Angel Invest Boston

In the final episode of the podcast I, Sal Daher, review important lessons I learned in seven years of interviews and decades of investing. In my voice and in the voice of my guests, I recapitulate the discoveries most salient to me and invite listeners to find their own nuggets in the sound archive which will remain available on Apple Podcasts and other platforms. AngelInvestBoston.com will have 250 episode pages with sound, notes, and in most cases, annotated transcripts.

I’ll be publishing new content at Substack.com focused on keeping fit as we age. You can find me there under Sal Daher or under Aging Fit. Startups will show up occasionally. Here’s a link to the Substack:

Sal Daher's Substack - Aging Fit

Thanks for listening.

Highlights:

• · Lesson 1: Company-Specific Risk – The Bad & The Good – Why It Matters in Startup Investing
• · Lesson 2A: “You know nothing, Jon Snow” – The Need for Tight Risk Control
• · Lesson 2B: “You Know Nothing, Jon Snow” – Whence a Real 400X Return
• · Lesson 3A: What to Look for in a Startup? What to Look for in a Founding Team?
• · Lesson 3B: The Most Significant Results from Ed Roberts’ Research
• · Lesson 4A: It’s Important Not to Keep Your Idea Secret but to Talk to Many People About It
• · Lesson 4B: The Google Problem – Why Founders Should Be Open About their Ideas
• · Lesson 3B Recapitulated: Robust Finding: Larger Teams Do Better; Startups Tend to Have Teams that Are Too Small
• · Lesson 5A: Focus, Focus, Focus
• · Lesson 5B: Focus, Focus, Focus
• · Lesson 6: Take the Money & Run
• · Lesson 7: It’s a Long Way from the Lab to the Clinic
• · Why I Am Ending the Podcast – Archive Available – See You at Substack.com

Guest: Sal Daher

Topics: angel investing strategies, co-founders, biotech, exits, pivots, partnerships with strategics

Lessons Learned is a compilation of hard-won lessons in angel investing. They come from my podcast interviews over these seven years as well as from my three decades of angel investing. Hints on how to build your portfolio, how to eliminate sure losers and other practical advice will be offered in the voice of my guests and in my own voice. Sorry that the release of the episode is delayed until Friday 12/29 due to personal matters and this year's Christmas calendar. Thanks for listening.

Aging Fit Substack: Learn More

Repeat life science entrepreneur Tom Weldon is now taking on aging. He is commercializing a compound to extend health span developed at a prominent institution. Composed of substances generally considered as safe by the FDA, the formula has shown impressive results in mice and, to date, in one human, Tom himself. Intriguing chat with a dynamic founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Tom Weldon
• What Problem Rejuvant Addresses
• "... Then the first time the combination is not additive, take it out. That's a process that would probably take a year or two, but it ensures that you'll have an optimal result. Or, you can buy Rejuvant, because we did all that work already..."
• "... if you decide that you'd like to try Rejuvant and you go on subscription, we give you a free DNA methylation test at time zero and then we give you another one after six months, which is included in the cost ... They're different and they have different algorithms. All of them except two that I'm aware of, one of which is what we provide, requires your current chronologic age as an input..."
• "... It was actually discovered by Steve Horvath and he developed the first biologic clock ... Your DNA is damaged every second that you're alive. Prior to puberty, your body does an exceptional job of repairing all of that. However, after that, it starts to decline..."
• "... Is there any evidence that repair is actually at work? How do we know that it's not just removing the methyl molecule from the DNA, and you have damaged the DNA that's just not methylated?..."
• "... How long have you been on Rejuvant?..."
• How Tom Became an Entrepreneur
• "... This company had this trajectory and now it's just gone Chapter 7 recently. That is the tough side of these life science technology companies because the technology moves so fast..."
• "... very difficult space. What I have seen in the medical device space, these 510k pathway devices where there is an existing predicate device, and then you can design something which is, no worse and perhaps much better than the predicate device..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Aging Fit Substack: Learn More

Life science board member and advisor Paul Hartung is back with wise tips on how to fund your biotech startup in these had times. Listen or read below.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Paul Hartung, Experienced Biotech Board Member & Advisor
• Paul Hartung Closed a Financing in the Midst of the Last Recession
• Seek Out the Right Grant Funding, Watch Expenses
• Pitch Contests Don’t Provide Much Money but Can Spotlight Your Startup
• Peer-Reviewed Publications Can Raise Visibility of Life Science Startups
• Look Outside Your Area, Consider Syndication Across Angel Groups
• Watch Out for Funds That Can’t Make Good on Term Sheets – It Happens More than You Think
• Be Upfront About Your Future Funding Plans
• “The nature of the investors change. For each stage of financing what you want to do is make sure that you identify who the lead investor is. Very important.”
• Lead Investors
• Summation
• About Strategic Investors

Topics: biotech, fundraising, raising money

Aging Fit Substack: Learn More

In my fourth decade of angel investing, I’m happy with my investments but regret having put them in my IRAs. Here are pros and cons of having illiquid, operationally complex and hard-to-value assets in IRAs.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Investing in Startups via an IRA Can Be Burdensome, Here’s Why
• How I came to Have so Much of my Net Worth in my IRAs
• Thank You Citibank for Encouraging a Young Banker to Save
• Thank You Bob Smith for Allowing Me to Fish When the Fish Were Running
• Why The Fish Are Not Running Any More
• “Some weeks I spend half my time dealing with IRA-related paperwork. I have many better things to do with my life.”
• The Initial Investment Is a Lot of Work for Everyone Involved
• Corporate Actions Guarantee Constant Attention to the IRA Is Required
• Then There Are the Required Annual Valuations
• It Gets Worse!
• The Upside of Investing in Startups from the IRAs
• Conclusion

Topics: angel investing strategies

Aging Fit Substack: Learn More

Raul Rosa, artist, musician, and sound engineer, discusses his work with the Angel Invest Boston Podcast, some of his favorite interviews, and his own startup, Podspot.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Raul Rosa
• Raul's Favorite Interviews
• Fortified Bike
• Howard Stevenson
• PodSpot
• Wistia
• Piction Health
• Savran Technologies
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, COVID, robotics/AI

Aging Fit Substack: Learn More

Katharine Woodman-Maynard has for seven years created a gorgeous and enduring graphic manifestation of this podcast on the web. I am fortunate to have this gifted artist enhancing my work with her talent and wisdom. She returns to talk about her favorite interviews, to share her journey as a professional artist and to offer valuable advice for those starting out.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Katharine Woodman-Maynard
• Katharine's Perspective of Startups
• "... I'm very grateful to you for having connected me with Drew Madson, who founded Readlee. Tell a little bit of the story. How did you connect with Drew?..."
• EndeavorOTC
• "... I found it fascinating in the interview that Eddie talked about how it was actually shown in trials to be more effective for adults than it was for children..."
• "... Human interaction resets us, brings us back to normalcy because if we're off on our own, we go batty..."
• Katharine's Professional Artistic Journey
• Sticking to a Schedule
• "... Once you can learn self-compassion for yourself and realize you're human and you make mistakes and not waste so much energy on being negative and hard, I think you're a lot freer to, advance in your career because you're not so hard on yourself..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, ed tech, platform

Aging Fit Substack: Learn More

Ethan Pierce’s startup Adaptive Reader makes great literature accessible to kids not reading at grade level. Harnessing generative AI with sophisticated prompts and quality control by humans creates compelling texts based on the classics. Ethan and his co-founder even have a promising business model. Great chat!

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Ethan Pierce
• Adaptive Reader and What it is Solving
• "... It's much better if they have this contact with the author, albeit in a structure that's simplified. After all, we're always reading Dante in the translation. We're reading Homer in the translation. It doesn't make it any less compelling..."
• Teachers' Opinions of Adaptive Reader
• "... That controversy, the conversation, the passion around helping these students read is really important and that's why we've been really grounded in research here and these conversations with these experts. I think talking to these teachers, the biggest challenge that they face is just getting kids to read at all..."
• Ethan's Entrepreneurial Journey
• Palette
• How Adaptive Reader Came About
• How Can Listener's Participate in Adaptive Reader

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, product, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Brian Denenberg is an angel investor, company advisor, and co-founder. Here, he discusses some of the companies he has been involved with, including Fairmarkit, Tive, and his work at Venture Lane Studio helping startups grow sales.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Brian Denenberg
• Fairmarkit
• How Fairmarkit Was Started
• Tive
• Inbound vs Outbound Marketing
• "... What Tive did, he innovated a tracker that goes on shipments, and it could go anywhere in the world, and it could not just tell you where the shipment was. It could tell you the condition of the shipment..."
• "... Scientists don't know the huge difference that exists between the lab and the clinic and industry. There's a massive gap and they think that something that works in the lab will work in a clinic or an industry very easily, but it mostly does not..."
• Venture Lane Studio
• "... We call it a studio. It gives us the flexibility to work in different ways. The best way to think of it is like an accelerator. It's really bespoke. We take three to four companies at a time. We're not looking to doing big cohorts..."
• Cedience
• CIRT
• Qase
• Brian's Background
• How Brian Got into Startups
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Brian Freeman, MD, co-founded Energesis to help overweight people lose weight by growing their energy-burning brown fat. Experiments in mice have shown this approach works with GLP-1 drugs such as Wegovy in accentuating weight loss. Great chat with a compelling repeat founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Brian Freeman
• Energesis: The Problem it's Solving
• "... What we're doing is we're acting on those cells and basically nudging them to make more mature brown fat cells, so that the mass of the brown fat cells increases..."
• "... That's pretty much it. We're trying to recapitulate cold exposure in a pill. That's right..."
• "... one of the issues with weight loss due to, let's call it caloric restriction ... The body doesn't take it lightly because we've evolved not to starve, right? ... The normal physiologic response to that is to reduce metabolic rate. That makes it harder and harder to lose weight as your weight goes down, and it makes it very difficult to keep that weight off..."
• Further Thoughts on Energesis
• Brian's Entrepreneurial Journey
• "... What if you could magically make everybody in America lean overnight, think of what that would do to healthcare costs. It would be reduced by at least two-thirds..."

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, product, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

My Walnut buddy Andy Bartlett, PhD brings great energy to the group and an expert’s perspective on computing. We talked about our favorite startups including Savran Technologies, evTS, and BioFeyn. He has interesting things to say about ChatGPT. We also had a great chat about his angel journey.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Andy Bartlett
• Savran Technologies
• "... three of the things I really love to see in startups is a founder like Çağrı that will go through walls, that's so important. Defensibility that they have a moat, so the strong patent portfolio..."
• evTS
• BioFeyn
• "... We're talking about the University of Illinois Gies School of Business. I'm so impressed with the way the faculty is running that business school. They're running it like a disruptive business..."
• "... They've gone ahead and they've kept this very affordable. The full program, it's 18 classes plus three capstones costs about $23,000 total..."
• Andy's Entrepreneurial Background
• "... My mother's family had entrepreneurship. My great-grandfather, Alonzo Dodge, started a Dodge Moving and storage company. I always thought my grandfather had founded it, but actually, it was his father. They always ran that. That was the family business..."
• "... Eventually, I got my way into the electrical engineering department and I've embraced that for years and years..."
• "... At Chrysler, I could draw a block diagram to model some algorithm I wanted to use for onboard diagnostic testing of the Chrysler vehicles. I could model it. I could simulate it. I could pull down a menu and immediately generate code that would run on a computer in the backseat of a test car. I would drive around and I could do my experiments and collect my data..."
• Andy's Opinion on ChatGPT

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Kevin Majeres, MD, teaches cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) at Harvard Medical School. CBT is the gold standard to treat mental health conditions without drugs. CBT can also help with workplace issues such as burnout or anxiety. Dr. Majeres (pronounced Majors) has built a digital platform, OptimalWork.com, to improve the quality of work life. I learned really useful things from this interview.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Dr. Kevin Majeres
• What OptimalWork is Solving
• "... what we are doing is bringing the insights of cognitive behavioral therapy out of the normal context, which is working with the cognitive behavioral therapist. We're bringing that to people in the setting of their work..."
• "... In fact, everything with regard to eating behaviors, there's abundant evidence that cognitive behavioral therapy works. At one level, you could see that the more someone was afraid of hunger, the more likely they would be to act on it..."
• "... This is why I think anxiety is the most central emotion to understand because anxiety is the urge to avoid challenge as challenge..."
• "... Cognitive behavioral therapy, I should say, it also tends to focus on what's happening right now. What are the emotions showing up right now? Where's the avoidance right now? Where does the reframing have to take place right now?"
• "... I think that we need more and more things like Endeavor OTC that are helping to identify what are the particular mental muscles that can be worked out, and whether these things are going to be universally applicable, or maybe there are certain subpopulations that that's exactly the workout that they need..."
• "... How would you compliment this Cybex machine for the mind with cognitive behavioral therapy?"
• "... That in a sense is like what we teach people at The Golden Hour, is how to just briefly strategize what you're about to do, lay out the steps in advance, think of how you want to be stretching yourself in these steps, calm your mind down for a moment, and then launch into it. Then you're going to have full traction, and then you get momentum. Flow is really just momentum in work..."
• Dr. Majeres' Psychiatry Journey
• "... anxiety is adrenaline waiting to be reframed..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, scholar

Jason Burke wants a better way for angels to invest in startups. He founded All Stage, the platform for angel investing that powers TBD Angels which he also co-founded. In this illuminating interview Jason discusses how All Stage helps the angel ecosystem. We also chatted about Moolah Kicks, and Folia Health.

Here's how All Stage's deal looks like in the All Stage platform:

All Stage deal within the All Stage product

Highlights:

● Sal Daher Introduces Jason Burke

● All Stage and the Problem it's Solving

● "... Because unless you've done sales a lot, it's really hard to deal with rejection, especially for scientific founders..."

● "... It's an example of some of the connective tissue between Showcase, the founder tool, and Community, the investor tool, to allow for that collaboration to happen..."

● Moolah Kicks

● Folia Health

● Jason's Entrepreneurial Journey

● "... I built the Tufts cross-country site, which today in 2023 doesn't seem groundbreaking, but at the time having a password on a site and detecting the IP address of who's using it and greeting them, that sort of stuff was absolute magic to do..."

● "... which came first? Angel investing or starting a company?"

● "... Was it a personal relationship, the first investment that you made as an angel?"

● Advice to the Audience

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Brazilian startup MirScience Therapeutics is working on reversing muscle loss. I had an illuminating chat with co-founder Milena Peregrino, PhD about the technology and the company’s progress.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Milena Peregrino
• MicroRNAs and What They Do
• MirScience Therapeutics
• "... Keeping in mind that we're talking about mouse models, it has not gone into human trials yet, but this is very promising..."
• "... We are going to need the non-rodent species. For now, we are planning to go with non-human primates, so monkeys..."
• How MirScience Was Founded
• Milena's Background
• "... Most people die from the results from falls. It's not necessarily immediately, it's within six months. If they have a severe fall, old people decline very fast and so this has huge implication for people to age better. The ability to have muscular old people going around instead of frail people who fall over easily..."
• Why Milena Chose Biology
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Repeat founder Agustin Lopez Marquez, ex-nference, brings his AI savvy to food delivery with his new startup. Built on CloudKitchens’ infrastructure, Mowgli addresses pain points for diners, sous-chefs and drivers. Loved my chat with this brilliant and practical founder. Sample Mowgli’s homey meals from exotic places at https://khipi.com/. (delivers only to Boston & Cambridge for now)

Highlights:

● Sal Daher Introduces Agustin Lopez Marquez

● "... my co-founder, who happens to be my wife, Brinda, she was the one that started the company and the first product about a couple of years back..."

● "... The idea here is that these are meals for explorers, for people who like to venture out, travel. This is not pizza or your usual weekend fare for the kids, and so forth..."

● "... it's an infrastructure play that has happened in the last three to five years. It's modular kitchens that are just the kitchens that are meant for delivery-only companies..."

● "... You're going to become like the McDonald's of adventurous eating..."

● "... we already have more than 10 drivers that consistently, every Tuesday, they choose to work for Khipi as opposed to working for any other food delivery company..."

● "... I understand you have 400 customers ordering right now. 90 of those are super dedicated and they order every week. They give you 80% of your business..."

Topics: co-founders, culture, discovering entrepreneurship, robotics/AI

Title: AI for Discovery Dining

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Repeat founder Todd Zion, PhD is back to update us on exciting developments at his second biotech startup, Akston Bio. We also geeked out a bit on how these magical proteins are concocted in the company’s bioreactors. Fun and instructive chat with a stellar founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Todd Zion
• Akston Bio's Founding Story
• "... The antigen in this case is the person's own insulin..."
• "... you're still taking advantage of that antibody portion, but you've neutered it so that it no longer alerts the immune system, but it retains one property that antibodies all have, which is the ability to recycle and last for very long periods of time in circulation..."
• "... We took the veterinary candidates and we partnered those with a company called Dechra Pharmaceuticals, PLC. They're one of the leaders in veterinary pharma development and this is all in the public domain..."
• "... We made a pivot at that point saying, 'Well, what if we just go back to the portion of the antibody that interacts with the immune system and make ourselves a vaccine against COVID-19 using the same exact technology?'..."
• "... you're going to continue involved in manufacturing, or are you just going to buckle down in the veterinary space and spin off these other technologies to other players?..."
• "... if you're not pivoting at least once in your development, you're probably doing something wrong..."
• Todd's Funding History
• "... what goes on in a bioreactor, which is the heart of what you're doing? Geek out a little bit of bioreactors..."
• "... there are these companies that do nothing but transfect CHO cells to produce particular types of protein..."
• Energesis

Topics: biotech, COVID, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Rather than purloin my kids' Ritalin, I play EndeavorOTC daily to improve my attention and be sharper. Eddie Martucci, PhD is the founder of Akili that developed the app which is backed by real science. In fact, the kid's version is FDA-cleared to treat ADHD in 8-12 year olds. Don't miss this great chat.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Eddie Martucci

• The Science Behind EndeavorOTC

• "... This is not IQ. This is attention. You can have extremely high IQ or low IQ and have a high attention score and low IQ or vice versa..."

• "... people with ADHD, it is not that they don't want to pay attention ... It's that that system of the brain that allows you to filter out what's irrelevant to your goal and focus in on what's relevant, that part of the brain, that interference filter is weakened..."

• "... You cannot become addicted to it because can't do it for more than 25 minutes period..."

• Eddie's Entrepreneurial Journey

• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

The third time is the charm for Piction Health. Super founder Susan Conover is back to talk about the third iteration of their business model which is showing promise of scaling profitably. Her AI has ingested a million diagnosed images of hair and skin conditions and is now making dermatologists 15X more productive. See for yourself at PictionHealth.com.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Susan Conover
• What Piction Health is Solving
• "... We solve the full problem for patients, end-to-end. If they have a rash or a mole they're worried about, or a case like that, they submit a case, we review that case within 24 hours with our board-certified dermatologist, we call in prescriptions..."
• A Typical Consultation at Piction Health
• "... How did you discover this? How is it that it dawned on you that this is the direction to go in?..."
• "... Dermatologists loving working with us is one of our really important metrics that we want to make it really easy for them..."
• "... How can our listeners be helpful to Piction Health?"
• Thoughts to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Rotator cuff tears are debilitating. What if you could take action to avoid them? Rabeeh Majidi, PhD founded OrthoKinetic Track to do just that through a wearable device and a predictive algorithm. Listen to our chat to learn more.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Rabeeh Majidi
• What OrthoKinetic Track is Solving
• "... What I would say is that orthopedic telemedicine lacks comprehensive physical exams..."
• "... How is it that your system solves a problem that is of real interest to the providers?..."
• "... it's not just about what you know, but also who you know..."
• How Rabeeh Became an Entrepreneur
• Parting Thoughts to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Richard Vlasimsky is using AI to create a low-cost way of vastly expanding our ability to detect lung cancer early. His algorithm for detecting lung nodules in chest x-rays just got FDA clearance. Listen to this remarkable founder who’s done a lot with modest funding.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Richard Vlasimsky
• What IMIDEX is Solving
• "... how much your studies cost to get your 510k.."
• "... We had multiple radiologists looking at the image, and then we had a final truther that adjudicated these independent reads that the radiologist did..."
• "... Payers care about catching it early so that they have better outcomes and the costs are much lower ... The providers, being the medical systems or the physicians, typically hospitals, they care about it because of liability issues and also because they could have the opportunity to treat something and they would get the revenue stream..."
• "... It's like a very fine-tooth comb picks up all the nits. The specificity relates to how many of those things that you pick up are actually what you're looking for and not false positives..."
• Exit Possibilities
• "... his definition of a startup is an enterprise that uses resources that it does not yet command..."
• Richard’s Entrepreneurial Journey
• "... You had this experience of joining a startup, then creating your own startup which was using machine learning..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, robotics/AI, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Growing new cartilage in your knees is a dream about to become reality. Listen to Ben Holmes, PhD, co-founder of Nanochon, to learn about his promising technology. Shoutout to Richard Meiklejohn of M2D2 for the introduction.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Ben Holmes
• What Problem Nanochon is Solving
• "... That's really what we're looking to do, is offer a solution that can be a much easier, much more cost-effective solution for providers, but also something that can really provide much better short and long-term outcomes for patients, and, ultimately, make the knee replacement obsolete..."
• The Solution: What it is, and How it Works
• "... We're seeing much better repair, and we're doing it with something that's an easy-to-use, off-the-shelf product..."
• What is I-Corps?
• Future Funding Plans
• Names and Numbers
• Ben's Entrepreneurial Journey
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

During COVID, Readlee, Drew Madson’s startup, offered teachers a highly effective way to measure and remedy reading deficits among online learners. This led to the company being acquired by Paper, the tutoring platform. An inspiring interview.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Drew Madson
• What Readlee is Solving
• Behind the Scenes of Readlee
• How Readlee Came to Be
• "... COVID just highlighted this need that already existed..."
• "...I highly recommend checking out The Opportunity Atlas. If listeners haven't looked at this, it's an amazing analysis of how certain interventions can actually improve people's ability to make more money over the course of their lives and have more opportunity and flourishing..."
• "... What are large language models going to do to this space?..."
• How Drew Developed an Interest in Education
• Parting Thoughts

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Tech founder David Kessler discusses his journey as an angel investor in companies such as CleanFiber, Wasabi, and Hilltop Bio.

