Terry Lo - Vizgen - Part 1

 Intro - 00:00:01: Welcome to the Biotech Startups Podcast by Excedr Join us as we speak with first-time founders, serial entrepreneurs, and experienced investors about the challenges and triumphs of running a biotech startup from pre-seed to IPO with your host, Jon Chee.

 Jon - 00:00:23: My guest today is Terry Lo, President and CEO of Vizgen Vizgen is developing and commercializing the next generation of genomics tools to expand on the capabilities of spatially resolved transcriptomics. Vizgen technology will aid the acceleration of biological research and discovery to advance human health. Terry is a pioneer in the emerging spatial biology market and has a proven track record of driving exceptional growth across global life science organizations, including Bristol-Myers Squibb, Hologic, Roche, PerkinElmer, and Akoya Biosciences. In addition to over two decades of experience scaling and building multinational biopharma and diagnostic groups, he is also an expert in developing business strategies for novel innovative products. Over the next three episodes, we cover a wide range of topics, including Terry's upbringing in the Midwest, pursuing a master's degree in microbiology at Virginia Tech, transitioning from big pharma to diagnostics, the challenges of scaling up a business, and Vizgen platform, mission, and plans for it's product pipeline. Today, we'll chat about Terry's early years. Studying psychology and molecular genetics as an undergraduate, and later microbiology and finance as a graduate student, transitioning from investment banking to corp dev and marketing roles at Bristol-Myers Squibb, and the importance of understanding customer needs and financial modeling and business development. Without further ado, let's dive into this episode of the Biotech Startups Podcast. Terry, it's so good to see you again. Thanks for taking the time to come on the podcast.

Terry - 00:01:46: Thank you, Jon Great to be here.

Jon - 00:01:48: Yeah, appreciate it. So as our team was kind of thinking about a fun place to start and figuring out ways that listeners can really learn from you vicariously, we thought it'd be fun to turn the hands back on time and really start at kind of the early days for you. And we thought it'd be cool to learn about what were some early experiences in your life that influenced your leadership style and business philosophy.

Terry - 00:02:13: Yeah. Oh, that's great. So I guess we're going to go back down memory lane. We'll start at the beginning. So first of all, I grew up in Ohio, right? So kind of part of the Midwest. My father's Chinese heritage and my mother's Korean. So a little bit of mixed ethnic from the Asian side and kind of growing up in a, what was it, predominantly, I guess you'd call white population in the Midwest. But pretty much, I would say kind of a normal childhood growing up, went to the local university, which was Ohio State University or the Ohio State University, went through the normal college experience there. You know, maybe what was a little unusual, I probably spent more time in college than maybe the average college student. So I think by the time I graduated, it was probably six years later, finishing out my undergraduate. So I enjoyed my time, I would say, during those days.

 Jon - 00:03:02: Absolutely. And growing up, did you always know that you would get into science or was it something where it kind of just like naturally developed as you were just exploring?

 Terry - 00:03:14: Yeah, no, certainly I didn't know at that time that I would be really kind of into this hardcore science field. But I would say, number one, I mean, I always had a fascination of how things work. So I think that that is certainly one of the ways that have tied me to the field. But, you know, maybe like a pretty stereotypical. Asian family, I think the expectation was I was going to grow up to be a doctor or medical doctor. Right. So that was kind of what was laid out for me. That was sort of the path. And actually, I was interested in psychology. And that's what I ended up as my first major or first degree in undergrad was was in psychology, because that was actually what really fascinated me about how behavior and how people think about things and why people do the things that they do. So that sort of interaction, I thought, was always fascinating. And that's. That's actually what I thought I wanted to get into. But I will tell you that that did not go over well at home. And that's why I ended up with a second degree, which was in molecular genetics. And that's actually what ended up getting me excited and interested about some of the sciences field.

Jon - 00:04:18: That's awesome. And I love hearing that. And I think back on my personal experience, too. I was originally exploring philosophy in the early days. Again, similar situation.

Terry - 00:04:28: There's probably only one level worse than psychology.

