🧬 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.
"If you are capable of acquiring knowledge, of applying the knowledge, and you like it, you can succeed. It doesn't matter what it is."

We’re revisiting some of our previous episodes over the holidays this year. Our next re-release is this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, in which Jacob Glanville breaks down how he built Distributed Bio from a napkin-stage idea into a full-service antibody discovery platform—without traditional venture capital. He shares how creative partnerships with USF’s biotech master’s program and a scrappy animal facility in Guatemala helped him access labs, talent, and proof-of-concept data, even as early setbacks with SuperHuman 1.0 cost him clients and sleep.

The conversation then dives into the realities of scaling: squeezing into half a bench at JLABS before expanding into a 7,500-square-foot facility powered by smart equipment leasing and a growing team. Jacob also introduces his “Respiration Model” of leadership—open debate followed by uncompromising execution—and explains why rising competition and strong universal vaccine data led him to sell Distributed Bio to Charles River Laboratories and spin out Centivax just as the pandemic hit.

Key topics covered:

• Building Distributed Bio's business model: Software licensing, SuperHuman library development, and service contracts without VC funding
• Scrappy early-stage execution: USF grad student partnerships, Guatemala animal facility, and surviving SuperHuman 1.0's defects
• Scaling operations: JLABS growth, equipment leasing strategy, protocol standardization, and hiring 60-70 interns over multiple years
• The "Respiration Model": Balancing organic innovation with hierarchical execution, managing co-founder tensions, and creating culture
• Strategic exit and new chapter: CRO acquisition timing, competitive landscape analysis, and spinning out Centivax for universal vaccines

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, Jacob Glanville, at these links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacobglanville/Website: https://www.centivax.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:Distributed Bio Acquisition https://www.criver.com/charles-river-acquired-distributed-bio Deep Sequencing for Phage Display Library Analysis https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37966608/PEGS Conferences https://www.pegsummit.com/Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud Computing https://aws.amazon.com/health/life-sciences/Phage Display Technology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_displayEquipment Leasing for Biotech Startups https://www.excedr.com/resources/equipment-leasing-strategies-for-biotech-startupsIncubator Models (JLABS) https://jnjinnovation.com/jlabsCompanies, Universities, & People mentioned:Pfizer: https://www.pfizer.com/JLABS: https://www.jnj.com/tag/jlabsCharles River Laboratories (CRO): https://www.criver.com/ University of San Francisco (USF): https://www.usfca.edu/Gates Foundation: https://www.gatesfoundation.org/Illumina: https://www.illumina.com/Gilead: https://www.gilead.com/Boehringer Ingelheim: https://www.boehringer-ingelheim.com/Adimab: https://adimab.com/
Timestamps: 00:00 Intro01:09 Finding Co-Founders and the Three-Stage Plan06:46 Building the SuperHuman Library with USF Graduate Students​10:22 Starting at JLABS and Scaling Lab Space​11:19 Equipment Leasing as a Growth Strategy​14:02 Challenges That Kept Him Up at Night​18:13 Learning from Academia vs Big Pharma Approaches​20:27 The Respiration Model: Balancing Innovation and Execution​23:32 Decision to Pursue Acquisition with Charles River​27:15 Spinning Out Centivax and Universal Vaccine Technology​27:43 Pandemic Timing and Gates Foundation Support​32:19 Outro​The 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.

🧬 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.

"Find the thing that gets you excited, that fascinates you, and then have the thing you love be something else."
We’re revisiting some of our previous episodes over the holidays this year. Our next re-release is this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, in which Jacob Glanville discusses his transformative years at Pfizer's Rinat site and his transition to Stanford. He describes how an open, collaborative culture allowed him to roam across teams, trading his coding skills for scientific mentorship while building critical bioinformatics infrastructure for antibody discovery.
Jacob shares how he converted a corporate laptop into antibody.pfizer.com, creating an internal web server that centralized analysis tools and enabled scientists to rapidly interrogate antibody libraries. Early access to deep sequencing let him dissect repertoires before and after selection, iteratively design better synthetic libraries, and publish influential papers—ultimately being promoted four times to Principal Scientist with only a BA. Despite this success, his burning idea for a universal vaccine drove him to leave Pfizer, pursue a PhD at Stanford, and simultaneously launch Distributed Bio.
At Stanford, Jacob explains how he "separated church and state," keeping therapeutic antibody work in his company while focusing academic research on T-cell receptors and cytokine analysis. He reflects on navigating Stanford's tech transfer process and contrasts the priorities of academia versus industry, emphasizing the value of finding work that fascinates you.
Key topics covered:

• Antibody Engineering at Pfizer: Building phage display analysis tools and turning a laptop into antibody.pfizer.com
• Deep Sequencing and Library Design: Using high-throughput sequencing to iteratively improve antibody discovery libraries
• Leaving Big Pharma: Walking away from Principal Scientist to pursue a universal vaccine concept and PhD
• Stanford and Distributed Bio: Balancing academic research, company building, and clean IP boundaries
• Career Strategy: Industry vs. academia, early exposure, and finding work that fascinates you

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, Jacob Glanville, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacobglanville https://www.centivax.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:Hidden Markov Models https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt1004-1315Technology Transfer 101 https://www.excedr.com/blog/what-is-tech-transfer Spinning Out of Academia & Into a Startup https://www.excedr.com/resources/how-to-spin-out-of-academia-and-into-a-startup 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Rinat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinat_Neuroscience_Corporation Pfizer: https://www.pfizer.com​ Stanford University: https://www.stanford.edu​ UC Berkeley (University of California, Berkeley): https://www.berkeley.edu Kimmen Sjolander https://www.linkedin.com/in/kimmen-sj%C3%B6lander-98a592/?originalSubdomain=nl Jaume Pons https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaume-pons-7560384/ Arvind Rajpal https://www.linkedin.com/in/arvind-rajpal/ Andrea Rossi https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrearossisf/ Wenwu Zhai https://www.linkedin.com/in/wenwu-zhai-1083575/ Javier Chaparro-Riggers https://www.linkedin.com/in/javier-chaparro-riggers-0415093/ Sawsan Youssef https://www.linkedin.com/in/sawsan-youssef-b274b010/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro01:25 Landing a Job at Pfizer and First Days in Industry03:47 Building Bioinformatics Tools and the Antibody.Pfizer.com Server08:10 Creating a Web Server and Collecting Antibody Data10:59 Deep Sequencing Antibodies and Building Better Libraries13:45 Why Leave Pfizer for Stanford17:16 Going Behind Enemy Lines: From Berkeley to Stanford18:46 Advice on Industry Experience vs. PhD Programs20:44 Starting Distributed Bio Before Stanford24:34 Finding What Fascinates You vs. What You Love27:33 Navigating Stanford's Tech Transfer and Keeping Church and State Separate29:44 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.

🧬 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.
"You don't always know at the time how something will be useful in the future, but if you keep following what fascinates you, those threads can re-synthesize into something powerful down the line."​
We’re revisiting some of our previous episodes over the holidays this year. Our next re-release is this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, where computational immuno-engineer and serial entrepreneur Jake Glanville shares how growing up in a Mayan Tzʼutujil village in Guatemala during a civil war shaped his path into biotech. He reflects on living amid limited access to medicine, navigating personal health challenges like asthma, and witnessing how simple interventions such as deworming transformed entire communities, inspiring his commitment to developing therapeutics and vaccines.​
Jake discusses the profound influence of his grandfather, a Rocketdyne engineer who worked on the engines that sent humans to the moon, and how that legacy lowered his sense of what is "impossible" in science. Watching his parents run a hotel and restaurant gave him an education in operations, resilience, and people management—skills that translated directly into building biotech companies. He also unpacks the negotiation lessons he absorbed from Mayan market culture, where the goal is sustainable, mutual value rather than one-time wins.​
The episode follows Jake's transition to the United States after his father's autoimmune disease diagnosis, his strategic decision to attend UC Berkeley, and how his self-taught programming background fused with population genetics to create a passion for computational immunology.
Key topics covered:

• Growing Up in Guatemala: How limited healthcare and infectious disease exposure motivated Jake's focus on medicine and immunology​
• Family Influences: The impact of a rocket engineer grandfather, entrepreneurial parents, and an artist mother on his scientific ambition​
• Entrepreneurial Mindset: Lessons in operations, problem-solving, and people management from running a restaurant in volatile conditions​
• Mayan Negotiation Principles: Market-born lessons in fair, relationship-focused deal-making and being "pushy smooth"​
• Berkeley and Computational Immunology: Combining molecular biology, population genetics, and programming to analyze immune diversity

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, Jacob Glanville, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacobglanville https://www.centivax.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:Tzʼutujil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tz%CA%BCutujil_peopleHidden Markov Models in Biology https://www.ebi.ac.uk/training/online/courses/pfam-creating-protein-families/what-are-profile-hidden-markov-models-hmms/Guatemalan Civil War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guatemalan_Civil_War 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:University of California, Berkeley: https://www.berkeley.edu/ Pfizer: https://www.pfizer.com/ Rocketdyne: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocketdyne Glenys Thomson https://www.linkedin.com/in/glenys-thomson-26961533/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro02:29 Growing Up in Guatemala and Grandfather's Influence05:16 Healthcare Challenges and Early Interest in Medicine07:23 Learning from Parents' Restaurant Business09:43 Artistic Training and Cross-Disciplinary Thinking10:16 Mayan Culture and Negotiation Philosophy11:07 The Hard Mode of Hospitality Business12:52 Meeting People and Building Relationships14:50 The Art of Negotiation and Leadership16:49 Learning to Say No17:29 Decision to Attend UC Berkeley19:56 Discovering Computational Immunology22:58 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.

"The biggest problem that we're seeing right now is that the efficiency gains have not translated to enterprise value. The customer is not seeing that result transcend into unit economics yet."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, we explore Krish Ramadurai's insights on AI-native venture investing and the evolving biotech landscape. Krish unpacks the current state of AI ventures, explaining why the foundation layer is being rapidly commoditized and how defensibility now lives in full-stack applications rather than point solutions. He offers a candid perspective on what founders often misunderstand about market fit, revealing that efficiency gains haven't translated to enterprise value and that most AI companies are building vitamins when customers need painkillers.
Krish breaks down the dramatic shift in funding benchmarks, where seed-stage companies now achieve revenue milestones that previously defined Series A rounds. He shares hard-won lessons from the tech bio space, explaining why platforms that forgot biotech is fundamentally a drug business struggled during the biotech winter, and why growth investors can only underwrite assets, not services models. The conversation also explores AIX's firm-building philosophy, emphasizing how combining technical expertise with authentic human connection—being "the same dweeb in and out of the office"—creates a competitive advantage in winning deals against tier-one funds with significantly larger checks.
Key topics covered:

• AI Commoditization: Why the core AI foundation layer is eroding and defensibility requires full-stack, wedge-owning solutions
• Funding Paradigm Shifts: How revenue benchmarks have evolved with companies skipping entire funding stages
• Tech Bio Reality Check: Why AI biotech platforms failed by forgetting that biotech is a drug business, not a software business
• Customer-Centric Building: The importance of understanding actual customer needs versus assumed efficiency gains, especially in healthcare's 16-month procurement cycles
• Firm Culture & Winning Deals: How EQ, technical depth, and authenticity enable winning competitive Series A rounds with smaller checks against tier-one investors