Sponsored by Purdue University enrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces David Kessler
• "... This is like a very counterintuitive investment for angel investors, but it was angel-funded..."
• The Importance of Updates
• What Hilltop Bio Does
• "... This is why I want to create infrastructure to help the angels support these academic founders with connections..."
• Wasabi
• "... helping founders hone their messaging, hone their presentation..."
• "... Basically, the question is, what other ways of looking at the world are there and are you flexible enough to say that there are other ideas out there, and you may wind up pivoting into one of those..."
• How David Kessler Got into Angel Investing
• "... Start slow, start small, and don't invest alone..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, building wealth, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Salvatore Viscomi, M.D. is CEO of Carna Health, a digital platform that is making it easier for patients with chronic conditions to do tests at home that would normally have to be done in the hospital.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Salvatore Viscomi
• What Carna Health is Solving
• "... We connect the device to our platform, we collect the data, we stage the disease, and then we share that information with the patient-provider..."
• "... The solution is really to bring the testing to the community, identify the 90% of people that don't know they have it, let them know they have it..."
• "... The devices on their own without connectivity and without a platform are really not a scalable solution for the type of programs that are needed to make an impact on these diseases ... The doctors are connected through a physician portal, and we identify all the people that are being screened..."
• Carna Health's Business Model
• "... We don't want our patients, necessarily, who are not feeling well, have medical conditions, to be exposed to other patients and potentially get infected..."
• "... One of the ways that Carna Health enables hospital home, is that it provides some of that testing in real-time, so patients don't need to go into a laboratory or phlebotomist..."
• Digital Twins: What Are They?
• Salvatore's Entrepreneurial Journey
• Advice to the Audience
• "... I think our system has been based on being very reactive to disease as opposed to prevention. The truth is that about 80% of longevity is determined by you and your environment and 20% by your genetics..."

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, product, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Nick LaRovere and Matt Hawkins co-founded Pryzm.io seeking to simplify the process of buying a home via technology.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Nick LaRovere and Matt Hawkins

• What Pryzm.io is Solving

• "... Nick and I are both technical co-founders. We love building things, and so we're really excited to actually have our product in the hands of our early agent partners here in Boston..."

• "... We take what is previously only agent-facing tooling, and we flip it around so that the consumer can really take charge of their own transaction. They can be empowered to work autonomously..."

• The Importance of Renter's Insurance

• "... real estate is a very congested space from technology perspective. What Pryzm is really trying to do is be that foundational information layer that the rest of the real estate experience can evolve from..."

• "... at Pryzm we are very much aware of where the opportunity for technology to help automate that space is, to understand documentation, to summarize documentation, to frame it, or repurpose it in useful ways that are understandable by somebody who hasn't read a full mortgage before, and that is very much part of the Pryzm experience..."

• How Pryzm.io Came to Be

• "... To make not just the entire ecosystem, but especially that consumer, that person who's really the core, the crux of the transaction, to have a better experience..."

• Parting Thoughts to the Audience

Topics: co-founders, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, robotics/AI

Coach Jina Klapisch who helps Sal Daher keep off 100 pounds is our guest in this episode. Sal and Jina discuss how HMR clients are able to take off and keep off significant weight with no hunger or feeling of deprivation. Check out HMR Weight Loss and Lifestyle Coaching at:

https://www.hmrnatick.com/about_us

Highlights:

● Sal Daher Introduces Jina Klapisch

● What Sets HMR Apart From the Rest

● How HMR Works

● "... What you're doing here is helping people discover the things that are easy for them to do repeatedly and make them into habits, and not try to do stuff that's hard, impossible for them..."

● Decision-Free

● Sal's Diet Journey at the Age of Thirteen

● Oprah and HMR

● "... when you're trying to make a very big change in your life, whether it's quitting smoking or quitting drinking, or with food, you need to take a break from that substance ... so that you can see clearly as you lose this weight and start to really figure out who I am as an eater..."

● How Your Environment Can Affect Your Weight

● Outlive by Peter Attia MD

● "... The first half mile that you walk every single day is the golden half mile. The first mile you walk is the golden mile. That is going to add years to your life..."

● Advice to the Audience

● Jina's Background

● "... 80% of weight loss is keeping it off, the hard part..."

● Jina's Parting Thoughts

After recording the full episode titled “Tech & Weight Control” I realized I left out some important technologies I use in making the shakes that support my keeping off 100 pounds. So, here’s a mini-episode with that staircase wit, as the French call it.

Highlights:

• · Ninja Creami Ice Cream Maker
• · Ninja Bullet & Cuisinart Mini-Prep Plus Are Smaller & Cheaper Alternatives
• · Shaker Bottles Are Real Calorie-Savers
• · Acaia Digital Scale

Topic: Healthy Aging

Guest: Sal Daher

Title: Staircase Wit: Shake Tech

Technology has long conspired against our health by making us fatter, more sedentary and sleepless. However, we can recruit tech as our ally in building healthy habits. Here is a review of the tech that is helping me keep off 100 pounds.

Highlights:

• · Tech Can Make Us Less Healthy but It Can Be Good for Us Too
• · Getting Help in Weight Loss Is Really Powerful, You Can’t Do It Alone
• · MyFitnessPal App
• · Noom App
• · Fitbit Charge 4 Tracker + Fitbit App
• · WHOOP Band and App
• · Shoutout to the Great Products from Hoplark
• · Plenity, FDA-Cleared Weight Control Device (Does Not Act Systemically)
• · “I used it [Plenity] as an on-ramp for my HMR diet...”
• · Fitbod
• · Life Fitness Elliptical Cross-Trainer
• · NordicTrack Cross Country Exerciser
• · Tonal
• · Bowflex SelectTech
• · $19.99 Chin-up Bar from Amazon
• · Marathon Sports
• · PowerStep Arch Support
• · The Drive: Podcast with Peter Attia, M.D.
• · Huberman Lab Podcast
• · HMR: for When You Are Really Serious About Losing Weight

Topic: Healthy Aging

Guest: Sal Daher

Title: Tech & Weight Control

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Getting enough sleep is important to Sal Daher’s effort to keep off 100 pounds. This short episode discusses how sleep connects with weight and how to improve sleep in support of weight control.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Why We Don’t Sleep Enough
• Markets & Technological Innovation Are to Blame but the Solutions Need to Come from Individuals and Voluntary Associations, not from Leviathan
• We Know We Need to Sleep More but the Cards Are Stacked Against It
• Why Is Sleep So Important to Weight Control?
• As We Age Our Need for Sleep Does Not Decline but Our Ability to Sleep Does
• Why I do Early Morning Exercises Outdoors – GoodLux Technologies
• Huberman Lab Podcast Offers Valuable Tips

Topic: Healthy Aging

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Sal Daher, CFA discusses the role of exercise in his keeping off 100 pounds of body weight with no drugs and no surgery, just good habits for eating, exercising and sleeping. Listen for tips and for encouragement on building your exercise plan.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Why Exercise?
• How Much Exercise Do I need?
• Don’t Get Overly Ambitious – Start Slowly but Build Steadily
• Within Safe Limits Do Try to Get Out of Your Comfort Zone – Here’s Why
• Think You Can’t Exercise? Listen to These Stories Then, Tell Me You Can’t Exercise
• No Financial Stake in HMR, Just Immense Gratitude for How Much They Have Helped Me
• It Matters When You Exercise
• Short Bouts Build Up
• Do a Variety of Exercises
• Zone 2 / Zone 5 Training
• Exercise Has an Unexpected Side Effect for Me
• I’ve Never Regretted Exercising

Topic: Healthy Aging

Nearly two years after starting the effort to take off and keep off 100 pounds, I took a series of trips. Here’s how I coped with the challenges of being on the road and maintaining my weight.

Highlights:

• · Trips to Napa Valley, Hamburg and San Sebastián Took Me Away from my Usual Supports
• · Travelling Heavy to Napa Valley
• · “…there may be people who can travel and not gain weight. But I’m not one of them. Therefore, I have to do unreasonable things to keep off those 100 pounds.”
• · Traveled Ultra-light to Hamburg – Just Carry-on
• · A Thought about the Effects of Alcohol on Sleep
• · Traveled Medium-heavy to San Sebastián – 23 Days Away Is a Long Time

I’m Sal Daher and I’m keeping off 100 pounds of body weight with no drugs and no surgery. I’m doing it by building and reinforcing healthy habits. I eat a lot but do not put on weight. It was not easy to build the healthy habits I practice but it can be done.

Highlights:

• · Introduction
• · Food Intake Is the Main Driver of Weight Management, Not Exercise
• · Repeatable Changes You Can Live With
• · What I Eat for Lunch Regularly Now
• · My Fat but Fit Delusion
• · Your Longevity Is Up to You, Nature Does Not Care About It
• · I Could Not Change My Habits Alone, Not Even in Singapore
• · I Needed Help to Build and Maintain My New Habits
• · A Cool Mind Trick
• · There’s a Reason They Are Called “Support Groups”
• · Getting Back to Diet – Here’s What I Eat Throughout the Day
• · Breakfast – This One Is for You Ralph Wagner
• · Hydration Is Really Crucial – Always Trying Cool New Drinks
• · Mid-morning Snack – Efficiency Is the Keyword
• · Lunch – See Above – But There’s More
• · Vegetables and Fruits Are My Best Friends
• · Mid-afternoon Snack – My Vitamix Blender Comes in Handy
• · Supper – It’s a Lot of Food So I Try Not to Eat Too Close to Bed Time
• · Evening Snack – The Treat I Look Forward to All Day Long
• · After My Evening Snack, My Probiotic
• · The Biggest Aha! Moment of My Dieting Career
• · Conclusion

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Layne Sadler founded KeyBio to help pharmaceutical companies better identify genetic traits in patients that may explain differing responses to cancer treatments. KeyBio’s computational approach promises to add a new dimension to precision medicine, which now looks at the genetics of the tumor, by also incorporating the genetics of the patient to improve outcomes in clinical trials.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Layne Sadler
• What KeyBio is Solving
• "... The revenue is solely focused on cancer drug discovery and the reason for that is because that's where all the money is in the pharmaceutical industry..."
• "... 90% of clinical trials fail and the cost averages around 792 million, spending about a billion dollars to run a trial..."
• "... I developed this AI platform and I wanted to start collaborating with other principal investigators or heads of labs in the Boston area..."
• "... The DNA of tumors, over time, it mutates and it becomes very different from the DNA of the host..."
• Why Layne Chose Entrepreneurship

Topics: biotech, founding story, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

After a career at DARPA, defending America from cyber threats, Jason Syversen founded Siege Technologies which had a great exit. He now focuses on angel investing and philanthropy. Inspiring chat.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship, and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jason Syversen
• What Problem Siege Technologies is Solving
• "... How do you measure and predict probability of success and collateral damage for a cyberattack? That is actually the technology we end up being acquired for when we sold..."
• "... I took over 10X Venture Partners, which is an angel group..."
• SportsVisio and What it is Solving
• "... That was a really interesting example of you think that this is all figured out even in pro leagues, and yet it really isn't..."
• Jason's Background
• "... if you had a choice between being born in a family with trust funds where your parents really don't care about you or being born in a hardscrabble family where the parents do care about you, choose the latter..."
• "... Human infants need nurturing and then beyond that, and when we're grown, we need a society around us that supports us ... This lack of connection is the biggest problem in America today..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Losing and keeping off 100 pounds is hard. Having done it, Sal wants to convince you that you too can gain control of your weight. No drugs, no surgery, just new habits patiently created and reinforced. Sal’s daughter Grace Daher conducted this frank interview.

Highlights:

• Here’s the Story of How Sal Daher Lost 100 Pounds with No Drugs and No Surgery – You Can Do It Too
• Sal Introduces His Daughter Grace Daher Who Is Asking the Questions
• When Sal Was First Told He Needed to Lose Weight
• A Big 13-Year-Old on a 1,300 Calorie Diet – Misery!
• Early On It Was Evident that Sal Was Triggered by Food but His Brother William Was Not
• Sal Became More Active in College but Bad Diet Caused Weight Gain
• Lost Weight During Summer Break in Brazil – Less Eating More Moving
• Sal Was Fit in College, But Still Overweight – Did Not Realize the Burden He Was Carrying Around
• Sal Got Down to His Ideal Body Weight in His Mid 30s Out of Concern for His Blood Pressure
• Lost the Weight on the HMR Program – No Hunger – More Is Better
• How the Weight Came Back On – Grace Remembers Sal’s Struggles
• HMR Program Turns Down Chance to Coach Oprah Winfrey Individually Because They Did Not Have Data to Support that Approach
• Attending Weekly Support Group Is Essential for Success Long Term – Alcoholics Anonymous Example
• Grace Was Shocked to See Sal’s Weight Loss After the Isolation from COVID
• Sal Was Proud to Be Fat but Fit – His Doctor’s Warnings Were Not for Fit People Like Him
• Being Overweight Has a Lot to Do with Genetics – We Have to Fight Our Genes
• A Painful Health Event Motivated Sal to Take the Weight Off for Good
• How the HMR Program Works
• The First Three Weeks Were Hard – Plenity Helped
• Maintaining Your Weight Loss Means Acquiring a Whole New Set of Habits
• The Multiple and Marvelous Benefits of Exercise
• There are No Magic Pills – Except Exercise
• The Importance of Human Connectedness in Weight Control
• Sal’s Regrets for Not Having Taken Off the Weight Earlier
• Sal Is a Big Supporter of Statins
• “How are you managing to keep off those 100 pounds?”
• Committed to a Baseline of 10,000 Steps Per Day
• Highly Structured Eating
• Cool Facts About Coffee
• “Why Is getting sleep so important?”
• “…you need the support of a coach to help you work out those particulars…”

With minimal funding, Gloria Kolb and her husband Eric Kolb have created a device to treat urinary incontinence that has received a coveted clearance from the FDA. Elidah, their startup, expects to exceed $3 million in DTC sales this year. I really enjoyed this story of a couple bootstrapping a promising business together.

Highlight:

• · Sal Daher, CFA Introduces Gloria Kolb, Co-Founder of Elidah
• · Elidah Is Solving Urinary Incontinence in Women – Device Induces Kegel Exercises
• · Just Got FDA Clearance for Overactive Bladder
• · “She only needs to wear it for 20 minutes a day, and then it turns off automatically.”
• · Differentiation from Other Devices: FDA Cleared for Incontinence
• · Randomized Control Trial Result: 75% of Women Experienced Statistically Significant Improvement
• · “It drives me crazy that women do wait so long and they don't tell anyone and they just deal with it for a long, long time. I think part of it is they don't think that there's any other good options for them.”
• · Seeking FDA Clearance for Over-the-counter Sales, Like Gelesis
• · Medicare Covers the Device
• · About 8,000 Customers Have Purchased ELITONE, Elidah’s Device
• · “You have shocked me. I'm not easily shocked. That airline magazines will not talk about urinary incontinence.”
• · “It's not quite the razor blade model. It is definitely about the treatment kit, which cost the $400.”
• · Have Built Sales of $3 MM with Just $750K in Angel Funding Plus $1.8 MM in Grants
• · “A third of women have the issues, over the age of 30, but then you go to over the age of 50 and it's 1 out of 2.”
• · “It's actually the number one issue of why people entered nursing homes. “
• · “To women out there, I just encourage them to get treated early.”
• · How You Can Help Podcasts Like Gloria’s Be Found
• · Gloria Kolb Studied Engineering at MIT & Stanford, Worked at Johnson & Johnson then Got Her MBA at Babson
• · Wife-and-Husband Founding Team
• · “...over the counter doesn't mean it's less of a product. It is a medical device, regulated product that went through all the hoops.”

Spinal fractures from osteoporosis cause many to lose their independence. Industry veteran Dom Messerli has a better way of fixing the problem than the risky practice of injecting liquid epoxy into the spine. Using engineered human bone, Lenoss Medical is offering a treatment that is safer, effective and easier to administer than the current standard.

Highlights:

• · Sal Daher, CFA Introduces Dom Messerli, Founder of Lenoss Medical
• · “Many times, the patients lose their independence when those fractures happen.”
• · Current Standard of Care is to Inject Liquid Epoxy into the Spine – What Could Go Wrong?
• · Liquid Epoxy Can Leak into Blood Vessels and Create Blockages
• · “When it's in the heart, usually what's prescribed is open heart surgery to take out the piece of cured cement out of the heart.”
• · Lenoss Medical’s Solution: Engineered Human Bone Material to Build Up the Weakened Spine
• · Grafting of Same-Species Bone Material Is Decades Old – What’s new Is Applying the Approach to Spinal Fractures
• · “...conducive for new bone formation.”
• · There’s No Donor Matching or Donor Rejection Issue Since No Living Cells Are Implanted
• · Lenoss Medical Was the Subject of Dom’s MBA Degree Project
• · Lenoss Medical Plans to Go to Market Via Distributors Specializing in Products for Spinal Treatments
• · The Argument for Hospitals Is Reducing Risk and Simplifying the Process
• · FDA Approval Process Was Relatively Low-Burden, Human Cell and Tissue Product Pathway
• · Dom Messerli’s Immigrant Story
• · “Eventually, I was affected with the layoff. I was waiting for that day. The next day is when I started Lenoss Medical.”
• · “...I feel we can have a positive impact with these patients with osteoporosis and the spinal fractures. That drives me.”

A miserable New England day had avid cyclist Eric Janszen dreaming of better indoor riding. Together with co-founder Eric Malafeew, he launched VirZOOM which now has 40,000 users on its virtual reality platform with great engagement. Fascinating conversation about virtual games becoming sport.

Highlights:

• · VirZOOM Gets Grant from Major VR Player for a Joint Development Project
• · Sal Daher Introduces Eric Janszen, Co-Founder of VirZOOM
• · Ongoing Crowdfunding Raise on StartEngine
• · VirZOOM Meets the Challenge of Helping People Enjoy Exercise
• · Technical Co-Founder Eric Malafeew Worked on Big Hits at Harmonix Music
• · VirZOOM Tech Lets Users to Do Cool Things Without Getting Motion Sickness
• · Broke Out of the Limitations Imposed by Being a Bike-Based Platform
• · “It sounds like you could actually play Quidditch on this.”
• · How the Pivot Came About
• · “Where we're heading is 100% without a bike.”
• · Making It a Sport Rather than a Game Has Huge Economic Consequences
• · Sal Speculates on the Possibility of VR Sport Slowing Cognitive Decline
• · “What gets us up in the morning is all of the reviews that we get from our customers...”
• · Average VirZOOM Customer Exceeds CDC Recommended Weekly Exercise
• · The Cost of Getting on VirZOOM Is Modest: $300 for the Quest Headset & $12 per Month

Caleb Wursten is an entrepreneurial prodigy who paid for college at Babson with a bike rental business. He’s now building a platform to provide digital nomads with fractional ownership of properties in desirable locations. International business executive Jon Aboitiz joined as co-host.