Jon - 00:04:31: Yeah. They're like, what? We didn't move here. And I was like, oh, this can be valuable, too. And the rest is history. But I'm at Ohio State and now you're doing a double major. And did you have an undergraduate lab experience that kind of got your hands in, like, where it really just fired you up? Or was it something where it was kind of more academic in nature, where it was more via the book?

Terry - 00:04:54: Yeah, I actually did lab work in psychology where I did a couple projects with different professors. And what's interesting, I think, is that, you know, we often think of psychology as kind of a soft science, a social science, not really one of the hard sciences. But it's actually very technically driven. There's a lot of statistics involved and it's very quantitative in that sense. So, you know, it's not as far removed, I think, as maybe I thought going into it. And then moving over into the genetic side, it really was. I think I had a really good initial molecular biology, molecular genetics professor. And he just kind of, really opened the door. It's something that like, wow, this is a really exciting field. And, you know, that was also at a time, I think, where genetics was something that was very new and very hot and exciting. And people were talking about gene therapy. That was the first time people were talking about gene therapy. It was really, really exciting, I think, to start to get into some of that stuff.

Jon - 00:05:54: Absolutely. And I think I had a similar experience to where there were some notable professors. Now, like on when you're originally on the premed track, it almost just feels like cram as much as you can and memorize as much as you can. And then I remember having a formative experience where there are more creative side, not to say the practice of medicine can't be creative, but it definitely did not make premed feel creative. But then had a moment of inspiration where our professor was talking about like wet lab science. And I was like, oh, it doesn't fully require just like cramming back. This is amazing.

Terry - 00:06:31: It's a good segue. You're talking about sort of the wet lab side and actually working in a lab. And I really didn't get that kind of experience until I went to grad school. So I went from there to do a master's in molecular microbiology at Virginia Tech, which was also another experience because you might think Ohio is kind of already out in the sticks. But Virginia Tech's in Blacksburg, which is a little bit more remote. But that was really the first time I had a chance to actually, you know, hold a pipette or, you know, really kind of run experiments. And I think the learning from there was, yeah, I'm not so great at that. I'm not the master chef in the laboratory. And I think that also helped to drive sort of my career path thinking from that point is that, hey, maybe it's not being a scientist in a laboratory. That's probably the best fit. But the science itself is still fascinating. And where do I take that? And thinking about that more from a business direction is where I landed and where I ended up.

Jon - 00:07:28: Likewise, there was a moment while in the lab was like, looking over like my colleagues and being like, oh, wow! Like you are in your element right now. Underneath the hood and you are far better at this than I am. And I had a similar experience. I was like, I think probably I have a stronger affinity to the business side, the business and operations side than I do, just like absolute peer research. That totally resonates with me.

Terry - 00:07:53: Yeah, it's clearly both a skill and an art. I mean, the people that are there that are good at it, I mean, they are master chefs, right? They know how to make these experiments work. And whatever the reason, you know, whatever that gene is that makes you good at it, I guess I don't have it. So it's time to pick another career.

Jon - 00:08:10: Totally. Using the analogy of like a kitchen, like a kitchen can't just function with only a master chef, right? Like there are various people. There's people who are on the grill. There are people who are doing sauces, like, and all of this together works together to make the dream work. Certainly when I was in the lab, I was like, crap, I want to be a master chef. I wish that could be me. But I think reflecting back on it now, it's kind of like that idea of that, like science takes a village. It's kind of like an orchestra and really for it to really work the way we want to. Because like every time I think about science and anything, if you're getting a drug approved or diagnostic test, it's like a little miracle. And it needs to perfectly work and it takes the village.

Terry - 00:08:51: Yeah, I think that's the way the scientific field works as well, right? Which is everything is built on something else. And it's hard to kind of pinpoint to say that really was the breakthrough or that was the person that invented this. And a lot of times people are credited for certain things, but it is certainly a build up process of, you know, so many contributors all over the world contributing into the field. So that's for sure.