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, Krish Ramadurai, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/krishramadurai/https://www.aixventures.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:Full-stack applications vs point solutions https://mitratech.com/resource-hub/blog/point-vs-platform-solutions-tech-stack-strategies-to-prepare-you-for-the-future/ Power law distribution in venture capital returns https://www.bipventures.vc/news/explainer-what-is-the-venture-capital-power-lawChoose the Right Contract Research Organization https://www.excedr.com/blog/contract-research-organizations CRO Expansion: Growth Without Adding Lab Space https://www.excedr.com/blog/cro-expansion-how-to-grow-without-adding-lab-space 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:OpenAI: https://openai.com/ Insilico Medicine: https://insilico.com/ Recursion Pharmaceuticals: https://www.recursion.com/ Sujata Bhatia https://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/sujata-k-bhatia Abhirup Banerjee https://www.linkedin.com/in/abhirupb88/?originalSubdomain=uk Shaun Johnson https://www.linkedin.com/in/shaunbjohnson/ Richard Socher https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardsocher/ Christopher Manning https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-manning-011575/ Anthony Goldbloom https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthonygoldbloom/ Pieter Abbeel https://www.linkedin.com/in/pieterabbeel/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro02:21 State of AI-Native Venture Capital & Market Commoditization04:21 Defensibility, Full-Stack Wedges & Shifting Funding Benchmarks07:35 AI Froth, Customer Overwhelm & Painkillers vs Vitamins09:51 Where AI Actually Matters in Biotech & AI-Developed Drugs13:26 The Reality of Venture Capital: Glamour vs Fund Management15:29 Building AIX: Firm Culture, Mission & Track Record17:23 Why Founders Choose AIX: EQ, Technical Depth & Being “Normal”21:45 Communicating Complex Science & Making STEM Accessible22:40 Looking Ahead: Fund III, 100 New Cures & Practicing the Craft24:35 Shout-Outs, Mentors & the Importance of Good People25:01 Advice to 21-Year-Old Self: Failure, Tactical Suffering & Growth26:43 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.

🧬 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.
"I'm only doing this because I'm already doing this or because I couldn't afford to hypothesis test."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, Krish Ramadurai, Partner at AIX Ventures, reveals his unconventional approach to building a venture capital career through simultaneous immersion in both academia and industry. The conversation explores how Krish pursued his master's in nanomedicine and PhD at Oxford University while working full-time at Harmonics Capital—an arrangement he negotiated by demonstrating that his research on machine learning algorithms for mRNA optimization directly aligned with his daily venture work.​
Krish challenges conventional wisdom about hustle culture, arguing that productivity drops after 55 hours per week and emphasizing strategic time protection over brute-force effort. He shares candid reflections on what he calls "controlled chaos"—how his achievements weren't the result of meticulous planning but rather making the best of challenging circumstances. The discussion then transitions to his strategic move to AIX Ventures, where he joined as the first institutional partner at a firm helmed by AI pioneers like Richard Socher (inventor of prompt engineering). Krish describes building AIX's TechBio practice from less than 10% to 25% of the portfolio in just over a year, leading nine deals while helping scale a fund that's become the #2 VC globally for performance with eight unicorns from their first fund.
Key topics covered:

• Oxford PhD Journey: Negotiating remote doctoral study while working full-time in venture capital, and how Oxford's unique tutorial system differs from traditional programs
• Work Efficiency Philosophy: Why 55 hours is the productivity ceiling and how strategic time management enables parallel career tracks
• Building the Venture Flywheel: The deliberate five-year strategy to establish deal sourcing, diligence capabilities, and founder relationships
• Advisory Ecosystem: Contributing to Nucleate, ARPA-H, and Department of Defense initiatives while maintaining a focused 10-hour quarterly commitment
• AIX Ventures Strategy: Joining a boutique AI-native fund backed by world-class practitioners, scaling the TechBio practice, and maintaining disciplined fund sizing to optimize returns

