Starting with any relevant education, walk me through the twists and turns of your career to date? How did one opportunity lead to the next + what was the key takeaway/ experience in each role + how did this lead you to where you are now)
So, I think my journey's a little different than a number of people in this space. I don't come from a science background. I barely took classes science or biotechnology. A lot of people in this space have a veterinary degree or in animal health. My relevant education is that I have a law degree and practiced as a lawyer and did that for many years. I had the opportunity when a couple of very bright scientists came to me and had some issues related to technology that they had developed and asked me as a lawyer solely to help them with that. And I did that and probably would've forgotten about it. Except that, a couple of years later they came back to me and said they had developed the technology to a certain point and asked if I would be interested in running the company. And it sounded like a great opportunity, so I took it! And I believe that it's not true for everybody, but for me, at least, the beginning of what's now been a 20-year career in biotechnology and biopharma has started with a chance meeting, and it was my good fortune that I found the career to be, really interesting since acquired a number of different technologies including being involved in the company that I'm currently involved in Seek Labs.
What was the pivotal moment that put you on your current founder path?
Yeah, I mean, I think I can think of three. One is partnering with a really smart business guy who helped me with running a business, with making substantial deals and with the idea of going to universities and going into their intellectual property portfolio, which very often just sits there. University professors come up with brilliant ideas. And the university owns either all or a piece of that. And we developed a system to go into universities to work with them on interesting intellectual property and to commercialize them. And I think that was an unmet need. It also provided an opportunity to really sit back and think what's next? Kind of what look out over the future, bring in smart people. I'm not one of them. Bring in really smart people who can say what's the next big thing? We brought in, for instance, someone who predicted, I think predicted the Global pandemic, COVID, who years ago wrote a paper about the confluence of disease, international travel, and urbanization, and talk to us about things that could be done that would have an impact on global health. So, I mean, that's one. And then the other is where I am right now. The opportunity to work with two other brilliant founders; Brad Bauer and Jared Bauer, who are bright, committed, and keep to a vision of impact on global health. And I think Seek Labs is going to do amazing things in the next couple of years. And it all started with the opportunity to work with those two.
We brought in, for instance, someone who predicted, I think predicted the Global pandemic, COVID, who years ago wrote a paper about the confluence of disease, international travel, and urbanization...
Can you provide a quick summary of the technology/ area of innovation and its potential application?
Seek Labs does two things primarily that are of, I think, of interest to this audience. One is a rapid portable testing platform called Seekit. And it is a kit that does extraction, it does amplification, detection, and remote communications, all in one very small platform. And we announced that just a few days ago. And so that's really new information. Pictures of it are on the website, and I think that impacts both global human health and certainly animal health. I mean, the trick in animal health, in my view, is to be able to have, well, it's true at human as well, but have testing at the site where the infection or issue is rather than taking the sample back to a laboratory where testing needs to be done, that wastes time. And this is something that is really revolutionary to think of being able to collect a sample on site and this can be anyone collecting a sample, so it doesn't even need to be a veterinary doctor. It could be someone with very little training or education, but training in the use of this. So being able to extract the DNA or RNA out of a sample, and then be able to amplify it right there. So not using heating or cooling, which is a traditional method of amplification, but it's revolutionary to be able to do it right in a single device, no power, do it at ambient temperature, and then to be able to detect it. So, I believe that the Seekit system is revolutionary. The other thing that Seek Labs is doing is that we have developed a method of, we think of, stopping viral growth. I talked a little bit about it at the conference in Tokyo. And we are in animal testing in that as we speak. And our expectation, our hope and belief is that it will be a novel method for stopping any virus from replicating.
What stage are you at?
We expect Seekit to be able to be sold and marketed in the first quarter of 2024. We are in preclinical testing in our pharmaceutical.
As a company of this size we must really look at a couple of methods for impacting global health. One is to go public and to acquire sufficient revenue to be able to build up a team to take it globally. Another is to be acquired by a company that already has in place global distribution. So, we have to consider who are the customers? One, any person or organization that is interested in animal health in rapid portable testing for any disease that's in aquaculture, that is in any companion animal, any animal disease; and the second would be companies that are interested in expanding their own portfolio of offering to customers to who may already be in this space.
Discuss the biggest challenges of getting to this point? With the benefit of hindsight, what would you have done differently if anything?
The typical challenges are true for Seek labs. I mean, there's scientific challenges. Initially what we're doing is hard. We've said that this is a company that's built upon years of failure. And it's one of the reasons why I mentioned that a significant event was the coming together of three founders who believed in a vision and who were willing to stick with the vision through failure, and who were willing to fund the vision through failure. And that's a luxury that a lot of companies and a lot of really great technologies don't have that people who are not aligned get impatient and give up. And we believed in a vision and stuck to a vision. So I think that's been a big challenge. Big challenges are continuing through failure and believing that it will ultimately lead to where we are right now. And then the typical problems of financing regulatory, which is super complicated. So, I think those are the primary issues that would resonate with anyone who's a founder. And the first may be it resonates and they think, you know, gee, I wish, I wish we would've had the luxury of being able to stick with it through failure.