Jon - 00:09:14: Absolutely, and there's a timescale element to it as well, as like, obviously, we're kind of like insiders at this point. But I have friends and family who are not in the sciences, but they see the headline like gene therapy approved. And they're like, nice, let's get another one. Like, let's just like, let's keep banging these out. And I'm like, wait a second, that took a long time to get to this point. You know, it's not an overnight success.

Terry - 00:09:39: Yeah, for sure. And then I was just going to add on, I mean, that really was the point, I think, in my journey where I would say then it did sort of become a little bit more clear, like starting to map out like, okay, I think I know what I want to do now, or at least I'm going to create a plan. And from that point on, it really has been pretty well defined in terms of what I felt like, you know, should be the steps, you know, to the next phase for my journey in my career. And it's kind of unfolded uncannily in some ways how I thought it might.

Jon - 00:10:12: And so right out of Virginia Tech grad school, did you know that business school was the path forward? Like, how did you choose your MBA as the fork?

Terry - 00:10:21: Yeah. So out of Virginia Tech, as I was finishing up my master's, and really that was where I was sort of mapping out, like, what do I need to do if I want to have sort of a scientific but also business commercial career? What are the things that are going to be important to be able to continue to move up in that journey? Actually, the first thing I sort of identified really was that, hey, you know, key experience commercially is that you have to know how sales works. Sales is like the common denominator, like where everything ends up being a sell. So understanding the sales process, having experience of doing sales. You know, and talking to a lot of other, I'd say, industry folks at the time, that really was the foundational piece. And, you know, what I also learned at the time talking to others was that, look, you want to do it sort of earlier in your career because if you're moving up in your career and at some point, you know, you're VP of R&D or whatever it is, you're not going to go back and get some sales experience. So if you're going to do it at some point in your career and you want that as part of your background, you want to do that earlier on in your career. So that seemed like a very logical way. And so it's actually a somewhat of a not difficult way to leverage both science and sales together because what I ended up doing was becoming a sales rep for a pharmaceutical company. So as a drug rep, again, sort of a classic sales position in the industry, that's where I started to kind of pick up my sales experience. But even at the time when I was going through that process or even interviewing in that process, I knew that the next step after that would be, would be to go to business school. So I already sort of planned that out as a next step afterwards.

Jon - 00:12:04: I got to say, that's awfully prescient of you to know that getting sales experience early is a critical thing. Because I agree. And I don't think I had the foresight like you did. I was just like, well, I got to figure this out. It's going to have to pay the bills for Exceder. And so I was like, all right, baptism of fire. And I think for a lot of scientists, sales can keep it at bay. It may not feel as natural. I mean, sales is hard. Don't get me wrong. And for you, how was that experience doing sales for the first time after having been in the lab?

Terry - 00:12:42: Yeah, I mean, it certainly was challenging. And I think there's also certain expectation, right? Salespeople, you would think of them to tend to be very extroverted, right? Because they need to connect with a client. They need to be able to go talk to them. And that's not me by nature. I'm more introverted than extroverted. So making that transition, that's a completely new field, you know, completely new skill set of trying to sell and also having that ability to kind of connect with people. I think that was definitely different and definitely something that needed to be learned. But that was also important to be able to learn those kinds of skills. I think what I did find to be more of a common denominator amongst the really good salespeople, that there's all kinds of personalities. I mean, they don't have to be extroverted. That's what I learned. And there are many introverted salespeople. It actually came down more to, I would say, this level of competitiveness that I found to be common amongst like the best salespeople. Like they were all like there to win. They were just so driven, just like any other like sports or any other competition. They just needed to win. And they were so driven by being able to quantify that success that that's really the most common characteristic that I found from the good salespeople. So that was also, I think, a very useful insight for me to kind of see, you know, what really can make sales effective. Like you don't have to be a certain way. You don't have to be a certain style. You just have to have kind of the drive.