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, Krish Ramadurai, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/krishramadurai/https://www.aixventures.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:General Partner vs. Venture Partner Explained: https://visible.vc/blog/general-partner-vs-limited-partner/ mRNA Therapeutics and Delivery Challenges: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11883111/ Tutorial System Fundamentals: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tutorial_system 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Oxford University: https://www.ox.ac.uk/ AIX Ventures: https://www.aixventures.com/  Nucleate: https://nucleate.org/ ARPA-H: https://arpa-h.gov/ Lux Capital: https://www.luxcapital.com/ Richard Socher https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardsocher/ Christopher Manning https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-manning-011575/ Michael Retchin https://www.linkedin.com/in/retchin/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro01:49 Pursuing Oxford While Working Full-Time at Harmonics03:02 Remote Master's in Nanomedicine: Breaking the Rules05:16 Research Focus: mRNA Optimization and Machine Learning06:45 Oxford's Unique PhD Structure and Three-Year Timeline08:16 Lessons from the Oxford Experience and Trade-Offs12:39 Integrating Graduate Work into Venture Practice14:42 Building Your Tribe: Mentorship and Network in VC17:13 The Path to General Partner and Leaving Harmonics19:36 Advisory Work with Nucleate and ARPA-H22:39 Joining AIX Ventures: Finding the Super-Freaks26:17 AIX Investment Strategy and Fund Structure27:37 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.

🧬 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.
"I was not like, 'Well, this partner helped me on it, and then we shared the deal.' I was like, 'I think I'm good at this because I basically did the output of an entire firm by myself, like, the first two years.'"
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, host Jon Chee continues his conversation with Krish Ramadurai, exploring his unconventional journey from Harvard academia to becoming a venture capital partner in record time. Krish shares how he applied his research training to venture capital, identifying a new category of compute-driven biotech companies before "TechBio" even existed, and executing twelve investments during his first year as an analyst—all while the COVID-19 pandemic sent markets into free fall.​
Krish reveals the critical importance of "shot-calling" in venture capital, explaining why many talented associates and principals get stuck in their careers by not claiming ownership of their wins. He describes compressing his MBA into sixteen months at Washington University while working two full-time positions, his rapid ascent from analyst to partner by consistently performing above his role, and the uncomfortable but necessary transition from technical expert to fundraiser when dealing with limited partners. Throughout the conversation, Krish emphasizes breaking traditional rules when conviction demands it, treating every investment like an evidence-based academic experiment, and understanding that in venture capital, you're only as good as your last deal.
Key topics covered:

• Evidence-Based Venture Capital: Applying academic research methodology to investment diligence and thesis development during COVID-19 market uncertainty​
• Identifying TechBio Before It Existed: Market mapping compute-driven biotech companies and building a comprehensive thesis workbook that led to investments in Insilico Medicine, Red AI, and others​
• The Art of Shot-Calling: Why claiming ownership of your wins is critical for advancing from analyst to partner, and how many VCs get stuck by sharing credit​
• Accelerated Career Progression: Navigating the venture capital hierarchy by doing work above your pay grade and forcing conversations about promotion through demonstrated results​
• The LP Fundraising Reality: Transitioning from technical diligence to selling yourself as a jockey to institutional investors, understanding emerging versus established fund dynamics​

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, Krish Ramadurai, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/krishramadurai/https://www.aixventures.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:Due Diligence Best Practices in Venture Capital: https://www.wallstreetprep.com/knowledge/venture-capital-diligence/ Market Mapping for Venture Investors: https://www.growthmentor.com/glossary/market-mapping/ 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Harvard University (Belfer Center, Taubman Center): https://www.harvard.edu/ MIT: https://www.mit.edu/ Washington University in St. Louis (WashU): https://wustl.edu/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro02:22 Evidence-Based Approach from Academic Research to Venture05:32 First Day at Harmonics and COVID's Impact06:39 MBA While Working Full-Time at MIT11:18 Market Mapping and Building a Thesis16:29 Shot-Calling and Career Advancement in Venture19:35 Accelerating from Analyst to Principal22:02 Transition to Partner and Ownership of Thesis23:31 Fundraising from LPs During COVID25:48 Understanding LP Landscape and Emerging Manager Dynamics30:05 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.