...the coming together of three founders who believed in a vision and who were willing to stick with the vision through failure, and who were willing to fund the vision through failure.
How have you approached funding?
As mentioned before, all three of the founder’s are helping to fund this but it was a typical thing of starting with friends and family as you began to move forward. And then we've been really fortunate with investors who we've had who are either private investors or small funds. And again, we’ve been super fortunate with those people who also have believed in the vision and have stuck with it through years, literally years of failure. We were actually pretty open about it on our website.
What has been the greatest source of help/ guidance along the way?
I mean, for me personally, I mentioned the dear friend of mine who's a longtime business partner who actually was a great source. I along the way have had really, really smart people, primarily in global health, which has been my background, who have shaped how I view global health and what we could do in global health. And people who have been extraordinarily kind and gracious and open to me in talking to me about global health and about things that could be done. I think as well, we're fortunate as a company. We have assembled a group of young and brilliant scientists. So I'm the one who gets to do this interview, but the people who do the work are the brilliant, innovative and determined scientists who now number almost 40 in the company who have done amazing work. The different components of SeekIt, for instance, each on their own are extraordinary inventions to be able to extract a DNA or RNA from a sample and do it within a small device and do it on site is an amazing thing all on its own.
...the people who do the work are the brilliant, innovative and determined scientists who now number almost 40 in the company who have done amazing work.
I think as well, the isothermal amplification method that is in that, I mean, global health has been looking to be able to do amplification without heating or cooling for a very long time. And to think of a small company of brilliant scientists who could come up with that method in addition to the extraction method, it's fairly amazing. So yeah, I mean, that is also one, I've forgotten exactly the question, but one of the key things that happened.
What do you think are broadly the biggest needs and opportunities in the Animal Health and Petcare markets?
I mean it's probably no surprise that I think the biggest needs are, number one a rapid portable testing system that can be done on site. You pick it, pick whatever disease, whether you're talking about African swine fever or white spot disease in shrimp, or avian influenza or companion animal diseases. The need that is unmet that I think benefits the industry the most is something a testing platform that can be done onsite. It can be done right then, right now, get an answer, stop the spread of disease, start treatment, all of those kinds of things can happen immediately, but the basis is you've got to be able to do it onsite and have a quick test. And I think you also have to have a system that is simple to use. Otherwise, the limiting factor is going to be that every test has to be done by a veterinarian. And maybe what you need is several tests out there that an animal owner can do, and can relay the results to a veterinarian, or to an animal health expert, and be able to move right into treatment or intervention or a method of being able to either treat or stop disease. I think that's critically important.
And the second is the ability to take a novel method and stop the spread of disease. You only have to look at African swine fever which has killed about 40% of the population of pigs on earth in a three-year period. To know that you've got to come up with a different method to stop that. And it's our belief that in the next several months as we go through animal testing that we'll show that we’ve come up with a method that can do just that.
What’s going to have the single biggest impact on change in your area of the market?
I believe that global financial markets is going to have the single biggest impact our area of the market. I mean, we've got war in two places, we've got kind of uncertain global markets, all of those things are difficult for any company looking to expand into the global marketplace. It takes, if Seek is to take the path of growing as a company and delivering products globally, we'll need an infusion of cash to be able to do that. That's just math. That's how that works. We're going to have to build up a sales force, and build up distribution channels, all of those kinds of things. And this all takes significant money. And so, the global market being unsettled or financial institutions kind of taking a wait and see attitude about where the markets are going to go, that impacts how things are. And it's the same if Seek decides that the smartest and best way to impact global health animals and human health is to partner with a company. Those companies are also impacted by global financial markets and looking to see into the future where are the markets going to go and do they have sufficient resources to do acquisitions or partnerships in this space.
It leads back to early on in this conversation where we came up with the idea of going to universities and going to bright inventors and either licensing or acquiring technologies that otherwise would be dormant. Part of what we had been saying, our value proposition is, look, you can either have a certificate that says you have a patent and that can sit on your wall and maybe that's all you want to have happen, but you know what we can do is provide capital to commercialize it and to fulfill the vision of taking that technology and actually having a positive effect on either human or animal health. And I think some people think, well, okay, that's all going to happen because it's a good idea. And sadly, that's not the truth. I mean, it only happens if you have capital to be able to commercialize it.
What do the next two years have in store for you?
I think that it's an exciting time for Seek Labs and Seek It. I think we are at the culmination of years of work, and I believe that the technology has matured to a place where it'll be challenging, but it'll be the most exciting time that this company has ever experienced.