Jon - 00:14:06: Totally. And it's funny because I am also, more introverted than I am extroverted. I had a moment of panic when I was first doing sales. I was like, I'm not built for this. When I was in the lab and got into my first foray of sales, I thought it was like, you got to be a person that can go into a room with strangers and just immediately have everyone like be your best friend. And that's not me. Like that's really not me. I'm far better at one-on-one smaller groups. But, you know, exactly what you said, it was eye-opening to see that this kind of style or my personal style wasn't, an outlier. There are definitely other people who kind of have a similar approach, but totally agree on the competitiveness. That is a driving force for sure.

Terry - 00:14:47: Yeah. I mean, one of the things I also learned is that you have to be creative to try to find out where can you get an advantage that maybe other people don't bring the same situation. I mean, you're competing against, you know, these other salespeople who are trying to sell their drugs and the doctor's offices. A lot of times they'll block off, like they won't let you go in to see the doctors. So how do you kind of get past those barriers? So being creative around that and sort of tapping into your own capabilities that might be unique and just try to find some unique angles to solve those problems. It is a very intellectual kind of challenge to go through.

Jon - 00:15:23: Absolutely. And I'm going to imagine like there's buyer psychology for a reason. And like your study into psychology, it kind of lends itself well. So after your kind of initial foray into sales, it sounds like you then headed over to University of Chicago for your MBA. At what point did you decide, okay, it is time.

Terry - 00:15:42: Yeah. Like I was saying, I sort of had the pre-set idea, like I want to spend this much amount of time. And then I should practice by saying I'd spent too long in undergraduate and maybe two of my master's. So it's like already like nine years worth of school, like where I had a real job. And so I didn't have a lot of time to burn at that point in my career. Like I'd start moving, moving on things. So I planned for basically around two years to be in sales. And that's what I did. So that sort of second year is when I started applying to business schools. And part of it was. Also, I did want to go to a school that I felt had a very strong reputation and something that would be value added, you know, as far as my own background. Not only the skill sets, but that people could all say, hey, it's not just Joe Schmo, but there's some credibility just even having the right name, I guess, in terms of your background and your academic training. So that was also part of the thought process in terms of not just the timing, but what school to go to and, you know, would it be worth it or not? I mean, business school is expensive, right? It's not free.

Jon - 00:16:47: Yeah, yeah. Not free.

Terry - 00:16:50: There's no TA positions, at least that I know of when I went to business school. So it has to be something that you think is actually going to help you from a career standpoint. And, you know, those were some of the criteria. But again, you know, trying to move beyond where I was in sales at the time, it felt like that was going to be an important piece to be able to have that experience.

Jon - 00:17:12: Absolutely. And at UChicago, were there any kind of like key lessons or takeaway you took away from that experience? I know you also had a focus on finance. Not all sales is finance, but, you know, so there's a bit of a specialty there.

Terry - 00:17:25: Yeah, exactly. You know, the finance piece for me was, is part of what I was hoping to accomplish was to try to get a diversity of different skill sets of understanding different areas. And, you know, business comprises so many different components and, you know, having already had the science background and getting the sales background. So I wanted to sort of leverage that as an opportunity to really kind of learn the finance side of things, which is a whole nother field to learn about. Probably the two most useful things, though, I did at UChicago was I learned to golf. One skill set I definitely picked up, and there's casinos there also on the river. So that's also another skill set I learned also was at a gamble at the casinos. But the most probably useful thing actually that came out of it was, you do an internship in your summer between your first and your second year of business school. And I did my internship in investment banking. And again, it's like, you know, completely night and day from working in the lab, you know, for being in the sales field. And now I'm working at Merrill Lynch Investment Banking. And it was another kind of really eye-opening experience. And I probably learned more. From that 10-week period, in terms of things that kind of carried forward, it was such an intense time period, such a learning process, that that was just incredibly valuable, I think, in things that I took with me coming out from business school afterwards.

Jon - 00:18:53: Yeah, I mean, investment banking is intense. I haven't done it, but I have friends who have. And I'm like, whoo.