🧬 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.
"You’ve just got to embrace the suck. When everything sucks, you just execute against it. It's nice because then when that situation happens again, which adult life works like that all the time, you can be more systematically prepared."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, we explore Krish Ramadurai's unconventional journey from Chicago's South Side to becoming a Partner at AIX Ventures. Krish shares how a career-ending femur fracture during his track and field career redirected his path from Johns Hopkins to the University of Illinois, where he discovered the intersection of hard science and business that would define his future.​​
Krish takes us through his audacious approach to getting into Harvard—auditing classes before formal admission, working three jobs simultaneously to afford tuition, and sending over 500 cold emails to find research opportunities. He reflects on how working alongside figures like US Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, CIA Director David Petraeus, and Nobel Prize winner Mike Kremer at the Belfer Center shaped his understanding of applied science and policy intervention. Most importantly, Krish emphasizes how rejection built conviction, turning financial desperation and constant setbacks into the foundation for his success in venture capital.
Key topics covered:

• From Superhero Scientists to STEM: How growing up with a cardiologist father and fascination with the scientists behind Marvel superheroes sparked his interest in biotechnology and applied research​
• Pivoting After Injury: The femur fracture that ended his track career and forced an unconventional path to higher education​
• The Unconventional Harvard Path: Auditing graduate courses before admission, juggling three jobs, and leveraging one connection into a full graduate school opportunity​
• Building Conviction Through Rejection: How sending 500+ cold emails and facing constant rejection taught resilience and self-understanding that would prove essential in venture capital​
• Applied Science in Action: Working on biological water filtration in Sub-Saharan Africa, collaborating with global policy leaders, and transitioning from think tank work to venture investing

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, Krish Ramadurai, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/krishramadurai/https://www.aixventures.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:Nobel Prize in Economics https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2019/summary/ 3D Bioprinting Technology https://news.mit.edu/2025/new-3d-bioprinting-technique-may-improve-production-engineered-tissue-0917 Venture Capital Due Diligence Process https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/duediligence.asp 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Harvard University https://www.harvard.edu​ University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign https://illinois.edu​ Johns Hopkins University https://www.jhu.edu​ Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs https://www.belfercenter.org​ Harvard Kennedy School Taubman Center https://www.hks.harvard.edu/centers/taubman 
Ashton "Ash" Carter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_Carter ​​David Petraeus https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidpetraeus/ ​​Michael Kremer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Kremer Paul Farmer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Farmer Sujatha Bhatia https://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/sujata-k-bhatia Rachel McCleary https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachel-mccleary-b26bb630/ Werner Bayer https://economics.illinois.edu/spotlight/historic-faculty/baer-werner Eric Schmidt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Schmidt 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro04:38 Upbringing and Early Interest in STEM06:18 Parental Expectations: Doctor, Lawyer, or Engineer08:49 Femur Fracture and Shift in College Plans10:28 Undergraduate Experience at University of Illinois11:47 Research on Biological Filtration in Sub-Saharan Africa17:19 Path to Harvard Graduate School19:58 Working Multiple Jobs While at Harvard23:21 Working at Belfer Center and Meeting Key Mentors25:34 Sending 500 Cold Emails and Facing Rejection28:22 Embracing Failure and Building Conviction31:47 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.

🧬 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.
Episode Description:

"Entrepreneurship is great, but, for me, family always came first. [My] wife and kids always came first. I didn't miss a single game or show or anything of the kids, whether it was at 3 PM or 5 PM or 7 PM, I did that. And then I figured out the work otherwise."
We’re revisiting some of our previous episodes over the holidays this year. Our next rerelease is part 2 of this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast with Parag Shah, where we discuss his journey from leading the life sciences practice at Hercules Capital to founding K2 Health Ventures. Parag shares candid insights about the pivotal moment he transitioned from banking to private credit, his decision to join Hercules as one of the first employees, and the challenges of scaling a fund from $25 million to over a billion dollars as a public BDC.
Parag offers rare transparency about the difficulties of navigating toxic corporate culture while building a successful business, and how those experiences shaped his vision for K2 HealthVentures. He emphasizes the critical importance of work-life balance in entrepreneurship, revealing how he never missed a single one of his children's games or shows despite the demands of building investment firms. The conversation explores the strategic advantages of evergreen fund structures versus traditional LP/GP models, and how K2's unique approach of combining debt and equity across the capital stack, along with dedicating a percentage of profits to underserved healthcare, represents a new model for impact investing in life sciences.Key topics covered:

• Transitioning from banking to private credit and joining Hercules Capital in its earliest days
• Taking Hercules public and scaling from $50 million to over $2 billion in life sciences investments
• Navigating difficult corporate cultures and the importance of building intentional company culture
• Achieving sustainable work-life balance as an entrepreneur without sacrificing family priorities
• Founding K2 HealthVentures with an evergreen structure and dual mission of profit and purpose

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, Parag Shah, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paragshah333/ https://k2hv.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:Biotech Startup Fundraising https://www.excedr.com/resources/biotech-startup-funding-optionsVenture Debt Financing https://www.excedr.com/blog/venture-debt-for-biotech-startups-overview Business Development Companies (BDCs) https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/bdc.asp Evergreen Fund Structures in Private Capital https://www.hamiltonlane.com/en-us/knowledge-center/evergreen-funds Understanding LP/GP Relationships: https://visible.vc/blog/general-partner-vs-limited-partner/ Private Credit and Venture Debt Explained https://www.investopedia.com/terms/v/venturecapital.asp 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Comerica Bank: https://www.comerica.com ​Hercules Capital: https://www.htgc.com 
Roy Liu: https://www.linkedin.com/in/roy-liu-36a35/Anup Arora: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anup-arora-368ba81/Meghan FitzGerald: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meghanmfitzgerald/John Hale: https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-hale-770158b/
Timestamps:00:00 Intro02:11 Pivoting to Private Credit and Starting a Fund13:06 Importance of Corporate Culture in Firm Building14:50 Going Public: Benefits and Pressures of a Public BDC18:60 Knowing When It's Time to Leave23:33 Taking a Break and Finding Balance29:34 Founding K2 HealthVentures38:30 Raising $400 Million: A Stark Contrast42:14 Evergreen Structure and Long-Term Partnership45:04 Working Across the Capital Stack48:46 The Value of Co-Founders53:14 Looking Ahead: Growth and the K2 Foundation54:38 Shout Outs and Gratitude57:43 Advice to Your 21-Year-Old Self01:02:06 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.

🧬 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.
"I was fortunate that my parents pretty much allowed for a more experimental, open approach to education being important, but do what you want to do, right? Try different things, take healthy risks."
We’re revisiting some of our previous episodes over the holidays this year. Our first rerelease is part 1 of this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast with Parag Shah, where we explore his remarkable journey from molecular biologist to CEO and Founding Managing Director of K2 Health Ventures. Parag shares how his upbringing in New York City with immigrant parents who encouraged experimentation shaped his entrepreneurial mindset, and describes the pivotal moment when he realized bench science wasn't his calling while researching at MIT's Whitehead Institute.​​
The conversation reveals how Parag boldly proposed building Imperial Bank's life sciences lending practice from scratch, despite being young and relatively inexperienced. He discusses lessons learned from MIT about persistence through failure, translating traditional credit frameworks to venture-backed biotech companies, and the complementary role of debt capital alongside equity financing in life sciences.
Key topics covered:

• From Science to Finance: Transitioning from MIT molecular biology research to credit investing and discovering alternative career paths for scientists​
• The Power of Risk-Taking: How liberal parenting, MIT's challenging environment, and willingness to fail fast shaped an entrepreneurial mindset​
• Building Credit Frameworks: Adapting traditional lending principles to venture-backed life sciences companies and understanding value inflection points beyond revenue​
• International Experience: Learning credit fundamentals at Bank Boston in Buenos Aires and navigating cultural differences while building professional expertise​
• Entrepreneurial Banking: Creating Imperial Bank's life sciences practice from scratch and the art of asking for resources when entering the unknown