Highlights:

• · Sal Daher Introduces Co-Host Jon Aboitiz and Caleb Wursten, Founder of Worldhaus.co
• · “The pandemic unlocked this digital nomad lifestyle for millions of people.”
• · Getting Expensive to Be a Digital Nomad as Airbnb Prices Go Up
• · Fractional Ownership vs. Timeshares
• · Owning 1/13 of Properties in Desirable Locations via an LLC
• · “You're addressing a key factor, it seems, which is the cost of living and how to make it even more affordable...”
• · “The first property is a $220,000 condo in Playa del Carmen, Mexico.”
• · Can Choose Between Occupancy or Renting for Income
• · Comparison to Fractional Ownership of Yachts
• · Developers Are Responding to Demand from Digital Nomads with Attractive Designs
• · How Cobu Intersects with Worldhaus
• · “...we wanted it to be simple and scalable, so we can also expand to Portugal and Colombia, Thailand easily...”
• · Examples of Exciting New Communities: Culdesac and Las Catalinas
• · Property Developers Can Be Remarkably Inventive
• · “They don't need to put up with the $3,000 rent for an isolating experience in a hundred-year-old house.”
• · “It's not so much that Gen Z doesn't want home ownership, it's that no one can afford home ownership...”
• · “I was super lucky in that both my parents are small business entrepreneurs...”
• · Caleb Wursten’s Bike Rental Business Paid for Babson
• · “Then in that time I got a couple rental properties, which is also a common theme with digital nomads...”
• · Real Estate Developers Are Already Designing Projects for Digital Nomads
• · “For, let's say $4,000, you can now own a season, an entire season in Bulgaria.”
• · Jon Aboitiz’s Parting Thoughts

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, platform

Title: Worldhaus.co

Angel investor John Williams comes from a background of leadership in sales and marketing in Big Pharma. He puts his experiences to work in helping his portfolio companies which include Lenoss Medical, Elidah and Eflex Energy. John’s affable personality made this really a fun chat.

Highlights:

• · Sal Daher Introduces Angel Investor John Williams
• · Elidah – Solving Postpartum Incontinence
• · Gloria Kolb of Elidah Embodies Howard Stevenson’s Definition of the Startup Founder
• · Lenoss Medical: Better Treatment for Fractures of the Spine Due to Aging
• · “...a guy who's 63 years old made the cut at the Masters this weekend. They [seniors] have higher expectations...”
• · No More Heart Attacks in 40 Year Olds Thanks to Statin Drugs Controlling Blood Lipids
• · “It's also fun to watch pitches. Because you're like, "Wow."”
• · Robotic Gloves Keep popping Up in Sal’s Angel Investing Career
• · Eflex Energy: Load Management for Your Home Backup Power
• · “I would have been able to manage my energy and my battery for five days with my phone if I had one of these connected digital circuit breakers in my home.”
• · How John Williams Started His Angel Investing
• · Became an Angel Investor but Never Watched Shark Tank
• · Interesting Startups That Have Pitched at Walnut Ventures Recently
• · John Williams’ Parting Thoughts

Topics: angel investing strategies, management, portfolio

The loss of two grandmothers to cancer propelled the daughter of an entrepreneurial family, Stephanie Culler, to a Ph.D. at Caltech and eventually to founding Persephone Microbiome. The VC-funded startup seeks to use gut bacteria to increase the success of cancer therapies. Persephone is also launching a probiotic for infants. Fascinating chat with a brilliant and articulate scientific founder.

Highlights:

• · Sal Daher Introduces Stephanie Culler, Ph.D. Co-Founder of Persephone Microbiome
• · Persephone’s Business Model Is to Partner with Big Pharma to Develop Products Based on Its Platform
• · A Probiotic for Babies and Infants Is Coming in Early 2024
• · Results from the Largest Study in the US of Infant Gut Microbiome Were Unsettling
• · Causes of Insufficiencies in the Gut Biome of Babies
• · “Upwards of 80% of cells of our immune system is in our gut.”
• · “...if you have a good microbiome, you're much more likely to respond to treatment.”
• · “We are wet lab and in silico.”
• · How Persephone Got Funded
• · The Importance of Enrolling Populations Previously Under-represented in Studies
• · The Promise of Population-Scale Data Sets
• · Scanning Large Patient Populations Unencumbered by Animal Studies
• · Why You Should Help This Podcast Get Found
• · Stephanie Culler, Ph.D.’s Entrepreneurial Journey
• · Entrepreneurial Family that Lost Two Grandmothers to Cancer
• · Sal’s Appreciation of Articulate Chemical Engineers Like Stephanie
• · Stephanie’s Experience at Y Combinator
• · How Stephanie Culler Connected with Leen Kawas
• · Stephanie’s Parting Thoughts on Biotech Winter
• Topics: biotech, robotics / AI, venture funding, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Fiza Shaukat founded Patient First.AI to make a difference in the healthcare systems in areas outside the US, such as Pakistan. She decided to create a platform which would allow patients to keep their healthcare data on a digital health card. This card would make the check-in process much faster and efficient.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Fiza Shaukat
• "...How PatientFirst.AI is creating value for patients in places where right now there's no really easy way except for a wad of notes, a notebook, to keep track from visit to visit..."
• "... You see all the digitization happening over there, but why don't you have the same seamless experience within healthcare? That's what we want to enable with this digital health card. They'll go at a clinic and they scan their digital health card or a QR code, and as soon as they scan that in, they basically are checked in..."
• The Patient First Business Model
• Next Steps for Patient First
• Fiza's Entrepreneurial Journey
• Familial Role Models for Entrepreneurship
• "... Somehow a brother and sister you have known each other for your whole life, so chances are you're going to get along more or less. Whereas husband and wife sometimes it can be you've known each other for three years and the stress of founding a company together can be very painful..."

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, robotics/AI, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Yousof Naderi, professor at Northeastern University, is co-founder of DeepCharge, which is commercializing a new technology for charging batteries without cables. Intriguing look at how our lives could change as our devices are untethered.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Yousof Naderi
• What DeepCharge is Solving
• "... In a case of the wireless charging, DeepCharge has selected and carefully from the beginning are working in a non-radiative technology, which means it's just coil by coil..."
• How DeepCharge Came About
• "... Also, there is this piece of sustainability that we can't go through all that, but we think that working with enterprise is really going to help us in our mission, also, to build a wire-free sustainable future..."
• "... Now, to go to the next level, we feel that this is a right timing to look at the strategic investor and partner that can stay, share our vision, and be able to provide resources and help to make this success for everybody..."
• The Future of DeepCharge
• Yousof's Immigrant Story
• Why Yousof Started DeepCharge
• Advice to the Audience
• "... I think one of the biggest pivots was just that type of technology that they use..."

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

The deep experience Carolina Alarco has gained in the biotech industry now informs her work as an advisor to startups and as an angel investor. Her incisive contributions at Walnut Ventures made me eager to learn more about her story and approach.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Carolina Alarco
• SYTE.bio and What it is Solving
• SYTE.bio Founders' Backgrounds
• Why Invest in SYTE.bio?
• Verbina
• Latinos in Bio
• "... I do want to say that Latinos in Bio will be raising awareness of some lack of representation of Latinos in the industry..."
• Carolina's Background
• "... I came up in the '90s. I came to study a graduate degree in International Management Harvard..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Chris Selland works at Squark.AI, a startup company that uses AI and machine learning with customer data from things such as games and delivery services to help with predictions of delivery time.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Chris Selland

• Squark AI and What It's Solving

• "... All of those types of predictions is essentially what we do with the model. Now, we do have some other customers using us for other purposes. For instance, a very large package delivery firm is using us, actually, for prediction of packages that might be late..."

• "... This, I think, highlights really the importance of networking and staying in touch with people that you've worked with successfully. Make sure that you stay in touch with them because you will have that twice annual conversation that you might have with someone that you worked two companies back with..."

• Squark in the Gaming Industry

• The Future of Squark

• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Mike Nolan is an angel investor specializing in machine learning. As an officer in the Air Force he trained fighter pilots on F-15s. Mike relates the opportunities offered by graduate work at MIT both professionally and in investing. Fun chat with a buddy from Walnut and a listener to the podcast.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Mike Nolan
• Piction Health and Machine Learning
• "... we don't frequently see companies that are on the bleeding edge of the academic research or the bleeding edge of what's going on and the top presentations at conferences and so forth, but that's okay..."
• The Capabilities of Machine Learning In the Health Field
• Mike Nolan's Background
• "... You got to picture this beautiful country, the White Sands, New Mexico, close by, and so forth, and here's this chimp running away from this 10-mile-long sled track..."
• "... They're highly creative people in a highly regimented situation. They are people who think in very creative ways, and so forth, and they have big personalities ... I suspect that there is a lot of room for creativity with fighter pilots..."
• "... Yes, things can go wrong, whether you're a founder or a pilot..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, robotics/AI

What founders and investors in startups need to know about the history of bankruns and how to protect themselves from them in the future.

Here's the text on which my talk was based:

Historical Perspective on SVB’s Failure for Investors & Founders

This is Sal Daher of the Angel Invest Boston podcast. Prior to becoming an investor in tech startups, I spent decades as a banker and trader involved with the distressed debt of countries. My experience came in handy recently in allowing me to reassure the startups in my portfolio with deposits at SVB that the FDIC would have no option but to make all depositors whole.

This piece aims to explain why the business model of banks and past government decisions precluded any other options. It also points to ways that founders can manage deposit risk. While it bothers me to see well-off people bailed out by the taxpayer, it is the necessary if imperfect course of action until we make structural changes to hold bank management more accountable.

Why was I so certain in my assurances? Because financial authorities in the US and other countries had learned a hard lesson back when Lehman Brothers (not a deposit-taking bank) was allowed to fail in September of 2008. Lehman’s bankruptcy set off an inevitable chain of events that led to the meltdown of the market for credit risk insurance. This revealed pervasive rot in financial instruments widely held by institutions starved for yields. Thus began the Sub-Prime Crisis that ruined millions and blighted the career of so many of my colleagues in finance for nearly a decade.

The hard lesson learned was that when a financial panic gets going it’s impossible to tell where it will stop. The term contagion is apt. Financial authorities understood the need to take prompt steps to reassure investors not to make irrational moves that could impoverish us all. Back in 2008 they ended up taking over banks which created lasting distortions, some of which are still with us today.

While the circumstances of SVB’s failure are different from Lehman’s, the fundamental lesson of maintaining the orderly functioning of financial markets still applies. If the FDIC had stuck strictly to its $250K deposit insurance limit (which BTW had been $100K until the Lehman event) chaos would have ensued. Depositors everywhere would have immediately started spreading any holding in excess of $250K to other banks to avoid the possibility of loss and could have melted down the entire banking system. An impaired banking system would have resulted in hundreds of thousands of companies going under and millions of people losing their jobs. So, preventing financial panic is a public service for the entire population. It’s comparable to the fire department. Fire brigades were set up to prevent individual house fires from spreading and burning down entire neighborhoods.

There is a fundamental flaw in the business model of banks. Banks lend long and borrow short. Borrowers want to repay banks months or years into the future. Depositors usually are not willing to tie up their money for more than a few months. This creates a mismatch between the maturity of loans made by banks (assets) and deposits taken by banks (liabilities). The delicate balance between assets and liabilities is hard to achieve. This is why banks keep cash reserves on hand, i.e., they don’t lend out all their deposits. They also have short-term borrowing lines with other banks or the Federal Reserve to make sure they have cash meet all their obligations.

But if enough depositors decide that a bank is impaired, even the soundest bank would not be able to meet the demand for immediate payment without outside help. This is the role the FDIC has come to play. A role with which I am not entirely comfortable, but as we have seen, is essential as things stand.

Many argue that unlimited deposit guarantee removes the incentive from depositors to vet a banks’ books. In the absence of this vetting there is a natural temptation for banks to take all the risk possible with depositor’s money because if things go well the bank’s shares will go up and the management will get bonuses. This moral hazard of deposit guarantees is supposedly mitigated by regulations that limit how much a bank can lend and impose minimum capital requirements.

Unfortunately, the regulations failed in the case of SVB. The bank appeared to meet its capital requirements but when depositors started to draw out money, it started to sell its reserves. This prompted changes as to how assets were valued and put it suddenly in default of capital requirements. This led to a failed attempt to raise more equity in the stock market.

One moment SVB seemed fine, the next moment it was on the rocks. Bank books are complicated beyond the ability of even the most sophisticated depositor to figure out. The idea of savvy depositors keeping banks honest is fanciful. The only parties who have any hope of knowing enough about what’s going on in the bank are its management and its board of directors. I support making bank directors and senior management personally liable if a federal rescue is needed.

So, what’s a founder to do when holding more than $250,000 in cash? One thing to consider is to have the funds in more than one bank, if only to avoid a sleepless weekend as so many founders experienced recently. But that only gets you up to protecting $500,000 or $750,000. Another option to consider is putting funds into money market funds held by Fidelity, Schwab or Vanguard. Funds held in custody for a beneficiary are legally protected from claims against the entity. This does not mean that there is no risk. Even safe money market instruments may lose value in times of stress, but the exposure to any one entity is much less concentrated. There’s always the risk of fraud or unauthorized trades but those are not usually system-wide and the entities usually make good on those.

Founders are in the business of sailing in uncharted waters. However, many of the risks that threaten a startup are known to accountants and board members. My advice is to bring up the matter of risk with your CFO and your board. If you don’t have one it’s time you found at least a fractional CFO and functioning board.

If found this brief piece useful I invite you to follow Angel Invest Boston on your podcast app. Thanks for listening. This is Sal Daher.

A common sports injury left Rick McMullen incapacitated. His search for recovery led to the founding of Alleviate, a platform for physical therapy that is finding a lot of satisfied users. Thanks to Bryanne Leeming for introducing Rick to me.

• · Sal Daher Explains Why He Came Off the Sidelines to Invest in Alleviate
• · Rick McMullen, Co-Founder of Alleviate, Has the Ideal Background to Build Such a Company
• · Investing from a Self-Directed IRA Is High-Burden
• · The Problem Alleviate Is Solving
• · People Often Quit Before Physical Therapy Begins to Work
• · College Athletes Have a Lot of Support; When They Graduate There’s Nobody to Advise them on Recovering from Injuries
• · Alleviate Aims to Fill the Gap in the Delivery of Physical Therapy in the US
• · “With all of these conditions, you’ve got to do the work [to get better].”
• · Atomic Habits by James Clear
• · Alleviate Is Getting Traction
• · Alleviate’s Revenue Is Cash-Flow Positive
• · Product Returns Are Learning Opportunities
• · Clayton Christensen’s The Innovator's Dilemma
• · “...the specific subset of musculoskeletal pathologies that we serve. You can call it a niche, but it's like a $10 billion niche.”
• · Rick McMullen’s Journey to Founding a Startup
• · “...this central idea that the golden rule is the most economically rational thing.”
• · Why Rick McMullen Is Focused on Capital Efficiency
• · Parting Thought from Rick McMullen

Topics: product, management, discovering entrepreneurship

Title: Physical Therapy That Works

Fintech founder and angel Aidan Yeaw discusses building and investing in companies such as NODE40 and Unruly Studios. Great chat with a Walnut colleague.

Highlights:

● Sal Daher Introduces Aidan Yeaw

● NODE40

● NODE40 Founding Story

● Unruly Studios

● "... The other component to it is that they're programming, but they're doing physical movement, physical exercise, large motor, physical exercise, running around, jumping up and down, and so forth because kids are too sedentary..."

● How Aidan Came to Angel Investing

● "... There's an ecosystem of small-scale venture capitalists that are growing, but the opportunities are so numerous, and the venture capitalists are so few, that they're an excess of opportunities, and a lack of funding, a lack of capacity to address this..."

● CoolSculpting

● Aidan's Career Journey in Fintech

● Advice to the Audience

Topics: fin tech, angel investing strategies, crypto

Title: Founder & Angel

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Jay DeVivo’s angel investing ranges far from his insurance background. Here we discuss his involvement with startups such as Hubly Surgical, FleetNurse, and ApprentiScope. Fun chat with a lively guest.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jay DeVivo
• Hubly Surgical
• "... The advantage for Hubly is that doctors don't need to learn any new skills. It's pressing a button and in fact, there'll be a wider swath of clinicians that'll be able to use it than can use the current hand crank drill..."
• FleetNurse
• "... See, that's the thing with Angel investors. They may be new to Angel Investing, they're not new to business..."
• ApprentiScope
• How Jay DeVivo Came to Angel Investing
• "... It's really tough as an investor because you're not controlling things. You're along for the ride..."
• Jay's Career Journey
• "... Later on, I did some strategy work for larger companies as well. I started that business right before business school and then I consulted all through business school and things were good, so I did it for two years after business school..."
• "... It's like in the third ring out from there is where the jobs live. Basically, what you need to do is talk to a lot of people and do informational conversations, low pressure, just talk and you say, 'Hey, this is what I used to do. This is what I'm interested in'..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Leen Kawas PhD, managing general partner at Propel Bio Partners, invests in life science companies such as Persephone Biosciences and Inherent Bio that promise immediate benefits for humanity. An uplifting chat with a dynamic VC and founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Leen Kawas
• What Propel Bio Partners Does
• Persephone Biosciences
• "... It's a pipeline for probiotics. They're starting with infant probiotics..."
• "... is anybody else working in the space of microbiome for babies? I haven't seen this..."
• Inherent Bio
• "... That's what Inherent is working on. They have identified an epigenetic signature that has the ability to better predict pregnancy outcome with men..."
• "...What is the profile of the kind of company that you find attractive in public markets now...?"
• Advice to the Audience
• Leen Kawas' Immigrant Story
• "... I want to tell entrepreneurs that are out there, no is typically not no. Just keep that in mind..."
• "... I just want to tell the entrepreneurs out there, you tell your own story, you work on your mission, you define your why. Keep going and you'll be successful..."

Topics: building wealth, management, raising money

Artist K. Woodman-Maynard discusses her gorgeous graphic novel interpretation of The Great Gatsby, the business of being a graphic artist and other engrossing matters. A delightfully different interview with a charming guest.

Highlights include:

• Sal Introduces K. Woodman-Maynard, Creator of The Great Gatsby Graphic Novel
• “Color is gorgeous. The drawings are extremely expressive and interesting… the style of the period is displayed.”
• “…I think it's a good way to get people who might not otherwise read The Great Gatsby, the prose book, interested.”
• Cashflow from a Graphic Novel Is Inconsistent – Good to Have Steady Income from Graphic Design
• “…it was very painful for me to cut out specific lines, because I love those lines.”
• “I'm in complete agreement that you shouldn't dismiss somebody's whole life's work just based on certain philosophies. It's a balance.”
• “…it started by a very intense deep reading of the text…”
• “The whole book took about 1500 hours. That's actively time tracked hours.”
• “…the first thing for a beginner that they need to know is that they can do it. You can make a living as a graphic artist.”
• “I was encouraged to go into architecture because that was considered to be more stable for artists. I'm so glad I didn't, because I graduated college in 2008.”
• “One thing that's been key for me has been diversifying my income. I have income from graphic novels. I have income from graphic design work, from illustration.”
• “I think it's an important thing for yourself as a graphic artist to be able to pivot and to be able to work in different ways.”
• “…finding good mentors. That's something that I would encourage your niece to do.”
• “Going to Harvard has really helped me with asking stupid questions.”
• “You can be a good business person and also be good at your craft.”
• “The Great Gatsby was a commercial flop at the time that it was published.”
• “He was making a huge amount. He would just spend it before he even got it, which is the direct opposite of me.”
• “…a captive audience of troops who read The Great Gatsby and then returned and spread the word about it.”
• “I'm wondering what's going to happen once the vaccine is out. Will we experience another Roaring Twenties in a different way?”
• “I do the Pomodoro method. …You work for 25 minutes; you take 5 minutes off. Then every two hours, you take a half an hour break.”
• “In high school, we had to take career placement tests. I had equal likelihood artist and military officer.”
• The Importance of Story Telling
• Addressing Mental Health Issues with Kids via Comics: TKAMI.org
• “I decided not to go into architecture because it wasn't my calling. Also, because I could see that it wouldn't be good for my mental health.”
• “It's just gorgeous. I highly recommend this work.”