Terry - 00:19:00: I was going to add that for me, I think it was particularly challenging compared to some of my peers. I mean, a lot of people go specifically to UChicago because they want to go into investment banking or they want to go into the finance field because they've already got that background, right? So many of them have already come from investment banking and then went to business school and went back to investment banking. So, I never had a job even where I sat at a desk right up to this point, where I sat in front of a computer as part of a regular job. And the skillset required there, there's a lot of just financial modeling. I mean, just running Excel, right? Being an expert on Excel. I mean, I had no idea how to use Excel, right? I'm coming here to investment banking. You have all these Excel jockeys sitting next to me and I'm like, you know, tapping in, you know, one formula, looking it up, how to do it. It took me so much longer to get through sort of a projects that I was working on, you know, than the typical person that was coming in to do these summer associate positions. And so that was incredibly challenging for me. So there was like many all-nighters that, you know, I'd have to kind of pull through even above and beyond what you typically get in Investment Banking, just because I was so slow. I was so not familiar with how this works and just trying to learn it as I was going. But I was way behind when I first started in that.

Jon - 00:20:20: Yeah. By the way, I had a similar experience. My co-founder was in that world too. And he was like telling me how he's been working on using Excel without a mouse, just hotkeys.

Terry - 00:20:32: That's the way you're supposed to do it, right? It's so much faster.

Jon - 00:20:35: Yeah. I was like, what do you mean? I use the mouse all the time. I was like, I'm doing it wrong.

Terry - 00:20:40: Yeah. You have to know all the shortcuts and all the codes and all that stuff. So it's its own language and people are good at it. They're amazing.

Jon - 00:20:49: Yeah, totally. And looking back on your investment banking stint in that, what would you say was your key takeaway from that experience? Obviously, outside of now you're a spreadsheet assassin.

Terry - 00:21:01: So I wouldn't discount sort of that one skill set in terms of being able to now be really effective, like running Excel, maybe not just running Excel, but obviously doing financial modeling, doing analysis that you've learned to do in investment banking. Because the next job I took was in the pharma industry again, but this time it was in corporate development. So this is like M&A licensing, and it's all deal modeling, valuation, you know, trying to make sure you come up with the right deal structure, but it's based on being able to do the right analysis. And coming out of that, I mean, with sort of a skill set now that I had brought from the investment banking experience was really incredibly useful at the time. And this was now where I had an advantage, right, over my colleagues, that they were not coming necessarily from that type of background. And then being able to do a lot of that really was, it was definitely a competitive advantage to be able to have some of those skills. And something that I still carry, you know, many, many years later that I feel very comfortable trying to do the kind of analysis and modeling and Excel myself up to a certain level now. I've mostly forgotten a lot of the key things that I don't necessarily want to be doing those things anymore, but still have that capability to kind of go back and do a lot of that, which, again, from a career standpoint, it's differentiating. And that's, I think, one of the things that kind of a takeaway here is that what is it that you have as a skill that differentiates you above and beyond? You know, it's not just I'm smarter, right? Because that's a hard thing to demonstrate. And it may not be true. So how do you differentiate and being able to have very clear areas where, hey, this is a specific skill that really is valuable and can apply well. I mean, that alone, I think, actually carries a lot of weight.

Jon - 00:22:52: Totally, there are a lot of smart people. You're not alone. So it's kind of this thing I completely agree is finding unique angles or approaches or other kind of like dimensions in which you can differentiate is critically important. With Corp Dev, like the model can break a transaction. If you don't do the analysis and you don't do the modeling right, that could be a bad acquisition, a good acquisition, you know, and even outside of M&A, we see it all the time at Excedr. It's just like the power of just like being able to forecast. Obviously, it's a little bit of fortune telling. You're like looking into the crystal ball a little bit, but it feels like a little bit of a superpower to be able to look forward like that.

