🧬 The Biotech Startups Podcast is powered by Excedr—helping life science startups accelerate R&D and commercialization with founder-friendly equipment leasing. Skip the upfront costs, stay lean, and focus on breakthrough science.
As a TBSP listener, you can get exclusive perks through Excedr’s partner network—special savings, promotions, and more. Explore these offers today: https://www.excedr.com/partners.
"Retrospectively, this was honestly the best childhood one can get, and it was absolutely without gadgets."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, we explore the formative years of Sergey Jakimov, founding partner at LongeVC, as he takes us from his childhood in post-Soviet Latvia to his graduate studies in Budapest. Sergey shares what it was like growing up in a small rural town near the Russian border, where limited resources, no technology, and long winters shaped his resilience, diplomacy, and drive to succeed.​
Sergey recounts his unlikely journey into competitive tennis under a retired national coach, training on concrete courts and turning the sport into both a discipline and a livelihood. He describes the grueling path to university admission—waking at 2 AM every Saturday for four-hour bus rides to attend prep courses in Riga—and the intense workload that followed, surviving on just three to four hours of sleep while juggling translation work and coaching gigs. A pivotal parliament internship shattered his idealistic views of government, leading him to embrace technocracy and meritocracy as guiding principles. Finally, Sergey reflects on earning his master's at Central European University in Budapest, where diverse perspectives and world-class academics further expanded his worldview and prepared him for entrepreneurship.​​
Key topics covered:

• Post-Soviet Childhood: Growing up in rural Latvia with no gadgets, outdoor adventures, and resourcefulness as survival skills
• Athletic Discipline: Training in tennis from age six on concrete courts under a retired national coach, developing grit and work ethic
• Academic Journey: Finishing school early, grueling university workload at Riga Stradiņš University, and working multiple side hustles
• Political Disillusionment: Parliament internship revealing bureaucratic inefficiency and cementing technocratic/meritocratic beliefs
• Graduate Education: Earning a scholarship to Central European University in Budapest, studying political economy and quantitative methods

If you enjoy The Biotech Startups Podcast, please consider subscribing, leaving a review, or sharing it with your friends. Thanks for listening.
Subscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-biotech-startups-podcast/id1679591994Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PSL162R2s0zOwU5913Zv4Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thebiotechstartupspodcast Website: https://www.thebiotechstartupspodcast.com/ 
Find our guest, Sergey Jakimov, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakimov/?originalSubdomain=lvhttps://longevc.com/ Find our host, Jon Chee, at these links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonchee
Learn more about Excedr:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/excedr/ Website: https://www.excedr.com
Intro & Outro Songs Created by OkKyojin, Owned by Excedr:Website: https://flow.page/kyojin 
Resources & Articles:Technocracy vs Democracy https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/technocracy.aspPolitical Economy Studies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_economy Meritocracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meritocracy Cognitive Biases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Longenesis https://longenesis.com/Longevity Science Foundation https://longevity.foundation/ Riga Stradiņš University: https://www.rsu.lv/en Central European University (CEU): https://www.ceu.edu/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro03:42 Growing Up in Post-Soviet Latvia06:56 Childhood Without Technology: Tennis and Diplomacy11:20 Training on Concrete Courts14:47 Choosing University and International Relations17:49 Weekly Bus Rides to Riga for University Prep19:32 University Experience: Three-Hour Sleep Nights21:59 Side Hustles: Translation Work and Tennis Coaching22:47 University Professors and Merit-Based Learning27:02 Parliament Internship: Idealism Meets Reality31:31 From Politics to Grad School Abroad34:16 Central European University in Budapest35:26 OutroThe Biotech Startups Podcast gives you a front-row seat to the business and science of building a biotech. Hosted by Jon Chee, CEO of Excedr, the show features honest conversations with founders, execs, and investors about their work, their companies, and how they got there. From scientific breakthroughs to startup lessons, each episode explores what it really takes to grow a life science company—from pre-seed to IPO.