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Paul Hartung returns to talk about how to fund promising biotech and life science companies. He continues his conversation from his previous episode discussing his past experience with angel investing.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Paul Hartung
• "... Tell me the story of the first syndicated angel funding here in New England..."
• "'... there's a bunch of guys like you and me who've been successful in business, who are starting to get together.' He said, 'I just joined a group called Launchpad...'"
• "... I was CEO from the start and chairman, the president and secretary and [laughter] and all the offices..."
• "... The story here is that technologies are coming out of labs that are amazing, that are just astonishing, that could do things that couldn't be done 10 years ago by any stretch of the imagination. It's not one-off, they're multiplying. The cost of developing this technology is a coming down..."
• "... how do I support angels? Due diligence I think is part of it, creating due diligence, and I think part of it is also syndication..."
• "... What is the end game? Who would be the strategic partners that might end up acquirers or might license the technology...?"
• Pros and Cons of Grant Funding
• ".. the timing of strategics is not the timing of startups..."
• "... I think there's a lot of room for Angel-friendly venture funds that will work with Angels and will help bring Angels over from software investing into the life sciences, perhaps initially for digital health, but eventually, in wet lab..."
• Advice to the Audience
• "...Don't just have a purely science team. You need to have someone who's going to be your business representative if you will..."

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, building wealth

Sascha Deri and Lindsay Becker were interviewed by co-host Ben Littauer and me about the equity crowdfunding campaign this fascinating rocket company based in Brunswick, Maine is doing on WeFunder. They are targeting the a growing niche of sending small non-human payload into space. They are doing this with a non-toxic rocket fuel that is friendly to the envidonment. As of this writing they had already passed the million dollar mark at WeFunder. Check them out here: https://wefunder.com/blushiftaerospace

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

What if automation could help patients better follow their prescriptions? Natalie Park and Saumya Rawat met at MIT and are co-founders of Pharmesol which seeks to do this.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Martin Aboitiz Introduces Natalie Park and Saumya Rawat
• What Problem Pharmesol is Solving
• Pharmesol's Product and What it Does
• Pharmesol's Business Model
• Fee-For-Service vs. Value-Based Payments
• What Makes Pharmesol Marketable?
• "... I think ideal profile of a customer would be an integrated delivery network. What that means is that they have both a health system as well as a health plan..."
• Why Not AI?
• "... Pharmesol is a clinical automation company, and we're solving the problem of lack of clinical capacity and challenges with workforces at provider organizations..."
• "... These people, they know what they're talking about. They're trained. Graduate degree, they're a doctor of pharmacy. Underutilized resource..."

Topics: co-founders, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Finding a less noxious way to sterilize medical devices is the goal of CL Tian, winner as MedTech Innovator ’22. She founded Phiex to commercialize a sterilant that allows devices to sterilize themselves in the presence of light. Industry is listening to this compelling founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces CL Tian
• What Problem Phiex is Solving
• "... The moat is how do you deliver it without using capital equipment, with plastic packaging material as the delivery system, and how do you deliver it when it's activated by light? Our materials, once they see ambient light, start to release a sterilant..."
• “... I don't think I mentioned, but the amount of devices that are sterilized with this cancer-causing technology's half of the industry. That's 20 billion devices in the US a year. There's no alternative for most of those devices…”
• CL Tian's Background
• How CL Tian Came to the Issue of Sterilization
• Message to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Paul Hartung is an angel investor involved in the life sciences field. Here, he discusses how he helps build companies such as Leuko, Clairways, Verisense, and others in the MedTech space.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Paul Hartung
• Leuko Labs
• "... Something dark goes through, that's a red blood. Something light goes through, that's a white blood cell. Then they count that, and then it can come up with immunocompromised, or low leukocyte count, or normal leukocyte count..."
• Upcoming Milestones for Leuko
• Clairways
• "... That's an area of great interest for me is academic founders in the life sciences, taking their technology from the lab into the clinic, or into the market. It requires understanding the technology, and it also requires understanding the market..."
• Verisense
• Xander
• "... Well, he's basically creating a software that interprets the voice of the person who's speaking to the wearer of the glasses, and creates a caption, which projected on the lens. You can caption what people are saying to you..."
• Paul's Backstory
• How Paul Got Into Life Sciences
• 3Com
• "... The whole premise of the technology was that you could take people who were suspect of the disease, and rather than immediately going in for really expensive brain imaging tests, which actually involve exposure to radiation and you can only do them very infrequently, this is something that could be done in a general practitioner's office, doesn't even have to be done in a hospital...:
• Sonivance
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, product, venture capital

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Founder, entrepreneur, and angel, Richard Lane, explains his experience investing in companies such as Alice’s Table and The Jitterbug phone.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Richard Lane
• "... The founder is in the business of discovering new territory, terra incognita. The angels and the board members are in the business of making sure that she doesn't run aground on well-known shoals..."
• Alice's Table
• "... She was helping women who were very much into floral arrangements to teach in-person classes in floral arrangement, and how to make a really beautiful floral arrangement. What her business did-- basically, she helped these women to run events. The women would use those tools in their network..."
• "... As an angel investor board member, I go in and I say, "Are you on schedule? Great. Everything's good? I don't care about that. I'll look at that later. Tell me what is keeping you up at night. What is the first stumbling block?"
• Richard's Entrepreneurial Career
• "... One of the driving things I had since my childhood was, what happens when you die?"
• Telephone Companies
• "... It's a business that didn't exist. Before that, landlines were everything. It was everything, that was telephony was a landline..."
• Pacific Telephone Company
• The Jitterbug
• "... A couple of things worth noting, a device around older people, needs to be looking at their user’s expectations. We're hardwired by the time we're 65 to think certain ways, to do certain traits..."
• LifePod
• Parting Thoughts to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, founding story, product

MIT Media Lab alum Alex Westner has glasses that show captions to hearing-impaired people during real-time conversations. His approach is to refine existing technologies to deliver an excellent experience in one use case. Loved the focus and his dedication to detail.

Highlights:

• Sal Introduces Alex Westner, Sound Technologist & Founder of Xander – Glasses with Captions for the Hearing-Impaired
• Xander Seeks to Assemble Existing Technology into a Great User Experience
• XanderGlasses Are Great on Privacy Because Nothing Is Recorded
• Xander’s Speech Recognition Is Built on Kaldi, the same Opensource Platform Alexa Uses
• Xander Trims Features of Augmented Reality Devices to Focus on It Use Case
• Maybe There’s an Annual $200 Million Market for XanderGlasses
• XanderGlasses Are Certainly Cooler than Hearing Aids (Faint Praise!)
• Xander’s Go to Market Approach
• What If Google Gets into the Business?
• Alex Westner’s Entrepreneurial Journey
• An Easter Egg for Raul
• Alex Westner’s Parting Thoughts

Topics: software, product

Title: Augmented Reality for Hearing Loss

Which Founding Teams Succeed? Are Founders Born or Made? Can Innovation Be Crowdsourced? How Many Jobs Do MIT & Stanford Add to the Economy? Blockchain for the Supply Chain? Chuck Eesley, Stanford's Startup Prof Addresses These Questions and More.

This timeless interview is being relaunched to make available the wise and affable words of Professor Chuck Eesley.

• Introduction

• Professor Charles Eesley Bio

• The Traumatic Founding Experience

• Shivang Dave, PlenOptika & Entrepreneurs in Poor Countries

• How Chuck Eesley Ended Up at MIT Studying with Ed Roberts

• The Economic Impact of MIT & Stanford: Millions of Jobs Created & Trillions in Economic Activity

• “And the other big takeaway is that we had been looking at the impact of these universities in too narrow of a way previously.”

• Robust Finding: Larger Teams Do Better; Startups Tend to Have Teams that Are Too Small

• Chuck Gets a Great Idea for Research While Hiking with a Friend

• Cooperative vs. Competitive Commercialization

• “…, if the industry is high in the effectiveness of patent protection, and high in the importance of complementary assets ... you're motivated to go and talk to the big guys, because you need their complementary assets…”

• “…low effectiveness of patent protection, low importance of complementary assets, that's where you tend to get competitive commercialization…”

• “Are You Experienced, or Are You Talented?”

• Sal Talks About the Impact of Portfolio Company Concrete Sensors

• Evidence-based Entrepreneurship

• Blockchain to Make it Easier to Finance Supply Chains

• “And with that additional data, then we can also start to optimize more and more of the startup process, and do a better job of picking which ventures to invest in, and to devote resources towards.”

• The Value of Thrift in Life and in Entrepreneurship

• Chuck & Family Plan to Give Their Money to the Universities that Made Their Success Possible

• “So, I think it [thrift] is an underappreciated value. And definitely in Silicon Valley…”

• Early Google Investor David Cheriton Is a Role Model for Chuck

• Chuck’s Parting Thoughts: (1) Entrepreneurs Can Change Their Luck, (2) If Chuck’s Projects Interest You, Reach Out, and (3) Be Frugal in Life and in Entrepreneurship.

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Stephane Allard, MD and Peter MacGuire of Alissa Pharma explained the company’s promising approach to treating cancers like Hodgkin’s lymphoma or pancreatic cancer which over-express a certain protein on the surface of tumor cells. Alissa’s therapy targets this protein with antibodies linked to radioactive material that decays quickly. The result is destruction of tumor cells with reduced toxicity. A really compelling chat.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Stephane Allard and Peter MacGuire
• What Alissa Pharma is Solving
• "... Then we can look at different indication because we already have preclinical data indicating that the product, the anti-ferritin combined with the radiotherapy could work in pancreatic cancer, in hepatic cancer, and in neuroblastoma..."
• How the Idea of the Product Came About
• "...What you've done is you have been able to create a more usable manufacturable chemistry ... which gives you better results, more stable results of the binding of the antibodies to the radioactive tracers or radioactive therapy..."
• Where Alissa Pharma is Headed
• Competition
• Peter MacGuire's Background
• Dr. Stephane Allard's Background

Topics: biotech, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Ten years ago, Pierre-Louis Théron dreamed of changing the internet. With two classmates at a top French engineering school, he created software that improved the streaming of content. The dream became portfolio company Streamroot which was acquired in 2019. A great story about three guys who made the internet smarter.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Pierre-Louis Theron
• Streamroot: the Problem it Was Solving
• "... What's interesting with our approach is it wasn't like we're going to remove completely the traditional or the CDN out of the picture, what we're doing is that we're going to sit on top..."
• "... Your genius idea was to come up with software that you could load onto peoples' set-top box, let's say a Roku, or whatever, over the box, they have local business..."
• Pivot Point in the Execution Phase
• "...We should also mention to listeners that the platform doesn't leave a footprint on the set-top box..."
• How the Idea of Streamroot Came About
• "... It took you a long time to develop your technology, but by 2017, it was rock solid, you ended up raising $6 million..."
• Pierre-Louis's Background
• "... I think it's being relentless, not only in your own dedication but also in building up the relationship with your partners, to have them excited and motivated year after year even though it's not an easy path..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Arturo Falck and Steven Valenti founded Whoo.ai to help owners and tenants of apartment buildings deal with security and buzzing people in. Their device connects to a free app giving tenants a Ring doorbell-like experience. A clever go-to-market strategy promises quick adoption.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Arturo Falck and Steven Valenti
• What Whoo.ai is Solving
• The Benefit of an Open, Android-type System versus a Closed, Apple OS-type System.
• "... As a property manager or property owner, you pay for the device and then you pay us a subscription service for every one of your tenants..."
• "... We actually are in a really good position to bring the technologies of things like Cobu to these communities because they already have the app..."
• Arturo's Backstory
• Steven's Backstory
• "... I just wanted to point out that my brother is also involved, we actually have two sets of brothers..."

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, co-founders, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Infection is a major problem for long-term users of catheters. Souvik Paul saw the problem in his family and founded Aurie. Based at Harvard’s i-lab, Aurie has a design that promises more safety and convenience. The reusable self-catheter is backed by a grant from the Department of Defense. Do listen to this committed and capable founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Souvik Paul
• The Problem Aurie is Solving
• "... Essentially, what we're doing is we're increasing access to the safer life-saving technology by making it safely, automatically, and portably reusable..."
• How Aurie is Reducing Infection Rates and Costs
• What Stage the Product is At
• Funding
• Balancing Online and In-Person Care
• "... Our whole model is partnering with people living with disabilities to develop products that help improve quality of life, improve health in everyday contexts..."
• Souvik's Entrepreneurial Journey
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Inspired by a tragedy Dr. Junaid Shaik built a device that radically lowers the cost of tests on blood smears. Livo.AI is now translating its experience in India to the US. Shout out to listener Sudhir Manda, MD for connecting me with this compelling founder and startup.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Dr. Junaid Shaik
• What Livo.ai is Solving
• "... We are basically digitizing these samples, whichever goes into a microscope so that a pathologist can basically see these tests or see these cells or samples in very high resolution from elsewhere, sitting elsewhere..."
• "... That's where Livo comes in. You directly jump right into the report, and the second problem is you don't have to in the first place travel there..."
• What Makes This Device So Affordable?
• How Livo.ai Will Bring in Revenue
• Dr. Junaid's Background
• “...I understand that what pushed you to start Livo.ai is that you had a tragic experience in medical school…”

Topics: biotech, founding story, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Founder Casey Grage has a better device for drilling into human skulls. Hear how her personal story led to the founding of Hubly Surgical. A truly compelling narrative.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Casey Grage
• What Problem is Hubly Surgical Solving?
• How Casey Came to Hubly
• Testing the Drill
• Studies on the Hubly Drill Vs. Hand-Cranked Drill
• "... We want to know when we're going through the finance committees and hospitals, what kind of questions do they ask? What data do they need? Then we want to intimately know the users of our very first customers, and we want to be able to interview them after they use the drill..."
• Casey's Entrepreneurial Journey
• Casey's Entrepreneurial Inspiration
• Failure Builds Success
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Tomer Amit and Sonia Berrih-Aknin, PhD founded PreciseMent Health to target treatments for depression and bipolar disorder guided by protein markers associated with good outcomes. The work promises to address the great uncertainties that exist in current treatment practices. Truly a mind-expanding conversation with a compelling team.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Tomer Amit and Sonia Berrih-Aknin, PhD
• What PreciseMent Health is Solving
• "...Basically, you had a database of patient data, where the patient's response to treatment had been recorded. Then you took blood samples, and you analyzed to see if there were proteins that indicated certain treatments being more likely to lead to successful treatment than others..."
• "... Really, for the first time, we can say that we are identifying dependable biosignatures in the peripheral blood..."
• Dealing With Side Effects
• "... We'll make it more accessible because of the copay. The $2,000 has a $300 copay with it, which makes it very difficult for a lot of people to pay. We can go in a lot lower because our costs of goods sold are going to be lower ... We want to really have a huge change in the way that mental health is treated and diagnosed..."
• Intellectual Property Protection
• "...We're targeting initially the psychiatry market. We'll be looking to provide them with a plasma card test, which will give them, in a sense, for the first time, the ability to test an individual at the point of care with a few drops of blood..."
• Tomer and Sonia's Backstories
• "... we are in the process of having biotechnology eat the world as software was eating the world for the last 11 years. We're seeing everything being turned over and reinterpreted in the light of these extremely powerful technologies that can discover patterns, where, before, it was just invisible for us..."

Topics: biotech, co-founders, founding stories

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Founder Tim Spong is back to update us on how vistaPath.ai went from product discovery to real-life operations. Our first interview was part of my due diligence for this digital health investment that is now VC-backed. A really instructive and fun chat.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Tim Spong
• VistaPath: What is It?
• "... You're using machine vision AI to give superpowers to the lab technician and to make his or her work more efficient, and also much more reliable, and much more accountable..."
• "... What you're doing is massively, massively consequential. A mundane thing, but that could have huge consequences..."
• The Spouse as an Unofficial Co-Founder
• "... When I say that my dad, my family, taught me perseverance, I think that he didn't teach me computer vision, he didn't teach me AI, but he taught me the ability to get over those moments..."
• Learn More at vistapath.ai

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Greg Geehan is co-founder of Carna Health, a connected health startup. Carna is removing friction from blood testing with an at-home kit for patients unable to go to a lab for a draw. Great chat with an interesting entrepreneur.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Greg Geehan
• What Carna Health is Solving
• "... You guys aren't actually doing the testing or anything like that. You're basically integrating these devices, you're doing the software around these devices..."
• What Stage Carna Health is At
• Carna Health's Founding Story
• Greg Geehan's Backstory
• “...We'll go back and forth a couple of times and see if it's worth investing in, and then if we all agree that there's something there, then I'll bring it to the core fund under NextGen Venture Partners and put it up for pitching and see if it goes through the process…”
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, biotech, founding story, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Lisa Frusztajer is Investor in Residence at The Capital Network, where she supports founders in raising angel money more effectively. We discussed some exciting startups that have benefitted from Lisa’s wisdom, skill and network. A powerful episode!

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Lisa Frusztajer
• "... What we're doing is we're breaking down how early-stage funding works, but we're also expanding the definition of what constitutes early-stage funding..."
• "... We're seeing the potential of digital health really exploding into all new areas that are both patient-friendly, and provider friendly..."
• "...The leadership training series creates a cohort where it's one of the few places where founders can really get together and let their guard down. Because one of the things with entrepreneurs, one of the things with founders is that you're under a lot of scrutiny, and you've got a lot of accountability..."
• How Lisa Came to Entrepreneurship
• "... I think there is potential for the number of women angel investors to increase even more than it has. You'd be surprised, the younger generation of angel investors that there are a lot more women among them than the older generation..."
• Sal's View of the Change in Investment Practices
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, discovering entrepreneurship, management

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Mark Ribeiro is managing partner at Juna Equity Partners in NYC, a growth equity firm that grew out of part of GE Capital. Since one of my portfolio companies was acquired by a growth equity firm, I thought it would be fun to learn more about this type acquirer.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Mark Ribeiro
• Angel Investing Vs. Private Equity
• What Juna Equity Partners is Looking For
• "... They basically provide autistic learning centers for kids that have been identified at an early age with autism. It's a company that when we bought it, it was still considered a somewhat niche space ... There was a change in the macro environment..."
• "... what private equity does is it allows companies to become more efficient, and it makes American companies, absolute world beaters..."
• Private Equity Investments Gone Wrong
• Advice to the Audience
• "... This is what angels do. Angels look at founder flesh. They evaluate founder flesh. The other thing is, is this a technology that has the potential to revolutionize an existing business somewhere? ..."
• Why Staying a Private Company is Better than Going Public

Topics: boards, angel investing strategies, management

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

As a practitioner working with foot injuries, Eric Greenspan became so excited about the potential of the smart insole developed by startup IWS that he joined the team. Great chat about the promising field of connected devices in healthcare. Walking six miles per day gives me a strong appreciation for Eric’s work.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Eric Greenspan
• What Innovative Wellness Systems (IWS) is Solving
• "... What we're really offering patients is peace of mind..."
• "... It helps the podiatrist document the value of their orthotics..."
• "... This is not a diagnostic tool. This is a monitoring device..."
• Innovative Wellness Systems' Founding Story
• How Eric Greenspan Became an Entrepreneur
• The Team Roles at IWS
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Nurses were a big part of the frequent medical care Alicia Tulsee’s family needed. This led to conversations about how uncomfortable, expensive and ill-fitting were the work clothes available to nurses. Moxie Scrubs was founded to solve that problem. Don’t miss this great conversation with a compelling founder.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Alicia Tulsee
• Moxie Scrubs: What It's Solving
• "' ... no one's created a brand for nurses and nurses have been shopping online since they received their first paycheck. This the future of the market ... '"
• The Future of Moxie Scrubs

• Alicia's Immigrant Founder Story
• "... I actually started my first business at 19 ... Going online and early days of eBay, I found wholesalers that were selling costume jewelry and purses and handbags and things like that. I said, "Oh, man, if I can buy this stuff and resell it, I can make more money than what I would be earning on an hourly wage at the mall ...'"
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story, product

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Yun Rhie, Minwoo Jung, and Minjun Kim are the founders of WittGen. The company is working with AI to create a more efficient platform for treating cancer, a field which tends to have a lower treatment success rate due to its complexity.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Yun Rhie, Minwoo Jung, and Minjun Kim
• "... The problem you have is that you have to figure out what kind of a tumor you have in order to treat it, to have the right medication to treat it...."
• Looking Ahead at What's to Come for WittGen
• "... Using sequencing of the RNA, which tells you what genes are being expressed and being triggered, and then you can look at that and then compare that to samples of the cells, looked at in the microscope and so on..."
• What Sets WittGen Apart
• How the Team Came to Be