Terry - 00:23:30: It is, you know, if you're really into modeling, it gets very advanced and it becomes more of a black box, right? Like nobody knows what the heck is actually happening. You put your numbers in and then it spits out numbers on the other side. So I think kind of the next beyond that is. You know, really having the ability to sort of communicate and using that as a way to justify your arguments and being able to sort of package that together in a way that you can share with the management. Say, hey, here's the analysis. I've kind of laid it out in a very clear and easy to understand way. Here's how the inputs work and be able to really defend like this is why we want to do what we want to do. That's kind of the way to, I think, apply it, you know, just beyond sort of this, the hardcore, like because a model is just a model. Right. And there's so many assumptions that go into it and whether or not it's actually configured right or wrong. Like nobody knows, you know, so it becomes more than on the communication side. Like, how can I leverage this in a way that now I can make it more clear for other people to understand?

Jon - 00:24:29: Totally. You're right. It is kind of a double edged sword. Like sometimes the model can feel like gospel, that kind of like fortune telling element to it. People are like, nope, this is how. The future will unfold. And you kind of have to put an asterisk to it, like a disclaimer. It's like subject to change because all of these assumptions and inputs that we're putting in here, these are changing variables. But once you spit it out in a PDF, people are like, they hang it up. They're like, this is it. This is like what we're doing for the next six months.

Terry - 00:24:56: This is the truth.

 Jon - 00:24:57: Yeah, this is the truth. And this corp dev role that you're in, was this at Bristol-Myers Squibb?

Terry - 00:25:02: This was at Bristol-Myers Squibb. Yeah. Yeah. And I started in corp dev. And then also moved into marketing later. I wanted to do a little bit more kind of operational on the business side and get into sort of true marketing. So that was the opportunity to kind of get onto the market side. And then I came back to corp dev again. But I also wanted to get international experience. So that was another thing on my checklist. I wanted international experience. So I came back to the corp dev group, but focused specifically on Asia Pacific as my geography.

Jon - 00:25:37: Very cool. Very cool. And I'm kind of like envisioning. It's like we talk about business being this very wide umbrella. The sales is obviously one component. You now know the finance. You know the corp dev, the M&A kind of transactional work. And then now there's like these two buckets, which are another kind of pillar within business of like marketing and then international expansion and Business Development that way. On the marketing side, what are some like key lessons you learned when you did your stint in the marketing department?

Terry - 00:26:03: Yeah, at the time we were launching kind of a new indication for breast cancer for one of the drugs that we had at Bristol-Myers Squibb. I think it's probably nothing necessarily earth shattering as far as people who have done marketing would kind of find this like sort of new or novel or not even like how you might think about marketing. But just in terms of how to think about the different marketing channels that you need to go after, you know, you're not just creating sort of one channel or one focus. You really have to kind of figure out the best way to create the right mix of the different channels and be able to message to them and what content you want to drive into those different channels. And then again, it becomes sort of like this model, right? Where like, how does all of that help you get a return on that investment that you're making on all of these different channels? So, you know, we've done a lot of work in that area to really figure out how to maximize that activity and that investment. A lot of work on trade shows, right?

Jon - 00:26:58: Yeah. Yeah.

Terry - 00:26:59: Like, and. I think in today's world, it's a little bit old school, but, you know, the trade show was such a core part of how do you interact with customers and how do you get your message across? Like people would see you at the trade shows or see your company at the trade shows. And what is it that actually makes it a good trade show to be able to present that? Whether it's through your booth or whether it's through seminars or whether it's through KOL dinners, right? Just trying to coordinate all of those activities. So this was quite tactical, right? It was a lot of sort of tactics around. What are the best ways to kind of really drive customer adoption and customer awareness around the product?

Jon - 00:27:37: Totally. And I have found the practice of marketing is also very analytical. And there's a lot of like financial models that go into marketing because like there's time and money going into a marketing initiative. But the running joke is like, I know half of my marketing spend works, but I don't know which half. I don't know.

Terry - 00:27:54: It's always a challenge and you really have a hard time measuring it. And this is the things that, you know, we talk today internally. About how do we measure this and how do we evaluate success around different programs? Because obviously there's a cost here and you've got limited resources. So you want to get the bang for your buck. And maybe the other thing I didn't layer on is that the scientific aspect. I didn't talk about that, right? We're still on the science side.