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, Parag Shah, at these links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paragshah333/ https://k2hv.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:Biotech Startup Fundraising: https://www.excedr.com/resources/biotech-startup-funding-optionsVenture Debt Financing https://www.excedr.com/blog/venture-debt-for-biotech-startups-overview Venture Capital and Venture Debt Relationship: https://dealroom.net/faq/venture-debt-financing The Human Genome Project https://www.genome.gov/human-genome-project 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology): https://www.mit.edu​ Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research: https://wi.mit.edu​ Comerica Bank: https://www.comerica.com ​Hercules Capital: https://www.htgc.com 
Larry Suskind: https://dusp.mit.edu/people/lawrence-susskind John Ehrenfeld: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnehrenfeld/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro02:44 Upbringing in New York City and Parents' Influence05:19 Early Science Teachers and Inspiration09:31 Choosing MIT and Meeting His Wife10:54 MIT's Rigor and Learning to Persist13:09 Fraternity Experience and Building Diverse Connections14:34 Undergraduate Research at the Whitehead Institute17:46 Pursuing Environmental Policy and Graduate School21:34 From Environmental Policy to Banking in Argentina25:45 Bank Boston's Credit Training Program32:39 Embracing Uncertainty and Being Willing to Fail37:51 Building Imperial Bank's Life Sciences Credit Framework41:32 The Role of Debt vs. Equity in Biotech Financing45:44 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.

🧬 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.
"The only advice I can give to my 21-year-old self is that advice doesn't work... But whenever you actually need advice on something that you do not know how to start or how to solve or how to figure out, you should really remember that someone in this world has already figured it out."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, host Jon Chee concludes his conversation with Sergey Jakimov, Managing Partner at LongeVC, exploring the realities of fundraising from limited partners and building a successful longevity-focused biotech fund. Sergey shares his unconventional approach to LP fundraising—telling his story rather than selling a product—and how personal experiences with age-related diseases drive his science-first investment philosophy.
Sergey explains why Fund One, which launched with 30% GP capital commitment, has achieved over 3x returns in just three years despite challenging market conditions. He reveals why big pharma's massive liquidity reserves, combined with looming patent cliffs like Merck's Keytruda expiration, create unprecedented opportunities for venture-backed biotech innovation. The conversation explores the vital role venture capitalists play in bringing breakthrough therapies to patients—therapies that big pharma would never risk developing on their own.
Looking ahead, Sergey discusses his vision for establishing longevity as an evidence-based, data-driven field while combating the "snake oil" supplements and questionable therapies that damage the industry's credibility. He emphasizes the need to translate scientific success stories into accessible language that attracts generalist capital, ultimately accelerating growth across the entire longevity sector.
Key topics covered:

• Fundraising Philosophy: Why telling your authentic story attracts like-minded LPs better than traditional pitching and selling
• Biotech in Down Markets: How good science always raises money and strategic assets get acquired even during economic downturns
• Big Pharma's Urgency: Understanding patent cliffs, liquidity reserves, and why pharma needs venture-backed innovation more than ever
• Evidence-Based Longevity: Building longevity investing around diseases and molecular assets rather than romanticized anti-aging concepts
• Industry Growth Strategy: Creating accessible success stories and attracting generalist capital to scale the longevity field

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:Patent Cliff https://www.foley.com/insights/publications/2025/09/patent-cliff-ma-activity-for-companies-right-now/ Keytruda Patent Expiration https://www.barrons.com/articles/merck-keytruda-patent-expiration-new-version-b0cc14d1  Preparing for Pre-Seed & Seed Funding https://www.excedr.com/resources/how-to-prepare-for-pre-seed-seed-funding 
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Merck https://www.merck.com/​​ Roche https://www.roche.com/​​ Novo Nordisk https://www.novonordisk.com/ 
Garri Zmudze https://www.linkedin.com/in/garri-zmudze-982a48138/ 
Timestamps:00:00 Intro01:55 Fundraising from LPs and Communicating a Science-First Thesis06:02 Building a Community of Like-Minded LPs11:53 Big Pharma's Liquidity and Patent Cliffs Create Opportunity13:23 Vision for the Future and Creating Added Value16:13 Making Longevity Accessible to Generalist Investors16:54 Combating Snake Oil and Building an Evidence-Based Field19:39 Shout-Outs to Team and Colleagues21:35 Advice to 21-Year-Old Self23:52 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.