Topics: robotics/AI, biotech, founding stories

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Seeking to match endometriosis patients with doctors most capable of treating the disease, Dr. Saeid Gholami founded iCareBetter. With a background in primary care, Saeid now works with AI to find better solutions to this issue and spread awareness of its importance.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Dr. Saeid Gholami
• iCareBetter: Finding a Solution for Endometriosis
• Peer Review: The Vetting Process for Endometriosis Surgeons
• How Endometriosis Affects Patients' Daily Lives
• How iCareBetter Started Out
• “...When we nail the model for endometriosis, then we focus on complex diseases which need multidisciplinary highly specialized care, replicate the model for their diseases…”
• How Saeid Gholami Came to the U.S.
• The Immigrant Superman Effect
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: robotics/AI, founding story, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Sherine Abdelmawla, PhD, founded Akanocure Pharmaceuticalsto combine chemistryand AI in a platform for discovering effective drugs that can be easily produced at scale. The first use case is a cancer therapy. Great chat with a compelling founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Sherine Abdelmawla
• What Akanocure Pharmaceuticals is Doing
• "... The challenge is ... logistically speaking, manufacturing antibodies, they have problems with pharmacokinetics. Can we have a small molecule that can do the job of that antibody? ..."
• Collaboration in the Lab Vs. Collaboration in the Field
• The Business Model for Akanocure
• "... interrupting the process that the cancer uses for hijacking the production of lipid fats to create its own version, a lipid shell that has particular features that make it really hard to detect the cancer..."
• Sherine's Backstory
• Why Research?
• “...Science is hard enough, but on top of it, doing science with inadequate resources…”
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: biotech, founding story, robotics/AI

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Tech VC and founder Jeff Rosen talks about his favorite portfolio companies at Broom Ventures and how his fund came about. He also tells a compelling story from his days at Teach For America.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jeff Rosen of Broom Ventures
• Team, Leadership & Culture
• “...we look particularly closely at the people and try to understand their commitment, their mission orientation, their psychology, their empathy.”
• Broom Portfolio Company Writesonic Helps People Write Really Fast & Effectively
• “It is scary. It's so good that you cannot possibly tell that it wasn't written by a human.”
• “We're quite comfortable investing in in-person teams, distributed teams, international teams. It's the people that matter more than anything else.”
• Broom Portfolio Company Tive: Hardware Trackers & Integrated Software for Supply Chains
• Broom Invested in Tive Just as the Pandemic Was Starting in 2020; Brilliant Move in Retrospect
• Krenar Komoni Is an Outstanding Founder Driving Surprising Growth
• Immigrant Founders and the Superman Effect
• A Conspiracy Theory Debunked
• Listeners, please Leave a Written Review on Apple Podcasts; It Helps Us Get Found
• Jeff Rosen’s Trying Experience in Teach For America
• Jeff Rosen Grew a Beard and Impersonated a Drill Sargent to Get Control of His Classroom
• “There were some extraordinary students in the school despite all of the challenges that they had faced in their lives.”
• Jeff Rosen Started Programing in Middle School be Creating Games for His TI-83 Calculator
• How Jeff Rosen Became a Co-Founder of Rhombus, a Blockchain Infrastructure Company
• Sal Daher Expresses His Skepticism About the Existence of a Compelling Use Case for the Blockchain
• Sal Daher Remains Open to Being Convinced About the Blockchain
• How Jeff Rosen and His Co-Founder Dan Von Kohorn Started Their VC Fund

Topics: co-founders, portfolio

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

CEO Ryan Eriksen and CTO Annie Bernard founded Sol Clarity, with the help of Malav Sukhadia, to develop a way to clean solar panels in areas where water is limited. It uses static electricity to remove dust and debris, while lowering the carbon footprint and using minimal energy.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Ryan Eriksen, Annie Bernard, and Malav Sukhadia
• Sol Clarity: Cleaning Solar Panels with Static Electricity
• Efficient Solar Panel Maintenance with Low Energy Activation
• "... What we're trying to do with solar energy is to make everything carbon-free, and that purpose is defeated if you're driving around trucks to wash these panels. The EDS can also have a negative carbon print attached to it..."
• The Decision Process for the Original to Current Designs
• "... The vision is to have this technology anywhere in the world on any optically clear surface that needs cleaning, and cleaning is a pain point there and water is not available to clean..."
• Founding Backstories
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: cleantech, co-founders, discovering entrepreneurship, founding stories

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Jake Tamarkin’s startup, Everyday Life, uses machine learning to match people who don’t fit the traditional mold of buyers with insurers eager for their business. Jake’s personal experience in buying a life policy surfaced this compelling opportunity.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jake Tamarkin
• The Problem Everyday Life Insurance is Solving
• "... Basically, what they're saying is, if you're poor, you're riskier, because of this very blunt instrument that they're using, which is credit score..."
• What Sets Everyday Life Insurance Apart
• Everyday Life's Founding Story
• Why People Don't Want to Talk About Life Insurance
• "...We basically pivoted out of banks and into insurance companies and that's been going much better..."
• How Jake Tamarkin Came to Life Insurance
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: founding story, discovering entrepreneurship, software

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Life science founder and angel investor, Marc Cote, discusses his experience in investing, as well as developing startups. He has valuable thoughts for founders and investors.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Marc Cote
• Marc Cote’s Founding Experience
• “...That's when I joined Boston Harbor Angels, and that was back in 2012. Shortly after we co-founded Synchroneuron saying, ‘What better way to get an investor perspective, than actually sit with a bunch of investors and actually put some of your own funding at risk?’...”
• How Synchroneuron Developed
• The Placebo Effect Vs. the Drug Itself
• Today’s Treatment for Tardive Dyskinesia
• “...The model that you had of bringing in a professional CEO doesn't exist anymore. Right now, the market for biotech executives is so strong…”
• The Challenge of Attracting Talent to Startups
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Joe Phoenix founded Givinga to democratize philanthropy. After a luminous career in investments, he is turning his fruitful energies and network to build a new space he calls philantech. A dynamic chat with a remarkable founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Joe Phoenix
• Givinga’s Mission
• How Givinga is Helping Portfolio Company Meenta Build its Non-Profit Effort, Curesology
• Givinga's Founding Story
• Joe’s Transition to Putnam
• “...Funds have been around for a long time, but it was like a breakthrough in financial technology that enabled the creation of mutual funds…”
• Cryptocurrency Versus Mutual Funds
• “...take your return, divide it into 72 and it tells you how many years it takes you to double your money…”
• Change in Money Value Over Time
• The Growing Biotech Industry
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: founding story, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

A career in international finance gives Marco Salvalaggio an unusual perspective on angel investing. We discussed his favorite startups and pondered strategies founders and angels can use to build better companies.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Marco Salvalaggio
• HappyNest: An App-Based Laundry Service
• Cactivate: Ad Placing for Small Businesses
• Revizion: Software for Managing Customer Reviews
• The Difference Between California and New England Angel Investors
• “...You need the Puritanism of New England and you also need the can-do informality of California…”
• Marco's Background
• “...It was the convergence of my personal life with my professional life that got me to Angel investment because I met a very nice woman that eventually became my wife…”
• Advice to the Audience
• “...if you have perspective where you understand the whole technology cycle ... that means that you're going to have less waste of resources, that means higher returns…”

Topics: angel investing strategies, discovering entrepreneurship, fin tech

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Gathering scattered medical data about a patient and giving it to the doctor in time for a visit is Connective Health’s aim. Founder, Ryan Hess, updates us on the progress of his startup in improving care and lowering costs.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Ryan Hess
• Connective Health: The Problem It's Solving
• Patient Info Doctors Are Missing and Why It Matters
• "... it's something a provider wants to see because they want that short story..."
• Connective Health's Next Step
• "... if it is a provider that is about to deliver treatment and there is an entity that has your data, that entity, as long as it's under the realm of HIPAA, can provide that data to the provider..."
• Advice to the Audience

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

David Fogel, CPA, is an angel investor who teaches entrepreneurship at Northeastern University. His company, Swifton CFOs, offers fractional chief financial officers to startups. We discussed strategies to help angel investors.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces David Fogel
• "Don't spend your time sweating the legal details"
• “...I've been involved in angel investing for maybe 10 or 12 years now between Mass Medical and TiE…”
• Inspiration for Success
• The Process of Angel Investing
• "Have a champion, have more than one champion, don't go into the room cold"
• Balancing the Budget
• "Tell me the truth. Don't candy-coat it"
• "To me, it's all about, do you have a great idea? Can you implement it?"
• Advice for the Audience

Topics: angel investing strategies, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel-Scale Biotech: Learn More

Carter Williams went from building fighter jets to building technology startups. A mind-expanding conversation with a VC who grapples with big ideas. Topics range from the future of food to how to get more people into the innovation economy.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Carter Williams, Aerospace Engineer Turned VC
• Portfolio Company Benson Hill Aims to Make Plant-Based Meats Affordable
• Portfolio Company Kula Bio Harnesses Micro-Organisms to Increase Nitrogen Fixation in Soil
• Gathering Scattered Data to Create Synthetic Control Arms for Clinical Trials
• Healthjump’s Role in the COVID Research Data Base
• How Carter Williams Went from Engineer to VC
• Carter Williams Greatly Respects the Risk Taking of Founders
• Savran’s Enabling Technology
• New Models of Startup Creation
• “I want to build the AWS of precision fermentation.”
• Carter Williams on Getting Capital Off the Sidelines and Into Innovation

Topics: portfolio, venture capital, biotech

Title: The Future of Food

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Orly Zeewy is a brand wiz with a focus on startups. Her book, Ready, Launch, Brand: The Lean Marketing Guide for Startups, offers success stories and actionable exercises which help founders build their brand. Great chat, learned tons.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Orly Zeewy
• Branding: Why Names Matter
• "You ask people what they want, you give them what they want, and ... they come because you give them what they want."
• Ugly Baby Syndrome
• The Impact of Social Media
• Advice From an Entrepreneur
• Social Media Algorithms: How They Affect Branding
• "Get clear on your story because people invest in stories"
• Finding the Right Target Audience

Topics: selling, platform, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

Investing modest sums and copious energy, Ben Littauer helps tech companies sprout. His focus is startups that do the most good for the world. Founders and angel investors value Ben’s advice greatly.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patebt attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Ben Littauer
• Discovering Angel Groups
• Why Be an Angel Investor?
• Startups That Ben Littauer Has Invested In
• " It started off as being a soft robotic glove that allows a stroke survivor to move their hand ... measure how it's doing, and do multiple repetitions"
• The Importance of Coachability
• "The stuff that you and I invest in now are people inventing new things and there are no right answers"
• Sal's Angel Investing Journey
• "Jeff helped me realize that ... where I should be focusing all my energies is in these early-stage companies"
• "Aquaculture is the future of food"
• Advice for Potential Investors

Topics: angel investing strategies, raising money, discovering entrepreneurship

Angel Scale Biotech: Learn More

AI is coming for the pesky chores of bookkeeping. Enrico Palmerino, founder of VC-backed Botkeeper, relates how machine learning is helping accountants and their clients. Compelling founder with a great story.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

• Sal Daher Introduces Enrico Palmerino
• What Botkeeper Does
• Why Efficient Bookkeeping Matters
• What Sets Botkeeper Apart
• Growing Clientele
• “We're venture backed. We've raised a total of about 90 million to date. We just closed our C round...”
• The AI Revolution
• The Statistics of Bookkeeping
• Challenges and How They're Dealt With
• Adapting to New Technologies
• Enrico Palmerino Had a Lot of Entrepreneurship in His Family
• Advice for Starting a Startup
• Evolving with Your Environment

Topics: robotics/Ai, founding story, product

Angel-Scale Biotech: Learn More

Bacterial growth in an IV caused a kid to lose his legs. Shocked by the tragedy, young physician Maryam Soomro began researching solutions. Her startup, TuCann, now uses black phosphorus tech from RMIT, Australia's MIT, to fight infection. Heartening!

Sponsored by Purdue University entreprenuership and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Maryam Soomro
• The IV Issue
• Black Phosphorus: How it Works
• Using Reactive Oxygen Species to Eliminate Bacterial Infection
• Creating a Startup: Where to Begin
• Where Will TuCann be Based?
• Getting a License For Use of Materials
• How TuCann Came About
• From Research to Entrepreneurship

Topics: biotech, techstars, discovering entrepreneurship

Opportunities in angel-scale biotech: Learn More

It can take days to identify the cause of a bacterial infection; Ed Goluch, PhD founded QSM Diagnostics to change that. QSM now has a device that can detect a bacteria of interest in minutes. Ed updates us on the headway QSM has made since his first interview, Diagnosis in Minutes.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Ed Goluch
• How QSM Diagnostics Came About
• Quorum Sensing Molecules: What Are They?
• Redirecting From Human To Animal Diagnostics
• Getting the Product Off the Ground
• Mail-in Test Kits Speeding Things Up at the Veterinary Offices
• Academic Founder to Founding CEO
• Persevering Through COVID Setbacks
• Animal Data Will Eventually Lead to Human Based Devices
• Greater Market in Animals Due to People Prioritizing Their Pets
• "The other interesting thing, lot of our sales are actually going to mobile vets"
• Getting the Word Out
• QSM Diagnostics Receives Prestigious Award

Topics: founding story, product, discovering entrepreneurship

Discover angel-scale biotech: Learn More

Eduardo Jorgensen founded Medicsen to improve the care of people with diabetes. Witnessing the struggles of patients taking insulin inspired Eduardo to leave medicine and build a device and an app to simplify the control of blood sugar by patients.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Eduardo Jorgensen, Founder of Medicsen
• What Medicsen is all About
• The Suggin App and What it Does
• Making an Insulin Device That Does Not Require Needle Injection
• Discussing Product Patents
• Sonophoresis: Sound Based Drug Delivery
• Raising the Funds for the Company
• The Role Models Behind the Startup
• "Even if you're comfortable getting out of your comfort zone, doing that as a dad, it's a hard thing to do."
• Funding for Angel Investors
• Making Medicsen Profitable
• Deep Dive into the Suggin App
• How the Product Works With the App
• Perseverance Regardless of Low Funds and No Business Experience

Topics: Biotech, Discovering Entrepreneurship, Founding Story

Angel-scale biotech: Learn More

While at Harvard Medical School, Senan Ebrahim was deeply affected by witnessing a still birth. Convinced better data could have avoided the tragedy, he founded Delfina Care with Priyanka Vaidya from EMOTIV, the EEG platform, and his brother Ali Ebrahim, PhD, a former Tech Lead at Google. Senan and Priyanka joined me for a great chat about the exciting things happening in digital health.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Senan Ebrahim and Priyanka Vaidya of Delfina
• Senan Ebrahim Was Interviewed in a Prior Episode Titled “Hikma Health”
• Obstetricians Are Flooded with Data from Pregnant Patients Leading to Poor Outcomes
• Priyanka Vaidya’s Experience with Gestational Diabetes Highlighted the Need to Coordinate Care
• “...I realized discontinuity of care is a major problem.”
• “Delfina wants to be that one place that integrates all of these discrete sources of data so that the mom stays in the center of the care...”
• Integrating Health Data Shows Up in Interviews with Jeremy Wiygul, MD of Pela Health and Ryan Hess of Connective Health
• “...how are we going to take better care of the four million pregnant moms in 2023 than we did in 2022?”
• Senan Reached Out to Priyanka for Product Savvy and to His Brother Ali for Experience Building Sophisticated Data Models
• The Patient Journey at Delfina
• “This data is being enriched as the patient travels along the journey.”
• Machine Learning Is Just Starting to Do Useful Things in Medicine Like Identifying a Stroke Quickly or Predicting Preeclampsia
• Incentives Are Aligned in Pregnancy Care; Nobody Wants Babies to End Up in Intensive Care
• What Delfina Means by “Closing the Loop” in Patient Care
• Delfina’s Platform Is Actually Live at a Practice in California
• Commercialization Will Focus Initially on Under-Served Populations
• How the Name “Delfina” Came About
• The Founding Story of Delfina Care

Topics: biotech, product, robotics / AI

Angels helping biotech startups: Learn More

Exited founder Sean Kevlahan, PhD tells the story of Quad Technologies and how an interesting polymer contributed to the explosion of cell therapies in the last decade. Sean gives great advice for biotech founders and investors, and joins Armon Sharei in my pantheon of chemical engineers who are gifted communicators.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patents attorney at Fish & Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Welcomes Sean Kevlahan, PhD, Founder of Quad Technologies
• “...how do you release a cell from a substrate [underlying substance] without killing a cell?”
• “Magnetic beads have been around for a while. Researchers use them to separate cells.”
• How Do You remove the Magnetic Beads without Killing the Cell?
• Quad Technologies’ Polymer Made It Possible to Remove the Magnetic Beads
• “When we first started out Quad, we focused on the academic markets.”
• The Success of CAR T-cell Therapies Opened Up an Opportunity for Quad -Help Multiply the CAR T-cells
• Emily Whitehead, the First Patient Treated with CAR T-cell Therapy, Is in Remission for Ten Years
• The Aha Moment that Put Quad Technologies on the Map
• Sean Kevlahan’s Epiphany Led to a Pivot and Product/Market Fit
• Ran Into Someone from Bio-Techne at the JP Morgan Conference & Discovered the Strategic Fit
• Bio-Techne Acquired Quad Technologies in July of 2018 – Investors Did Very Well
• Sal Daher Is Eager to Learn About Sean Kevlahan’s Stealth Startup
• “Even in biotech winter exited founders who have had this kind of success are very much in demand.”
• Sean Kevlahan’s Grandfather Was an Entrepreneur, a Successful Restauranteur
• Sean’s Entrepreneurship Activated by Hitting the “3-Year Wall” Doctoral Students Experience
• Quad’s Polymer Used to Be Just Coating for Microfluidics Chips; Sean and Adam Hatch Imagined Many More Uses
• “We went from obviously, biotech, which just makes the most sense to coating the undersides of boats for marine biofouling.”
• Due to MassChallenge, Quad’s Tech Was Used in the International Space Station
• Sean Kevlahan Speaks Well of Northeastern University’s Tech Transfer Office
• Quad Raised $ 6 Million Which Qualifies as Angel-Scale
• The Vital Importance of Clear Messaging by Life Science Founders – Lose the Jargon!
• “...I have to do a mental check, and making sure that I'm not being too jargony.”
• Biotechnologies Are Multiplying and Creating a Cascade of Opportunities
• Quad Raised $ 6 Million from Fifteen Angel Investors
• Siamab Raised $ 14 Million from More than Forty Angels
• Going from Biotech Founder to Biotech Executive: Compare and Contrast
• Jeff Behrens Recommends that Prospective Biotech Founders Get Experience at Big Biotech Companies
• Parting Thoughts from Sean Kevlahan, PhD

Topics: biotech, partnerships with strategics, pivot, returns, IP / patents, Mass Challenge

Opportunities in Angel-Scale Biotech: Learn More

Founder Justin Real tells us how Realplay Sports survived the COVID pause and set itself up to serve booming customer demand in 2022 and 2023. In the 2-year hiatus, Realplay expanded the type customers it can address and brought in partners to enrich its product offering. An inspiring chat with a compelling founder.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneuship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Welcomes Back Justin Real, Founder of Portfolio Company Realplay Sports
• Justin Real Diplomatically Notices That There’s a Lot Less Sal
• “...Realplay is a technology company with a goal of solving a problem for the amateur sports ecosystem.”
• Realplay Serves Mainly the 14 to 18-year-old Players Being Recruited. Younger Players Who Aspire to Be Recruited Also Forms a Significant Clientele
• “When they're watching the kid playing in the tournament venue, they can just enjoy the game instead of being there with the camera, taking a video...”
• The Impact of the Angel Invest Boston Podcast in Connecting Justin Real and Launchpad
• Erik Bullen Was an Early Believer in Realplay Sports
• 2020 Was Supposed to Be a Big Growth Year for Realplay, Then COVID Hit
• The Big March 13th Event in Arizona that Never Happened
• Potential Partners Began to Reach Out During COVID to Explore Collaborations
• Connections Made During COVID Led to a Much Richer and Diverse Product Offering that Made Realplay More Compelling to Users
• How Realplay Stayed Alive in 2020
• Rapsodo Now Provides Pitch and Ball Tracking on Realplay
• In 2021, Realplay Still Managed to Grow Despite All the Uncertainties
• Realplay Expects 2022 to Set a Record for Growth in Revenues
• Jason Real Makes the Point that Zoom Lowers the Cost of Taking a Meeting with Someone and thus Makes People More Willing to Take Meetings
• Realplay’s Current Challenge Is Stepping Up to the Expected Tripling of Business in 2023
• Peter Thiel’s Advice on Follow-On Investments
• Parting Thoughts from Justin Real, Founder of Realplay Sports: Gratitude + Watch Out for That Curveball

Topics: product, raising money, partnerships with strategics, COVID

The promise of angel-scale biotech: Learn More

Founder & VC Aaron Michel of 1984.vc on portfolio companies, Reggora, Faimarkit and Relevize and how they exemplify the firm’s approach to seed-stage investing. Aaron also gives Sal a mind-expanding suggestion on angel-scale biotech. Compelling & jargon-free!