Jon - 00:28:18: We're still doing science.

Terry - 00:28:19: There's a big scientific aspect of this as well. That's so key, right? And what we're selling to doctors in life sciences or we're selling to research scientists and laboratories. So the science. The science piece and being able to really communicate like, what is the breakthrough here? How do we talk about, you know, what's been developed from a medical application standpoint? And really deepening dive into a lot of these studies and being able to present back the research from the studies. I mean, that was such a core part of what we did in marketing.

Jon - 00:28:49: Totally. And I think, again, kind of like to go back to the kitchen analogy or like an orchestra grounded in the science, like obviously you have to have really good science, but you also need to be able to communicate it well. If you have really groundbreaking science, but are unable to communicate it, it can sometimes just like fall flat and no one knows. And then obviously that lends itself well to actual sales too, when you're trying to actually like boots on the ground by interface with people. So sounds like you've leveled up a lot in terms of like marketing know-how and you're now making this transition to international business development. Can you talk a little bit about that experience and how that unfolded?

Terry - 00:29:23: Yeah. I mean, I think for international, I mean, I think at least for me, you know, still young in career, like just wanted to travel and wanted to be out in different places and, you know, eat different foods and stay at different hotels. I mean, that stuff was all exciting back then. I mean, it's like not necessarily too exciting today, but in those days, I would say part of the appeal, right. Wanted to have, you know, some experiences to be able to go out and travel and do some of that. And it was, it was a great way to sort of combine some of the business experiences and then apply it also into different areas. And I think what's really interesting is that a lot of my career has focused on kind of emerging fields, right. Emerging technology, emerging markets. But when I say emerging markets, you probably think about like, you know, South America or markets that are not yet as rich maybe as the United States, but it's really a lot of this kind of early stage penetration, of a business, of a product and how to get into those markets. And that certainly was, I think, the experience for APAC. And then later also when I moved to my next role as well, which was focused on international was really, that was an opportunity really to learn about like, oh, this product has been in the US for like 20 years, but it's the first time it's come to this country. And so it's, you really get the opportunity to figure out like, how are you building this business for this product line or this product area into a new marketplace?

Jon - 00:30:49: Totally. And that's interesting too, because like, we're currently going through a similar international expansion and we've been doing the Excedr thing in the United States for a long time, but then we're like jumping in. We're just like, whoa, it almost feels like brand new, like emerging, like company creation. It's like, oh, like this thing that I'm so familiar with, but in this context feels like brand new, brand new. And so you're now doing international business development. And I know I've spoken to a lot of folks who want to like learn, like from a scientific background, want to break into business development. Would you have any advice for anyone who's looking to break into business development? Like what are some like, skill sets that are worth developing and what would it take to break that ice?

Terry - 00:31:30: Just to clarify, because business development sometimes has two different meanings in the industry. So sometimes business development, we think about it as more like sales, where you're effectively trying to, usually a new market or a new product that you're kind of early on trying to drive early adoption around. The business development I was in was still part of the corporate development side. So that's still more like M&A licensing. It's like the company level deal making rather than at an end customer level transaction. But kind of to answer your question, maybe on both sides, I mean, I think having sales experience, again, it just applies everywhere, right? Because it is something that you, one, it's not always a good just skill set to have, but really just knowing the customer. That's what at the end of this, people want to make sure, or you want to make sure that you have this capability where you understand the customer. So sales is the core way to really get that type of experience and understand the customer. And then, you know, marketing on the other side of it really helps you to kind of understand, like, what are the groups of customers that we're dealing with, right? Then how do we kind of make sure we're messaging to these groups the right way? And then for me, because there's more corporate development in this job role, it was really about bringing in some of that financial experience as well. Like how to structure a deal, how to do the valuation, how to show the economics for one side. And the other side make sense for both sides and we can shake hands and get the deal done.

