CEO of Neobe Therapeutics, a company engineering biologics to treat immunologically cold tumours.

Pedro talked to us about his work, his time working in one of the world's leading cancer centres, why you shouldn't start fundraising too early and not being afraid of sharing your ideas with the world.

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"It's one thing having an idea, but you've got to be able to make it and you've got to be able to sell it."

Just one extract from a wealth of sound advice offered by Ian Pike, Chief Scientific Officer at Proteome Sciences, on the Careers in Discovery podcast.

Ian also talked to us about how CROs have become a crucial part of drug discovery, the importance of serendipity, his one career regret and being willing to pivot in your vision for your working life.

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"It's important to have a plan [for your career], it's important to know where you want to be, but it's almost more important to be able to break from that when something interesting comes along....focus on what you'll learn from each opportunity and how that takes you closer to where you want to go."

As Chief Business Officer at NanoSyrinx, James Lapworth plays a key role in developing a truly novel solution to the "delivery problem" faced by Biotech research around the world.

James joined us to talk about how he built a career in the commercial side of drug R&D, the advantages of nanosyringes and the role of a Chief Business Officer in a start up Biotech.

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"If you find that you're dissatisfied, pivot. If the place you're at isn't meeting your expectations, perseverance isn't going to help you."

Yulia Lampi is the Chief Scientific Officer of coding.bio, a company born in the pandemic who are using AI to advance cell therapies for cancer.

Yulia joined us to talk about cellular machines and why they could hold the key to targeting solid tumours, building a company around her life (rather than the other way round) and acheiving balance as a scientist.

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"You don't need to know everything about a job to be able to do it....imposter syndrome is a massive issue. You may not know every answer, but you're not expected to, and nobody does."

Victoria Marsh Durban is the CEO of Cellesce, a Cardiff-based Biotech championing the industrialisation of organoids.

Vicky talked to us about her journey from academic researcher to CEO, learning to run a business without any formal training and how going on maternity leave propelled her into a career in industry.

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"There's not a single experience that you can have working for someone else that will teach you how to build a company. People will say this to you, but you really have to internalise it and when you're ready, you will go do it."

Returning to Careers in Discovery is Rabia Khan, now CEO of Ladder Therapeutics, a Biotech company focused on the novel problem of mapping the druggable transcriptome.

Rabia caught us up on the last two years, sharing what she's learned about becoming a Biotech CEO, why you're never quite "ready" to start a business and the importance of building the company you want to work for.

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"I think of genetics as your inherited risk of disease, and epigenetics as codifying your environmental risk. We know they work together and that they determine who will respond to which treatment, along with how well treatments are likely to work."

Joanna Holbrook is the Chief Scientific Officer at Cambridge Epigenetix, a company pushing the boundaries of DNA sequencing to enable precision medicine.

Jo joined us to talk about her international career, how 6 letter sequencing is creating new scientific frontiers, the secret of communicating with non-scientists and why good science is necessary, but not sufficient.

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"Meet people who do the role you're interested in, and ask them what they hate about their job - you'll find out a lot! Ask them what they like too, and you'll find it really insightful."

Claire Thompson is the CEO of Agility Life Sciences, an award-winning formulation development CDMO on a significant growth curve.

Claire talked to us about her key learns from her career so far, including the importance of coaching, not "chasing every ball" and why what other people think of you is none of your business.

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