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

• Sal Daher, CFA Introduces Aaron Michel, Venture Capitalist at 1984.VC
• Reggora: “...they're just enabling the lenders to do an appraisal almost in an Uberized fashion, in a much faster and much more efficient way than it used to be.”
• Brian & Will of Reggora Sold $5 Million of Real Estate in their Senior Year at Boston University
• A Dorm Room Business Helped the Founders of Reggora Discover a Scalable Business Opportunity
• Fairmarkit Is Automating the Enterprise Procurement Process
• Relevize – Helps Companies Sell Better via Channel Partners
• Relevize Gives Channel Partners Digital Advertising Content and Then Monitors Performance
• Aaron Michels Founded PathSource to Help People Find the Right Career
• Sal’s Partner Bob Smith Was Not Cut Out for the Law But was a Natural Entrepreneur
• “Both my parents are professors. They were both professors at Boston University. Both had started companies.”
• CareerPath’s Pivot
• How Aaron Michel Crossed Over from Being an Operator to Being a VC
• “Ideally, you can choose your competitor set.”
• “For B2B actually, we are open to investing pre-launch, as long as there's a product.”
• Aaron Michel’s Mind-Expanding Suggestion for How Better to Address the Opportunities of Angel-Scale Biotech
• “VCs tend to overvalue their advice and undervalue their introductions.”

Topics: founding story, competition, venture capital

Why angel-scale biotech is so promising: Learn More

Qiuyan Xu, PhD is a statistician, an entrepreneur and a colleague at Walnut. We talked about the startups she has invested in, her immigrant journey and the work she does at Gravitate AI (https://www.gravitate.ai)

Sponsors: Purdue University entrepreneurship & Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Qiuyan Xu, PhD, Statistician, Entrepreneur and Angel Investor
• Qiuyan Xu Talks About Her Investment in AOA Diagnostics
• Qiuyan Xu Talks About Her Investment in Octagon Therapeutics
• What Sal Daher Looks for in an Academic Founder
• Qiuyan Xu Wonders About the Long Holds in Life Science Investments
• “It's an important thing to remember now that the early-stage, angel-scale life science investing is really, really just beginning to take off.”
• “There are some angels who have done very successfully, with just a handful of companies.”
• “Weeding out the obvious losers. I think it makes a lot of sense.”
• We Still Know Surprisingly Little in the Life Sciences
• Qiuyan Xu Came to the US in 2003 to Study Statistics at UC Davis
• “...I got my PhD in 2008, in statistics, in the middle of a recession.”
• What Drove Qiuyan Xu to Become an Entrepreneur
• Qiuyan Xu’s Company Is Gravitate AI (https://www.gravitate.ai/)
• Gravitate AI Helps with Data Cleaning & Automation as Well as Customizing Open-Source AI Solutions
• How Qiuyan Xu Became an Angel Investor
• Contagious Enthusiasm
• Qiuyan Xu’s Advice to Angel Investors
• “You're urging angels to step right in, but at the same time, exercise control and have a budget.”
• Advice to Founders

Topics: robotics / AI, discovering entrepreneurship, angel investing strategies

Angel-scale biotech is hot: Learn More

Slater Victoroff founded Indico Data in his dorm room at Olin in 2012. Two years later Indico had gone through Techstars and was VC-backed. Hear the story of how making deep learning accessible to enterprise customers led to massive growth.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Slater Victoroff, Founder and CTO of Indico Data
• Indico Was Founded in a Dorm Room in 2012, Two Years Later They Raised $3 million in an Oversubscribed Round
• Machine Learning Is Programming with Data Rather than Code
• Deep Learning Is Characterized by a Focus on Unstructured Data i.e., Text, Audio and Images
• Indico’s Original Aim Was to Make Deep Learning Accessible to Software Developers
• Slater Victoroff Founded Indico Because Most Innovation in Deep learning Was Driven by Industry
• Indico’s Experience at Techstars
• Semyon Dukach Saw Promise in Indico Others Did Not
• “...Techstars really helped us understand was that we were real.”
• Why Slater Victoroff Gave Up the CEO Role
• The Shift to Enterprise Clients and Massive Growth
• Stellar Customer Satisfaction Metrics Was the Secret
• Slater Victoroff Was an Unlikely Founder
• About Hiring Machine Learning Talent
• Slater’s Work at .406 Ventures
• What Sets Olin College Apart
• How Textbooks Empower the Self-Directed Learners
• Why Slater Victoroff Does Not Invest in the Life Sciences
• Parting Thoughts from Slater Victoroff

Topics: founding story, robotics / AI, Techstars

Angel-scale biotech is exploding: Learn More

Practicing urologist and founder Jeremy Wiygul, MD believes millions of people are suffering needlessly due to the inadequate delivery of effective treatment, among these his own wife. Pelex aims to use new technology to integrate existing resources and greatly enhance patient outcomes for people with pelvic floor problems such as incontinence. A fun chat with a compelling founder.

Sponsors: Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jeremy Wiygul, MD Founder of Pelex
• “...up to 60 million Americans are affected by one form or another of pelvic floor disorders.”
• Pelex Combines a Connected Device and a Telehealth Platform to Provide Effective Care
• Pelex Intends to Bring Together the Right Provider, the Right Treatment and the Right Delivery of Care
• Consumer-Grade Pelvic Floor Devices Are Hit or Miss
• Parallels to Imago Rehab Which Delivers Physical Therapy Remotely via a Connected Device
• Connected with Jeremy Wiygul via Chrissy Glover of Imago Rehab
• Jeremy Wiygul’s Own Physical Rehab Informs His Work
• Why Would a Urologist with a Practice in New Your City Found a Startup?
• What’s the Innovation Pelex Is Bringing to Market?
• The Regulatory Strategy to Build Value in the Long Run
• “...we feel very strongly that our outcomes are going to be above, and significantly better than any other service that's out there.”
• Strategy with Regards to Intellectual Property
• The Combination of Practitioner, Care and Delivery Has the Potential to Build a Brand Based on Dramatic Improvements in Outcomes for Patients
• If the Wife of an Urologist Struggles to Get the Right Care in Her Husband’s Specialty, There’s Obviously a Problem
• Contact jeremy@pelex-med.com if You Have the Problem or Want to Help
• Exit Strategy
• The Power of Bringing the Right Technology to Market at the Right Time
• Learn More at https://pelexhealth.com/
• Thanks Chrissy Glover of Imago Rehab for the Introduction to Jeremy Wiygul

Topics: biotech, discovering entrepreneurship, software

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Erik Bullen, Angel, Founder & Listener
• Erik Bullen Is Excited About Focal Point, a SaaS Solution in the Procurement Space
• “It's one of those stories where he could not find a solution to actually solve this problem so... I'm going to create my own solution and build my own company.”
• Anders Lillevik of Focal Point Was on the Fence About Joining Techstars Atlanta; It Turned Out Well
• “What Focal Point does is it integrates a lot of the other silos that are out there.”
• How Erik Bullen Reshaped His Work Life After Selling His Company
• “...Guidely is targeting...alternate methods of mental health and personal development and using techniques, not clinical techniques...”
• Cyberthentic: “...a very novel way to prevent email business compromise...”
• “It's actually complementary to some of the other cybersecurity solutions out there.”
• Meenta Grew Exponentially During COVID
• Gabor Bethelendy’s First Startup Failed; a Few Months Later Gabor Was Starting Meenta
• Gabor Bethlendy Met His Co-Founder Stephan Smith Because Their Sons Got into Fisticuffs at School
• Realplay: Simplifying Sports Videos for Tournament Venues
• Realplay Cameras Record Tournament Play, Its Algorithm Finds and Tags Crucial Parts
• Erik Bullen and Justin Real of Real Play Developed a Close Advisory Relationship
• Erik Bullen Was Born in Bremen to a German Mom and an American Dad
• Biked 10 Miles in His Suit During a Virginia Summer to Get to a Job Interview!
• “"Looks like you need a beer." He goes over a fridge gets me a beer. This is a very different interview than I was expecting.”
• “It was formative for me in terms of really loving starting things and building things as well.”
• "Hey, by the way, your van is smoking."
• Erik Bullen Worked in Amsterdam in Digital Marketing; World Wildlife Fund & International Red Cross Were Clients
• Erik Bullen Eventually Headed Global Services at Brightcove
• Sal Daher Asks Erik Bullen About Obstacles to Investing in Biotech
• Knowledge About the Science and the Industry Is the First Obstacle
• Long Investment Hold and Capital Requirements Are the Second Obstacle
• “Life Sciences would be great, but you know what, I can't spread myself too thin either.”
• “I'm big on finding solutions and supporting cancer research...but I have not invested in a company that focuses on that area.”
• Sal Daher’s Perspective on the Knowledge Problem in the Life Sciences
• Why Sal Daher Is Bullish on Daphne Zohar and PureTech Health
• Why Sal Daher Is Focusing on Angel-Scale Biotech
• RockStep Solutions and VistaPath Bio Are Examples of Software Eating the Life Sciences
• “Most of these companies are going to end up being bought by a strategic.”
• The Angel Invest Boston Podcast Introduced Erik Bullen to Angel Investing
• Compare & Contrast: Walnut Ventures, Launchpad and TBD Angels
• Erik Bullen’s Parting Thoughts

Angel-scale biotech is taking off: Learn More

Susan Conover of Piction Health, is building an AI to improve results and reduce costs in the treatment of skin conditions. Piction has amassed 500,000 diagnosed images and is already helping primary care physicians interpret skin problems in patients. A great chat with an inspiring founder.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Thanks Sponsors Purdue University Entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson
• Sal Daher Introduces Susan Conover of Piction Health
• Susan Conover’s History with Melanoma and the Scarcity of Dermatologists
• "What are opportunities for identifying skin diseases and how can technology help?"
• “...we help elevate every doctor to have that visual expertise of a dermatologist...”
• Piction Health’s Data Set Includes 500,000 Diagnosed Images with a Variety of Skin Tones
• “We're, right now, focused on rashes.”
• “...what makes the most sense to start with is a buyer who's realizing the value of our product now.”
• “We estimate we can save these organizations, risk-bearing organizations, $160,000 per doctor per year.”
• Piction Health Is Looking for Providers Who Have at least 50% of the Downside Risk of Patient Costs
• Looking for a Product Manager and a Senior Machine Learning Engineer
• Piction Health Is Partnering with a Big Provider to Develop Its Product Offering
• Scaling Dermatology from 40 Patients per Day to 40,000 Patients per Day
• The Value of Techstars and MassChallenge to Piction Health
• Parting Thoughts – Advice to People Who Are on “Survival Mode” at Work

Topics: Mass Challenge, Techstars, robotics AI, discovering entrepreneurship

Psychiatrist and founder Jacqueline Olds on her startup and her mission to fight loneliness in America. Words of wisdom and lots of laughs in this interview that could actually make your life better.

Brought to you by:

• Purdue University entrpreneurship, and
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces, Jacqueline Olds, M.D., Psychiatrist and Founder
• Jacqueline and Her Husband, Founded GoodLux Technologies to Help Treat Depression without Drugs
• They Created a Device and an App to Help People with Bright Light Therapy
• “We thought this would be a wearable that would remind people that there was a way to treat their depression without using “
• Sal Used the GoodLux Sunsprite to Help His Newborn Grandson Sleep Through the Night
• “The people who lived in places with an abundance of sun sometimes got seasonal depression, because they couldn't stand going outside in the summer, and they were inside like moles.”
• Overcoming Loneliness, Practical Strategies for Finding Connection
• “...a huge percentage of our patients were lonely but they were all embarrassed to admit it, and were thinking that they were the only ones who felt lonely and left out...”
• Marriage in Motion: “...what lasting marriages look like.”
• The Lonely American: Why Americans in Particular Experience so Much Social Isolation
• “There's that undercurrent of American culture that essentially says you're going to be okay if you're on your own...”
• “Fewer people are getting married and fewer people are living with other people and everybody acts like that's a reasonable thing to do...when it's bad for your health mentally and physiologically.”
• “Part of the reason psychotherapy can be helpful, is that you bring out these secrets that you felt terrible about and they sound positively measly when you talk them over with an actual human being...”
• Americans Are Confiding in Fewer and Fewer People
• Opportunities for Human Interaction Are Disappearing Due to Technology and Other Factors
• The Down Side of Interacting with People Only When You Feel Like It
• “To live in an environment where you have so many ties means you have very few choices...”
• The Thickly Connected Social Environment of Sal’s Home Town in Brazil
• Social Life of Grad Students in Boston in the Mid-1960s
• The Town of Roseto and Its Notable Cardiac Health and Longevity Outcomes
• The Secret of Longevity Was the Close Social Bonds of the Community
• The Down Side of Close-Knit Communities
• The Paradox of Choice: How Too Many Options Keep Us from Deciding
• “...COVID has given us all a chance to reset and try to achieve balance in a new way because we were forced to calm down and give up some of our favorite enjoyments like going to restaurants or going to plays or going to concerts.”
• Psychiatrist Jacqueline Olds’ Suggestion for Connecting Younger People Working Remotely
• “Lots of slightly anxious, lonely, depressed people decide, "I don't want anyone to know how needy I feel, so I'm just going to take my light down.’”
• The Value of Witnesses in Marriage
• “...making sure those three o'clock thoughts are just that, nonsense. At eight o'clock in the morning, with coffee in front of you, just, "It's nothing. It was just a nightmare."”
• Love, Shopping & Cocaine
• “When a college student comes in and they're looking all miserable and cold and unhappy with their studies, and then they find somebody that they're starting to fall in love with and suddenly they're full of smiles. You can just see the dopamine practically showing on their face.”
• Parting Thoughts from Jacqueline Olds, M.D., the Wise Psychiatrist

The Promise of Angel-Scale Biotech: Learn More

The miracle-working CEO of portfolio company Finetune Learning is back to tell us about the latest developments in applying artificial intelligence in educational assessments. We also got into remote work and explored how to support younger workers in creating professional networks while working remotely.

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Expresses Gratitude for His Sponsors: Purdue University Entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson
• Sal Daher Introduces Steve Shapiro the Miracle-Working CEO of Finetune Learning
• Finetune Learning Uses Technology to Support the Creation of Great Educational Assessments
• Version 1.0 of Finetune Made It Easier to Grade Essays Consistently – A 2X Improvement
• Finetune Version 2.0 Is More B2B – It Is Assisting in the Effective Creation Content for Educational Assessment
• Making Assessment Writers 10X More Effective
• “The other product that we have that scans the text, then classifies and tags it, does it in two orders of magnitudes more than a team of humans. Let's throw away the 2X to 10X and start saying 100x, 200x.”
• “...we never said this is something that replaces a human. We believe that strongly. We always say this is something that's going to augment humans who are really good at this.”
• Pre-Trained Systems Will Revolutionize Adaptive Learning
• “In most cases, we're not a full solution. We are either a widget or an intel inside a larger solution with a large partner that's a multi-billion-dollar”
• "I went into this because I actually hated school and you're throwing me back into a classroom....”
• Old-Time Adaptive Learning
• “That missing 10%, they have to be trained and they're not there because the teaching methods don't fit their learning style.”
• “...there's a ton of Gen Z and Millennial founders out there that are starting to create companies in education technology...”
• Unexpected Source of Talent for Cybersecurity
• Finetune Driven to Remote Work Before the Pandemic Due to the Difficulty of Competing for Talent with Amazon and Google in Kendall Square
• Lessons on Managing a Remote Workforce – Learned from GitLab
• The Right Approach to Company Culture
• How a Founder Learned to Get Along with Her Co-Founder
• How Younger Workers Are Disadvantaged by Remote Work
• How to Help Younger Workers Build Social Networks? A Question for Jacqueline Olds, M.D.
• How Do We Reskill Angel Investors to Help Build Life Science Startups?
• A Happy Outcome from Zoom School
• Steve Shapiro’s Parting Thoughts

Topics: edtech, management, robotics / AI, software

The Promise of Angel-Scale Biotech: Learn More

SPVs (Special Purpose Vehicles) are democratizing startup investing. In this interview with Jeremy Neilson, founder of Assure.co, we discussed how founders and angels can benefit from these increasingly economical platforms and what they mean for the future.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jeremy Neilson Co-Founder of Assure.co
• Sal and Jeremy Met at an Event Held by Jason Calacanis in 2019
• “...the engine of a large number of groups that do angel investing.”
• Use Cases for SPVs (Special Purpose Vehicles)
• It Used to Be Very Pricey to Set Up and SPV – No Longer
• A Way for Angels to Increase the Diversity of their Portfolio
• co Is helping Democratize Investing in Private Assets
• co Focuses on Accredited Investors – Does Not Do Equity Crowdfunding
• The Founding Story of Assure.co
• “...AngelList called my co-founder, Katie, and I and said, "Can you guys figure out how to do funds in bulk?"”
• Sal Daher Advises People Not to Make the Mistake He Made in Creating His Own SPVs – A Lot of Work!
• “He's the pope of angel investing podcasts. I'm just a cardinal, or perhaps a bishop.”
• Biotech Too Is Being Democratized
• “...we're seeing in the ecosystem is a very large shift away from thinking strictly financial.”
• “No longer is it a very small niche of uberwealthy or venture funds, now it's the entire ecosystem of accredited investors now have the opportunity to participate.”
• io and Curesology
• “We have seen clients come and say, "I want to donate my carry to a good cause."”
• “Carta, AngelList, Assure.co were those three that got started all together back about eight, nine years ago.”
• Cheaper SPVs Are Helping to Give Access to More Diverse Founders by Broadening the Reach of Investors
• Sal Compares Two Robotic Glove Startups Three Decades Apart to Demonstrate How Much the Startup Ecosystem Has Developed
• “Her life is going to be so much easier in starting that company than it was for Chrissy Glover’s starting Imago Rehab [today] and way, way easier than Beth Marcus’ starting EXOS back in the early '90s.”
• “Assure.co is helping to lower the dead weight of a startup rocket that's trying to reach escape velocity.”
• Wisdom from Waseem Daher of Pilot.com on Angels & Cap Tables
• SPV Pricing at Assure.co
• co Powers Jason’s Syndicates, EquityZen and Forge Among Many

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, fin tech, angel investing strategies

The Opportunitites in Angel-Scale Biotech: https://syndicate.angelinvestboston.com/en-us/the-surge-of-opportunities-in-angel-scale-biotech

The dynamic duo of founder Adam Martel and super angel Christopher Mirabile are back on the podcast to report on the sale of Gravyty and to discuss Adam’s new startup, Givzey.

Highlights:

• Gravyty Created a New Category
• How COVID Affected Gravyty
• Merging Gravyty and Graduway
• Sal Compares the Gravyty Exit and the Mavrck Exit
• Selling a Startup to a Private Equity Firm
• Adam Martel Talks About his New Startup, Givzey
• “Because we're experts in data, we've seen if you make a gift to your alma mater for the last 20 years, odds are that you're going to make a gift in the 21st year.”
• “...the ability to understand the market and to understand the timing of the market; is the market ready for this, has been shown to be a very important predictor of success in ventures.”
• Sal Daher Shifts the Conversation to the Life Sciences
• “...you don't meet many academics who aren't pretty sharp. When you think about it, many of them are really quite good at project management.”
• Being Coachable Is Essential for First-Time Academic Founders
• “...Michael Jordan wasn't coachable, but I think he would tell you that he heard everything people said.”
• AceUp, the Executive Coaching Platform
• Purdue University Entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson Sponsor the Podcast
• Hilltop Biosciences and Founder Amanda Drobnis
• QSM Diagnostics
• Kalion: Bioengineering Microorganisms to Produce Valuable Compounds
• KnipBio – Another Use for Microorganisms
• Piction Health – AI for Skin

Topics: product, exits, biotech

Why Sal Is Bullish on Biotech: Click Here

Adam de Sola Pool, a highly successful pioneer in green tech investing in the 1990s, now sees huge opportunities in blue tech. Don’t miss this fascinating tour of ocean technologies conducted by an engaging investor/guide.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Welcomes Back Fellow Angel Investor Adam Pool
• “...he finds the kind of opportunities [in ocean tech] today that he saw in cleantech back in the 1990s.”
• The Surge in Aquaculture Creates Massive Opportunities for Investors, including Angel Investors
• Adam Pool Recently Invested in BioFeyn Which Is Making the Feeding of Farmed Fish More Efficient
• “...we're transforming the food part of the $3 trillion business that is the ocean economy.”
• Sal Sees Parallels Between the Explosion of Opportunities in Biotech and in Blue Tech.
• Cool: Seatrec and its Ocean-going Electric Charging Stations
• Cool: Making Fish Food Out of Mealworms and Black Soldier Fly Larvae
• Cool: Ocean Rainforest Produces Kelp Used to Control Bovine Flatulence
• Cool: Reel Data Uses Facial Recognition for Salmon. IKYN!
• Interested Angel Investors Can Contact Blue Angels
• https://sea-ahead.com/blue-angels
• Cool: Oyster Tracker Offers Digital Tracking of Oysters from the Sea Bed to the Dinner Plate
• Cool: Fish in Fashion – You Won’t Believe This!
• “I'm so glad that I violated my format and went blue instead of bio.”
• Many Exits in Blue Tech
• Interesting Companies Protecting the Oceans but also Creating Work Opportunities for Displaced Workers
• Several VC Funds Being Raised – Investable by Angels
• Sal Daher Sees Adam de Sola Pool as a Visionary Who Is Also Practical

Topics: product, exits, portfolio, venture capital

Why Sal Is Bullish on Biotech

VeraMorph has a new way to deliver insoluble drugs by mouth. Founder Doug Godfrin, PhD elucidates the promise of accessing the 85% of drugs that are not soluble. Does VeraMorph pass Sal Daher’s screen for angel-scale biotech? Listen and find out.