Jon - 00:33:02: Absolutely. And I love hearing this too, because like, I think sometimes science has a tendency to put the blinders on and just like hyper, hyper specialized. But what I'm hearing is that there's definitely benefits to be had to a breadth of knowledge and being able to kind of like put on different hats at any given time when, you know, obviously the general MO is to just like, boom, you are now this person and you do this one

Terry - 00:33:31: It's always a kind of interesting decision pathway, right? Whether or not you have a career, which is really, you know, let's say you're into marketing and you spend, you know, 30 years just doing marketing and you just keep kind of going up the marketing ladder. And that would be one path versus, you know, you're kind of doing some time here, you're doing a little bit of time there, picking up different skills in different areas. There are pros and cons in both directions, I think, right? Because you don't necessarily want to be, you know, jack of all trades, master of none, right? And it's like, what skill do I actually bring? I'm not an expert in anything, right? So trying to think that through, it's an interesting decision point. I don't think there's really a right or wrong answer there. I certainly found in my whole career that it was incredibly valuable to have broad experiences from different areas. And, you know, certainly my current role, being able to have that background has allowed me to kind of understand, hopefully, parts of the business better, think about strategy better. But also think about the underlying drivers that are important for our business.

Jon - 00:34:35: Absolutely. And one way I heard it well put is kind of like this thing where you have a breadth of experience, which then informs where you want to specialize or where you want to invest more of your time. Kind of to what you're saying is kind of like instead of just being a jack of all trades, master of none, you kind of get that exposure and then you figure out where your strengths are. And then you're like, okay, it's finance. It's like finance, but it's all additive and accretive where like everything you've kind of experienced makes you a better, in this case, finance person or whatever it may be you choose.

Terry - 00:35:05: Yeah, I think there's no doubt that any of your experiences hopefully should be a creative, right? It should add to hopefully your life journey. I think you're always going to be able to benefit. So I think wherever there's sometimes an option of like, should I do this or shouldn't I do it? I think erring towards doing something generally tends to be a good decision because you just get this new opportunity that you've had a chance to learn something different and something new. And hey, you know, maybe that's something that you didn't realize was going to be such an important part of your future life. So I do think that that does play out. And that's sort of the decision point of you focus kind of in one area or do you kind of really try to diversify? I mean, I think a lot of it's also personality driven as well, right? Again, going back to people have different personalities. People will do well in a certain types of pathways and do better maybe in other pathways. So I think you also have to kind of consider your own personality and figure out like, yeah, you know, I like to kind of go and sort of pick up new things and then try to integrate it all. And then try to apply it to the next thing. Or I just love doing R&D. And I just want to do that.

Jon - 00:36:12: Totally. That's a great point. That is not to be understated. It's like it has to work with your personality because if it doesn't, you're going to wake up and get out of bed and be like, I don't like this. You'll want to just like throw in the towel. It has to have at least some sort of like it doesn't feel like friction is what I would imagine it feeling if you're just like forcing it.

Terry - 00:36:31: Yeah, exactly. I think that comes down to that's sort of the real question that you want to answer, right? It's for yourself. It's like, what is it that I really want to do? And that's a hard question to answer sometimes, right? You think you want one thing, but then you don't really know until you've kind of gone through the process.

 Outro - 00:36:48: That's all for this episode of the Biotech Startups Podcast. We hope you enjoyed our discussion with Terry Lo. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave us a review and share it with your friends. Thanks for listening. And we look forward to having you join us again for part two of our conversation with Terry. The Biotech Startups Podcast is produced by Excedr. Don't want to miss an episode? Search for the Biotech Startups Podcast wherever you get your podcasts and click subscribe. Excedr provides research labs with equipment leases on founder-friendly terms to support paths to exceptional outcomes. To learn more, visit our website, www.excedr.com. On behalf of the team here at Excedr thanks for listening. The Biotech Startups podcast provides general insights into the life science sector through the experiences of its guests. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from the podcast is at the user's own risk. The views expressed by the participants are their own and are not the views of Excedr or sponsors. No reference to any product, service or company in the podcast is an endorsement by Excedr or its guests.