Sponsors: Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish and Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher, CFA Introduces Doug Godfrin, PhD, Founder of VeraMorph
• A New Way to Deliver Drugs Orally
• How VeraMorph Gets Around the Solubility Problem
• VeraMorph’s Approach Is Janus-like: Shelf Stable but Available Where Needed
• The Decade of Biotech & VeraMorph
• AltrixBio: Gastric Bypass Surgery in a Pill
• Sal Daher’s Biotech Screen: Strong Patents
• “VeraMorph actually owns the patents outright for this platform technology.”
• “We've really taken a totally different perspective with this class of material by focusing on immediate release via oral delivery...”
• Sal Daher’s Biotech Screen: Capable Academic Founder
• Sal Daher’s Biotech Screen: Is it Angel-Scale?
• US$1 Million Will Get VeraMorph to Production for Pre-Clinical Trials
• “...chances of reaching that next set of milestones is 90% or above.”
• Doug Godfrin Is Collaborating with Colin Minchom, PhD, a Veteran of Drug Development
• US$ 2 to 3 million More Will Take VeraMorph to Clinical Stage, Doug Predicts
• Sal and Doug Look at the Odds of Getting to Clinical Stage
• Sal Daher’s Biotech Screen: Do Strategics Care?
• Sal Daher’s Biotech Screen: Platform Technology?
• Sponsors Purdue University and Peter Fasse Are Founder-Friendly
• The Upside of Failure in Biotech
• This guy calls me up, "Saleh, let's get together at Darwin's in Cambridge. I want to talk to you about a new company."
• Doug Godfrin’s Parting Thoughts

Topics: biotech

• Sal Daher Welcomes Back Iron Woman Diane Stokes, Founder & Angel
• This Interview Picks Up Where the Prior Interview Left Off – Back to Wyebot
• How Wyebot Weathered COVID
• Diane Stokes and Colleagues Formed a Firm to Help Startups Grow
• Squadle – Promising Startup in Which Diane Stokes and Sal Daher Invested
• Dermal Photonics – Diane Stokes Is Trying Their Product
• Dermal Photonics Is Championed by Super Angel Jeff Arnold Who Has Been on the Podcast
• Sal Daher’s Standing Question: How to Get More Angels to Do Biotech
• “He discovered that VCs are not doing the small-scale biotech anymore. By small scale is a company that could sell for $200 million.”
• “They all want to have the next Moderna.”
• “One of the things is, is it manufacturable? How do you get to scale on your manufacturing, if it's not even at that stage yet?”
• Diane Stokes Believes Angels Have to Be Shown the Possibilities of the Biotechnology Beyond the First use Case
• “The resource we have an abundance of, are brilliant academics with no business experience, but with tremendous motivation.”
• “If you get a physician that is open to having somebody work with them and know what they don't know in that, it can be very successful and I think this is similar.”
• “Being able to understand the state of where your organization is, what help you need, where to spend that newly acquired funding that you received.”
• Diane Stokes Plans to Do a 2000-mile Bike Ride to Fight ALS

Topics: management, angel investing strategies, biotech, pivot

Artificial intelligence guru Gil Syswerda is back to talk about angel investing and to give practical advice to founders. We closed with entertaining stories from Gil’s career.

Highlights:

• AI Guru Gil Syswerda Is Back to with Tips for Angels & Founders
• Why Founders Should Value Their Time at $10 per Minute
• “...I stopped driving...I take an Uber or Lyft because it's not worth my time to be in a car... An Uber is way cheaper than $10 a minute.”
• Advice to Founders: Find a Co-Founder with Critical Skills You Lack
• Advice to Founders: “You need to be in the trenches, along with everybody else.”
• “One thing you make a must-read is an article by Paul Graham. It's called Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule.”
• “...The Hard Truth About Innovative Cultures, Gary Pisano just nails it, when he talks about how to create an innovative culture...”
• “...get an executive assistant as soon as you can.”
• “...you just cannot function at 100% if you don't get enough sleep.”
• Exercise Is Essential: Intense Outdoor Exercise at Sunrise; plus do Bouts Like Taking the Stairs
• “It's actually quite difficult for most people to make money as an angel investor.”
• “...I believe that Jeff Arnold probably does pretty well on his investments but he has pretty grounded knowledge in the biotech space and he has a methodology for evaluating companies.” How to Make Money in Biotech with Jeff Arnold
• Frank Ferguson Was a Spectacularly Successful Investor (Bose and Curriculum Associates) by Focusing on a Few Investments Intensely Practical Dreamer with Frank Ferguson
• Howard Stevenson Got Warren-Buffett-like Returns on His Angel Portfolio [Wealth & Families with Howard Stevenson]
• Sal Daher and His Biotech Screen for Angel Investing
• “These people [academic founders] have tremendous skills. If we can help them turn those skills in the direction of something useful, I think they can create a lot of value.”
• VistaPath Bio Using Off-the-Shelf Machine Vision to Create Value in Pathology
• Gil Syswerda Stories
• The HP Interview or Everything I Needed to Know I Learned in Third Grade
• Growing Fish at BBN Labs
• The Interview at Lawrence Livermore Research Laboratory
• Gödel, Escher, Bach & All That
• The AI Researcher and the Daughter of the Soviet Scientist
• Simulating Professor Paul Scott
• How to Have a Board without a Board
• Gil Syswerda’s Perception of Where AI Is Today
• Gil Syswerda Highlights People Who Were Influential in His Success

Topics: co-founders, angel investing strategies, management

Why Sal's Bullish on Angel-Scale Biotech: Learn More

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Founder Matt Breen of Rahoo Baby is back to update us on the progress of the company and on their new product, Walk Block. This startup is building a brand around helping parents support the cognitive development of their babies.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Matt Breen, Co-founder of Rahoo Baby
• “...scarcity of information that parents should have about how to positively impact their child's early development...”
• “...only about 6% of families actually tap into that knowledge that we [therapists]”
• “...oftentimes, it really isn't rocket science. It's stuff that can really easily be implemented into a parent's daily routine in terms of how they interact and play with their”
• Many Developmental Delays Can Be Remedied with Simple Interventions that Do Not Entail Onerous Visits to the Hospital
• Rahoo Baby’s First Product Is a Baby Lounger that Reduces Reflux and Increases Tummy Time – Funded by a Kickstarter Campaign
• “Very little marketing spend is required to attract customers, which is a huge advantage for our startup.”
• Walking Independently Drives Cognitive Development – Second Product “Walk Blocks” Promotes Walking
• Rahoo Baby Is Creating Content to Help Parents Based on Each of the First Twelve Months of the Baby’s Life
• A Shout Out to Angel Investor & Listener Mark Bissel Who Connected Us
• Martin Aboitiz Made Himself an Expert in Electronic Health Records – 80 Million EHRs in His Company’s Data Lake
• Sal Daher Pitches Purdue Entrepreneurship & Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson
• Matt & Erica Have No Model for Entrepreneurship in Their Families
• Another Reason to Join Sal Daher’s Syndicate List

Topics: co-founders, raising money, selling, product

When Semyon Dukach’s family came to America as refugees from the Soviet Union, they had a hundred dollars to their name. Semyon is now one of Boston’s most consequential VCs. Along the way he founded a couple of startups himself and made some remarkable angel investments that put him in a position to be helping founders with money and time. He has a knack for encouraging founders during the tough times. He’s done some fascinating stuff, like being a member of MIT’s fabled blackjack team, more recently he headed up Techstars in Boston. Then he raised a venture fund, One Way Ventures, focused on working with immigrant founders.

Don’t miss this inspiring interview. Topics covered include:

• Sal’s Announcement of the Angel Invest Boston Syndicate
• Sal’s Intro of Semyon Dukach
• Semyon Dukach Bio
• The Moment Semyon Dukach Figured Out What He wanted to Do in Life
• Semyon Dukach’s Immigrant Story
• One of Semyon Dukach’s Adventures on MIT’s Fabled Blackjack Team
• The Satisfaction of Helping Out Customers in Significant Ways
• Semyon Dukach’s Tremendous Pivot Story
• Semyon Dukach’s First Angel Investment
• Some of Semyon Dukach’s Favorite Startups – Wanderu, Quanergy & Lovepop Cards
• Semyon Dukach’s Leadership at Techstars Boston
• Semyon Dukach’s Advice to Startups Applying to Techstars
• Why Are Immigrants So Over-Represented Among Founders
• How One Way Ventures Came About
• About Eveline Buchatskiv, Semyon’s Partner in One Way Ventures
• Semyon Dukach’s Advice to Angels & Founders

Topics: venture capital, angel investing strategies, Techstars, focus, co-founders, founding story, exits, pivot

Join Sal's Investment Syndicate: Click to Join

Listener Robert Nagle is a mathy software guy and an angel investor. We had a great chat which included his perceptions of the risks in biotech investing and also discussed some of the companies in his portfolio. This is an instructive conversation with a thoughtful angel investor.

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Listener Robert Nagle, Mathy Software Guy and Angel Investor
• Robert Nagle Was Born in Ireland & Came to the US
• Robert Nagle Knew Jon Hirschtick as a Brilliant Intern at Computervision [ Jon Hirschtick podcast: https://www.angelinvestboston.com/jon-hirschtick-innovating-in-the-cloud]
• “If you're nice to people, sometimes they remember, sometimes they don't. If you're a jerk, they always remember...”
• Robert Nagle’s First Angel Check – Startup Making Bespoke Eyeglass Frames
• Conversation About Virtual Angel Investing
• “...many fascinating opportunities that spill out of the universities...”
• “That model that serves virtually-based, tool-based, asynchronous doesn't depend on a meeting is one of the exciting innovations that I think TBD Angels has brought to fruition.”
• “I think more than one model is good for angels. The aggregate sums as you point out can be comparable.”
• Robert Nagle Belongs to Hub Angels, Sky Ventures and TBD Angels
• Two Brothers in Law: How They Help Sal’s Angel Investing
• Robert Nagel on His Portfolio Company Easyship
• Robert Nagel on His Portfolio Company NODE40 – Pickaxe & Shovels for Crypto
• Sal Daher on Portfolio Company Meenta – A COVID Rocketship
• Rockstep Solutions – ERP for Pre-Clinical Trials
• VistaPath Bio – Machine Vision Helping the Intake of Pathology Samples
• “...what holds you back from investing in life science companies?”
• Sal’s Mentor on Life Science Company Was a Life Science Skeptic Having Made His Money in the Space
• “...life science companies...are taking over the value of the portfolio. That's where all the value creation is going on.”
• Said of SQZ: “...I'm putting my money on the fact that they have a technology that helps other people produce their therapies faster, more efficiently.”
• Said of Savran Technologies: “A few million dollars is enough to develop two use cases in a company like that.”
• The Subset of Biotech Companies that Interests Sal Daher, CFA
• How Sal Daher, CFA Made a Good Chunk of His Net Worth on a Scary Asset
• “At one point I had my kid's tuition money in Nigerian promissory notes. You'll probably say, "Majnun," that’s Arabic for crazy.”
• “That taught me a lesson that a particular area, a particular asset that people don't like at all, they turn their noses at it. There, I will find opportunity.”
• Why Life Science Companies Are Paradoxically Accessible to Intelligent Lay People
• “I don't think the challenge is people being unable to see the opportunity. I think the problem is...on the risk side.”
• The Weird & Wonderful Story of Bacteria That Glow in the Dark
• Robert Nagle on Marc Andreessen’s Thesis about Founder-Led Companies
• “I'm always gratified when I talk to a listener. I have yet to be disappointed, and I'm also surprised at the number of people come up to me and say, "I started my startup because of listening to your podcast."”

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech

When Sid Satish saw his first surgery he was struck by the contrast between the advanced technologies in use side by side with ancient practices such as the negotiation over how much patient blood has been lost. He saw an opportunity to apply technology to create an informed calculation of blood loss. This was in 2011, now this technology runs on iPad Pros and is in use at 30 hospitals. In the fall of 2021 Gauss Surgical was acquired by Stryker so it’s time to re-launch this compelling interview.

Here are some highlights from this eye-opening interview:

• Siddarth Satish’s Bio
• Got Hooked on Entrepreneurship from Business Plan Competitions at UC Berkeley
• Gauss’ Device & Software Scans the Operating Room to Estimate Blood Loss – Too Cool!

[The Product Is Called Triton and Has Been Adopted at 30 Hospitals and Used on 100,000 patients Already]

• How Gauss Got Started
• “…we've had a few of our health systems study the delivery of the system and find that it has clinically impacted blood transfusions, made them more efficient, it has led to a significant increase in the recognition of hemorrhage, which is the problem we're trying to solve….by almost 400 percent.”
• “When you're trying to change an entire field and trying to change the way that medicine is ultimately practiced with a completely new perspective, it takes re-imagination both on the technical front, but also on the clinical front, on the customer-facing front.”

Topics: robotics / AI, discovering entrepreneurship, founding story

Join Sal's Investment Syndicate: Click to Join

Salvatore Viscomi, MD founded his own startup and is now with GoodCell which isolates and stores cells of healthy patients who may need them for future cell therapies. The startup is founded by David Scadden, MD of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute. A truly informative interview.

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher, CFA Introduces Salvatore Viscomi, MD, Physician, Founder & Investor
• “...to isolate and store cells that you may utilize for future therapy.”
• “The ability to not only isolate and store the cells but to be able to say, "These cells are of good quality for future therapy...”
• “One of the unique capabilities we have is looking at what are the genetic changes that happen in our lives that cause risk.”
• “...two years from now, and we can always reference your biobank material to see what your baseline levels were.”
• GoodCell Co-Founders: David Scadden, MD, Trevor Perry, CEO, Brad Hamilton, CSO
• Salvatore Viscomi Was Vetting GoodCell for a Friend but Ended Up Investing and Coming Aboard as Chief Medical Officer
• Raised $30 million Series Seed, Looking for Strategic Collaborations
• GoodCell Has Expanded on the Intellectual Property Licensed from the Broad Institute
• “The second filing was around the ability to determine the quality of cells that go through a manufacturing process.”
• Owned Patents Also Cover Matters Related to Autoimmune Disease
• How GoodCell Tests for CHIP (proliferation of unhealthy cells) Works
• Possibility that a Therapy for CHIP Will Be Developed
• A Plug for Purdue University Entrepreneurship & Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney
• “Purdue is in the middle of the country in West Lafayette, Indiana and so they're really making a big effort to reach out to angel investors in both coasts.”
• Salvatore Viscomi’s Father was a Stone Mason from Italy Who Moved to US via Argentina
• How Salvatore Viscomi, MD Got the Entrepreneurial Urge
• The Resistance of Certain Academic Institutions to Entrepreneurial Ventures
• “...taking that idea and making a business out of it, which is probably what was really the most fun for me...”
• How Being an Immigrant Makes People More Prone to Entrepreneurship
• “No matter how smart you are, no matter how smart your idea is, it's very difficult to do it alone.”

Topics: biotech, co-founders, discovering entrepreneurship, IP / patents

Sal's Syndicate: Click to Join

Virtual visits & robotics to improve greatly the recovery of stroke patients. Chrissy Glover & her startup, Imago Rehab, are taking to market technology from Harvard's Biodesign Lab informed by deep experience in how stroke rehabilitation is done now.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Chrissy Glover, Co-Founder of Imago Rehab
• “...they've had a stroke maybe a year ago, and their hand is just stuck in this fist position.”
• “It's well understood that what is required for successful recovery is high-intensity rehabilitation.”
• 300 Repetitions of Hand Movements per Day Is What’s Needed; Stroke Patients Now Get 30 Reps Twice a Week - If They Can Get to the Clinic
• The Brain Is a Lot More Plastic Than We Thought, Even the Brain of the Elderly
• “...we see people who are five years post-stroke and able to really drastically improve their hand function, which is really exciting.”
• With The Robotic Glove in Their Home, Some Patients Go Way Beyond 300 Reps per Day and Have Great Outcomes
• Chrissy and Imago Have been Through Mass Challenge
• FDA Regulatory Path Is Relatively Simple; Imago Rehab Is Getting Reimbursed for the Virtual Visits Even Before Approval
• “We actually just entered the market, which is exciting news for us.”
• With Imago Rehab, Sal Daher Has Dèjá Vu from His First Startup Investment, EXOS, Which Involved a Force-Feedback Glove
• Co-founder Kristin Nuckols Brings 15 Years of Experience in Occupational Therapy
• Technology Developed at the Harvard Biodesign Lab under Professor Conor Walsh Who Is Also a Co-founder
• Sal Daher on the Connection Between Creative People and Startups
• How Chrissy Glover Decided to Become an Entrepreneur
• Chrissy Glover Takes Notes and, More Significantly, Can Read Them!
• “You talked about could there be a multiplier effect for therapists where we're taking out some of the mundane tasks so they can really be more efficient with their time.”
• Imago Rehab Has the Potential to Build Strong Value for Individual Therapists and Thus Attract Large Numbers of these Sought-after Specialists
• Basecamp and Summit Thoughts on Imago Rehab
• “We're hyper-focused on stroke in the hand, but then we do have larger aspirations.”
• “Actually, in the Biodesign Lab, there is a shoulder and elbow device also in development.”
• “It could be learning algorithms, making their work more efficient, making their lives more manageable...Because the limiting factor in therapy is the availability of therapists.”
• “This is entrepreneurship. It's Stone Soup.”
• “...Imago Rehab, a startup that is getting ready to revolutionize the space of physical rehabilitation ..”

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship, and
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Topics: product, robotics / AI, co-founders, Mass Challenge, platform, founding story

Sal's Investment Syndicate: Click to Join

Harvard’s Tom Eisenmann is the author of Why Startups Fail: A New Roadmap for Entrepreneurial Success. We discussed valuable lessons from the book and how they might apply to biotech startups.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Prof. Tom Eisenmann of the Harvard Business School, Author of Why Startups Fail
• Howard Stevenson’s 400X Return
• Contrasting Brad Feld’s Book with Prof. Tom Eisenmann’s Book
• Sal Daher’s Favorite Part of the Book: Failing
• “[failed] founders probably cycle through those. ...the Kubler Ross stages...”
• “...basically, half of failed founders come back and get back on the horse and do it again.”
• Shutting Down the Failed Venture, Gracefully
• The Number One Killer of Startups: False Starts
• “...engineers are particularly vulnerable to this because they want to build.”
• Sal Daher Discusses SQZ Biotech’s False Start and Brilliant Pivot
• The Origin Story of Why Startups Fail
• “...the factories that actually make this stuff actually generate enough cash to invest in new apparel companies...”
• Silver Linings of the Pandemic
• Tom Eisenmann on Harvard’s School of Engineering and the MS/MBA Program
• Tom Eisenmann on Tough Tech: Technical Uncertainty + Market Uncertainty
• Creating Supports for Life Science Academics to Become Founders
• Creative Destruction Labs
• Sal Daher’s Focus on Biotech Angel Formation
• Software Startup Funding vs. Biotech Startup Funding
• Maybe Successful Angel-Backed Founders Such as Todd Zion and Armon Sharei Could be a Resource for Training Angels
• The Dynamics of Venture Capital in the Last Decade – Many New Shoots
• Tom Eisenmann’s Parting Thoughts

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship, and
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Topics: biotech, management, co-founders, Mass Challenge, raising money, scholar, venture capital

Join Sal's Syndicate: Click to Join

Genius founder Sam Bogoch of Axle.ai returns to the podcast to tells us the secrets of equity crowdfunding. Axle.ai helps enterprises with massive video files make them usable. The startup has found great success on Republic and Sam has wisdom to share.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Sam Bogoch Founder of Axle.ai Who Is a Returning Guest
• Sam Bogoch’s Back Story Is on Another Episode Titled “Boy Genius, MD & Founder”
• Axle.ai addresses the accumulation of video content in enterprises
• What Axle.ai Does for Its Customers Such as Sports Venues
• Enables Remote Work & Finding Relevant Parts on Massive Video Files
• It’s a Big Problem and Companies Are Getting Acquired – Adobe Bought Frame.io for $1.3 billion
• Video Files Grow Faster than Bandwidth, So Most of Them Are Still on Disk Drives, Not the Cloud
• “...Amazon Web Services, when they're collecting very, very large data sets, they actually send out a tractor trailer-“
• How Do Crowdfunding Investors Get Paid Out?
• “We probably couldn't have gotten to where we are today had we not done that equity crowdfunding.”
• Sam Bogoch and Axle.ai Had a Great Experience at Republic
• Axle.ai Went Live Just Before the COVID Lockdown – Maybe It Helped Because a Lot of People Were on Their Screens
• The Joy of Watching the Investments Come In on Real Time
• Axle.ai Is Growing Fast But Not Fast Enough for VCs
• “Today we have over 1,000 investors in our company.”
• How Much You Can Raise on Republic?
• Sal Daher Pitches Sponsors Purdue University Entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse Patent Attorney
• Secret #1: Be a Business that’s “Crowdfunding-Ready”
• Secret #2: Your Business Has to Be Easily Understood by People
• Secret #3: Be Radically Committed to Communicating with Potential Investors
• Republic Vets Startups Closely Which Leads to a Success Rate of 90%
• Could a Life Science Company Succeed in Crowdfunding?
• “You want to know what it takes to be successful, but you also want to see what flopped and understand what it was about the intersection of the platform, the audience, and the company itself that did not click.”
• “...I do think that taken broadly, that this trend is going to change the way investing happens over the next 5 to 10 years.”
• Relatable Companies Like Nanno (Uber for Nannies) Have Investors Who Use Their Services and Refer Their Friends – They Go Viral
• “It's like Stone Soup at scale.”
• Contact Sam Bogoch at sam@axle.ai to Get His Advice
• Sam’s Company Axle.ai Is Raising Right Now So Check Them Out on Republic
• Secret #4: Have a Really Catchy Video
• Sal Daher Lost 70 Pounds Thanks to Plenity and the HMR Program

Topics: fundraising, Robotics / AI, software

Join Sal's Syndicate: https://www.angelinvestboston.com/our-syndicates

Sponsored by Purdue University entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Hesitant about investing in biotech startups? Founder Çağrı Savran and I discuss the unique opportunities and requirements of angel-scale life science startups. This is the first in a series of biotech angel bootcamps.

Highlights:

• Podcast Sponsored by Purdue University Entrepreneurship and Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney
• Sal Daher Introduces Founder, Çağrı Savran, PhD
• Purdue University Now Evaluates Professors of Engineering on Translation of their Technology to Industry as Well as on Publications and Citations
• Episode Created for Angel Investors Who Are Hesitant About Biotech
• Savran’s First Round of Funding Was Very Easy, the Subsequent Three Rounds Took Great Effort
• Several Walnut Members Had Invested in SQZ, Which Also Had a Fast Angel Round
• “...they saw parallels between SQZ and Savran.”
• ” If somebody is taking too much time to think, they're probably not interested and that's okay. You don't need the whole world...”
• “...it's similar to marriage... Sometimes it clicks, sometimes it doesn't click.”
• There Are Many People Looking for Attractive Investment Alternatives – It’s About Finding Those People
• Sal Asks About an Alternative Way to Fund Biotech Startups that Could Be More Efficient in the Long Run
• Angels Should Consider Staging their Investment in Biotech Startups Over Four Years with Annual Drawdown Based on Milestones
• Staged Funding Would Provide a Stable Financing Path So Founders Can Focus on the Business
• Angel Investors Have Contributed Much More than Money to Savran Tech; Advice, Introductions and Encouragement
• Çağrı Savran Wants Angels to Appreciate All the Trial & Error Involved in Building Life Science Companies
• When Things Work Out, Life Science Companies Can Build a Lot of Value Due to Strong Barriers to New Competitors
• Software Startups Face Stiff Competition Due to Low Barriers to Entry for Competitors
• “...you need to worry about minimizing user-to-user variation, especially if you're making an instrument. It's not like a computer code where if you hit a couple of keystrokes, it doesn't matter who it is that's hitting the keystroke.”
• Biotech Startups Have Different Metrics for Progress from Software Startups
• Biotech Startups Tend to Collaborate with Big Players; Software Startups Usually Compete
• Strong Patents Are Needed to Make Biotech Startup Valuable to Strategic Players
• “If the startup is making progress, it will have built a prototype.”
• Maturation of the Technology Is an Important Measure of Progress, It’s What Will Get the Company Acquired
• Founder-Led Companies Are Special
• Startups Can’t Afford Experienced People in Management but They Can Get Them on the Board
• “...the lesson here for angels is, don't expect a professional CEO in a life science startup.”
• We Are Living in a Time of Miracles; Biotech Miracles
• There Are Promising Biotech Startups that Can Flourish with Just $5 Million in Funding – Angel-Scale Biotech Startups

Topics: biotech, management, angel investing strategies

Sal' Syndicate: Click to Join

Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is the whole ball game. Whoever gets it first will rule. Who’s ahead and how to bet on them; this is only part of the excellent second chat with AI wiz Gil Syswerda.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Second Installment of Interview – AI and the Future
• Sponsors:
  • Purdue University entrepreneurship, and
  • Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson
• “History is full of financial firms devising algorithms that work great in the past and don't work in the future.”
• “...our back testing showed on average 15% returns per year, and our live performance was exactly that, 15% per year.”
• “...we needed a supercomputer to run our algorithm. We built one. In the end, we spent upwards of a million dollars on this machine, and it took $10,000 a month in electricity to run it.”
• Gil Syswerda Teams Up with the Legendary Paul Tudor Jones and His Hedge Fund via Percipio
• The Start of the Sub-Prime Mortgage Crisis Breaks Gil’s Algorithm and He Goes to Cash
• Investors Complain When Gil’s Fund Goes to Cash in August of 2008 but by the End of The Year, They Think He’s a Genius
• The Algorithm from Gil’s Hedge Fund Finds Use at a Lead Generation Company
• Percipio became Jobcase which Is Heading to Unicorn Status
• After the Hedge Fund Experience Gil Returns to Angel Investing
• Gil “Busted” While Coding at Darwin’s Coffee House
• Genetic Rule Induction Seminar at Babson – Big Turnout
• Machine Learning Talent Is Had to Get Even for the Legendary Paul Tudor Jones
• Gil Starts FeatureX to Look for Patterns in Satellite Imagery
• Machine Alpha Looked for Trades Based on Tudor Data
• Algorithms Required so Much Computing that AWS Bill Approached $2 million in One Year
• Gil Syswerda’s Next Challenge Is Artificial General Intelligence
• “...if you're so smart, how come you're not a billionaire? The answer to that is I like to work on hard problems, hard technical problems.”
• Sal Discusses Some of the AI Companies in His Universe: PathAI, Pilot.com and VistaPath
• The First Company to Build Artificial General Intelligence Will Rule
• Buy Google Shares Because DeepMind Is Doing Amazing Stuff and Could Win the AGI Race – What Else to Buy
• Jeff Hawkins – Thousand Brains Theory - Numenta
• AI Research Is Hugely Expensive Due to the Massive Computing Requirements

Sponsors:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Mostly diagnosed in late stages, ovarian cancer is a silent killer of women. Oriana Papin-Zoghbi of AOA Dx aims to defeat this threat. Fresh out of Y Combinator, the team is making impressive headway in commercializing a promising technology from McGill University.

Highlights:

• Sal Introduces Sponsors, Purdue University Entrepreneurship & Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney
• Sal Daher, CFA Welcomes Oriana Papin-Zoghbi of AOA Dx to the Podcast
• Ovarian Cancer Is a Silent Killer of Women
• “None of us on the founding team were originally scientists... We needed to really create a partnership.”
• Partnered with Professor Uri Saragovi of McGill University
• “...80% of cases being diagnosed when they're already Stage III and IV.”
• Professor Saragovi’s Approach Is Using Certain Glycolipids in the Patient’s Blood as a Marker of the Presence of Ovarian Cancer
• AOA Dx Supported by a Retrospective Study – Reached 95% Accuracy
• Sal Daher, CFA Makes the Case for Re-Skilling Angels Used to Investing in Software into Life Science Investors
• “We expect to be on the market in the US by 2025. Another four years out from here.”
• AOA Dx Is Developing a Platform for Early Detection of Other Diseases as Well
• Is AOA Dx Considering a Strategic Collaboration?
• A Good Attitude Towards Strategic Collaboration
• “...I can make the case for life sciences and that is where we are today is at the cusp of innovation, or medical innovation in the life sciences, this is truly just the beginning.”
• “...our ability to beat cancer or Alzheimer's or other types of diseases. It's that impact investment that is going to make a difference 30 years to come from now...”
• “I fully attest to the value Y Combinator gave us...”
• “...TBD Angels I worked specifically with, or closest I should say, with Yael and with Vicky was, how quick and transparent all of our communication was.”
• “...for anybody that is interested in the art of persuasion, I very much recommend reading about Robert Cialdini and his books...”

Topics: biotech, co-founders, founding story, fundraising

Sal's Syndicate: https://www.angelinvestboston.com/our-syndicates

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University Entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

The best measure of a founder is how much she can get done with limited resources. By this metric, Bryanne Leeming is an outstanding founder.

Two years before she had a paper prototype and vague hopes for a Kickstarter program. At the time we spoke she had a sleek physical product that’s gaining market. She also had the software to make it valuable and had completed a successful Kickstarter campaign.

The interview with Bryanne Leeming left me inspired.

Here’s some of what we talked about:

• Bryanne Leeming Bio
• How Bryanne Leeming Decided She Wanted to Be a Founder
• What Bryanne Leeming Got from Her Babson MBA
• Balancing Time Between Consulting Gigs & Working on Her Startup
• How Being an Athlete Affects the Work Bryanne Leeming Does
• Bryanne Leeming Tells the Unruly Studio Story
• How Bryanne Leeming Overcame Not Being a Technical Founder
• Sal Reads a Listener Review – Asks Listeners to Review the Podcast on iTunes
• Bryanne Leeming Tells About Her Kickstarter Experience
• Bryanne Leeming’s Tips for Founders on Fundraising
• How Unruly Studios Is Doing a Lot with Few Resources
• Unruly Studio’s Go to Market Plans
• Product Roadmap for Unruly Studios
• Bryanne Leeming on Taking Advice as a Founder

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

In December of 2017 I interviewed Çağrı Savran, Ph.D. about plans for his startup in which I had just invested. Almost four years later I interviewed him again to review the progress of the company which is changing the way breast cancer is followed up after treatment.

Highlights:

• Update on the Original Interview with Çağrı Savran, Ph.D.
• In December of 2017 Savran Was Operating with Essential Components Handmade in the Lab – In October 2021 the Main Components Are Produced by a Vendor
• Early Technology Was Used in a Major Clinical Trial at Indiana University School of Medicine and Significantly Improved Prediction of Recurrence of a Breast Cancer
• The Existing Technology for Capturing Circulating Tumor Cells Is Not Scalable – Savran’s Tech Is Amenable to Scale
• Strategic Players in Prenatal Diagnostics Are Interested in Sequencing the Cells Captured – Savran Is Uniquely Positioned to Provide That Ability
• The Basic Technology Is Like a Kitchen, the Different Assays Are Like What’s Being Prepared in the Kitchen
• Savran Has Recruited a Capable and Involved Board
• Sal Daher Summarizes Savran’s Progress in the Last Four Years

Sal's Investment Syndicate: Click to Join

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

I invested in Savran Tech back in 2017 around the time of the first part of this interview. Recently I sat down with Cagri Savran to review the progress of his remarkable biotech startup in the last four years. Listen to the original interview followed by a recent update.

Here is a list of the topics discussed:

• Çağrı Savran Bio (Çağrı Is Pronounced Cha-re)
• Accident that Took Çağrı Savran from Turkey to Indiana
• Purdue University’s Remarkable Support for the Commercialization of Faculty Inventions
• Çağrı Savran: “So, when I say "extremely rare," I mean one-in-a-billion rare.”
• Çağrı Savran: “Our technology can find those five or six or ten cells that are, among about a billion.“
• “…from a blood sample, you have a glimpse into the tumor without cutting into the person.”
• The Promise of Monitoring Cancer Treatment with a Blood Draw
• “The advantage is if you can do this with a blood sample, it gives you a chance to do this test frequently, right?”
• Applicable to the Prenatal Monitoring of the Fetus
• Savran’s Tech Is Simple, Fast and Results in High Purity and Yield – 1000 Times Faster than Typical Microfluidic Systems
• Like Alexander with the Gordian Knot, Savran Has Loosened One Constraint to Great Effect
• Bigger Scale and Faster Flow Allows the Fast Separation of Rare Cells
• Device Seems Amenable to Large Scale Usage – Handling Many Patients at the Same Time
• How the Invention Came About
• Why Çağrı Savran Founded a Company
• Purdue’s New Commercialization Policy Played a Big Role in the Decision to Found the Company
• Why Turbocharging Cell Separation Is So Important
• Other Use Cases: People Are Always Suggesting New Ones but Need to Concentrate
• Savran’s Tech Is a Game Changer because of Throughput and Parallelization
• Other Techniques Look at Pieces of DNA – Savran’s Tech Is Capable of Finding the Entire Genome
• Sal Daher Reads the Review by Spizzy Spong on iTunes and Asks for Your Review
• How Savran Landed Bigwig Advisor Ken Morse
• How Savran Found Its CEO – Patrick Rivelli
• "Oh, you have no idea how I wish that somebody would say that about me, that I'm 'quietly competent.'”
• Savran’s Choice of the Right Patent Attorney Was Crucial – Peter Fasse Helped Way Beyond Patents
• Patrick Rivelli, CEO Proposed a New Go to Market Approach
• What Makes the Savran Lab at Purdue so Productive
• Çağrı Savran Urges Fellow Academics to Bring Their Inventions to Market
• Update on the Original Interview with Çağrı Savran, Ph.D.
• In December of 2017 Savran Was Operating with Essential Components Handmade in the Lab – In October 2021 the Main Components Are Produced by a Vendor
• Early Technology Was Used in a Major Clinical Trial at Indiana University School of Medicine and Significantly Improved the Ability to Predict Recurrence of a Breast Cancer
• The Existing Technology for Capturing Circulating Tumor Cells Is Not Scalable – Savran’s Tech Is Amenable to Scale
• Strategic Players in Prenatal Diagnostics Are Interested in Sequencing the Cells Captured – Savran Is Uniquely Positioned to Provide That Ability
• The Basic Technology Is Like a Kitchen, the Different Assays Are Like What’s Being Prepared in the Kitchen
• Savran Has Recruited a Capable and Involved Board
• Sal Daher Summarizes Savran’s Progress in the Last Four Years

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University Entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson

AI wiz, founder and angel investor Gil Syswerda on building algorithms and companies. This episode focuses on Gil’s biography and his startups. It’s the first in-studio interview since spring 2020. We had a blast!

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Gil Syswerda, Founder and Super Angel
• Gil Syswerda Lucked into a Great High School – Built His Own Calculator
• "Computer programming. What is that?"
• “Because programming a computer for the first time you have this machine that just does whatever you tell it to do. The power is just indescribable. It just seems like the possibilities are unlimited.”
• Selling Cutco Knives to Pay the Rent – Learned to Sell
• “...I taught myself programming on that computer at Calvin College...”
• “When I wasn't at a place working, I would just fly to a city where I had friends and hang out with them. I just literally lived nowhere for a year.”
• Gil Meets His Wife Carol - They’ve Been Married 38 Years Now
• “One day I was at my job as a programmer, the next day I'm in class.”
• Animation Toolkit Was a Flop Because It Was Too Much of a Niche Product
• “The target audience is miniscule. We just didn't realize it. It was the classic mistake. If we build it, they will come.”
• Genetic Algorithms: A Lesson from Evolutionary Biology
• Gil Syswerda Gets into Hot Water with His Advisor by Being a Know It All
• BBN Labs – Gil Syswerda Wrote Seminal Papers in AI that Are Still Frequently Cited
• “What I really wanted was a job where I could use genetic algorithms and the only place on the planet that I could find that did anything of the kind was BBN Labs...”
• “I tried every way I could think of to get a ride in an F-14 but I never succeeded.”
• “Just because you're the CEO doesn't mean you have complete decision authority.”
• Optimax Systems Was Bootstrapped by the Founders – Had Revenue Right Away
• Raised Money to Cover Working Capital – Michael Mark Invested
• Pitch for Pater Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson
• “...created a machine for making scheduling systems and user manuals.”
• “We did not want to try to perpetuate the engagement with a customer by doing consulting...”
• Optimax Systems Followed Its Business Plan; Never Pivoted
• Shell Oil’s Tank Farm Broke Opitmax’s Optimization Algorithm
• Built a Scheduling System for the Mayo Clinic, Made the Mistake of Thinking Mass General Would Buy It Too
• “It was a very rapid four-year run to get an acquisition offer from i2 Technologies. We beat them in every single sales situation.”
• Optimax’s Revenues Had a Direct Positive Impact on i2 Technologies’ Earnings
• What Gil Syswerda Did After Leaving i2 – Travel the World + Race Cars
• The Big Lesson for Startups from Being a Race Car Driver
• Gil Syswerda’s Management Workflow at Optimax Systems
• Gil Syswerda Believes in Putting Boards to Work
• “...instead of becoming a professional race car driver, I decided to go back to my roots and build another hammer. Again, it's based on genetic algorithms...”
• “Machine Insight was to correct a really big tactical error that we made with Optimax Systems.”
• “I didn't even have to finish the presentation and they're already sold.”
• More Gil Syswerda to Come in Future Episodes

Topics: software, robotics / AI, product, selling, management, boards, co-founders

Sponsored by:

• Purdue University Entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson

Medical records are way less informative to doctors than patients imagine. Electronic health records (EHRs) have failed to deliver on their promise to improve health care for forty years. Ryan Hess, founder of Connective Health, means to change that. I invited digital health founder Martín Aboitiz to co-host this valuable interview with me.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Co-Host Martín Aboitiz & Guest Ryan Hess, Founder of Connective Health
• Connective Health Aims to Deliver to Primary Care Physicians What Electronic Health Records Have Promised for Forty Years
• Ryan Hess Tells Us About What Surescripts Does
• Martín Aboitiz Introduces His Startup, Healthjump
• The Pillars on Which Ryan Hess’ Work Rests
• Connective Health Seeks to Provide the Primary Care Physician with a Complete Picture of Where the Patient Has Been and What Care Has Been Received
• “Even the basic information is helpful with behavioral health patients, because those are the ones that typically have been to multiple locations and the patient may not remember every place that they've been to...”
• The Potential Uses for Healthjump’s Data Lake of 80 Million Patient Records
• Healthjump Is Focused on Discovering Things About Patients in the Aggregate; Connective Health Works to Provide Such Useful Information When It Applies to an Individual Patient Being Seen by a Physician
• The Information has to Be in the Doctors Workflow & Has to Be Timely and Relevant
• “How do we get them to trust it?”
• “What protects you as a startup from just being blown up because somehow your algorithm missed something?"
• The Role of Independent Review Boards
• How Not to Do It: Practice Fusion Being Paid by Purdue Pharma to Recommend Oxycodone for Back Pain
• Healthjump Makes Money by Solving Interoperability Problems Between Electronic Health Record Systems
• Connective Health Aims to Get Paid for Lowering the Cost to Payors of Providing Care to Behavioral Health Patients
• How Much Volume Connective Health Needs to Break Even
• Regulatory and Legal Changes that May Help Connective Health
• Martín Aboitiz Believes Industry Over-Estimates the Technological Difficulties of Sharing Data
• Ryan Hess Points to Basic Difficulties Such as Identifying a Patient Across EHRs
• Institutional Investors Have a Hard Time Understanding Digital Health Due to Dizzying Number of Moving Parts
• “If there's been some really very impressive exits for companies in certain areas, all of a sudden, the limited partners are all excited about companies in this space, and venture capitalists are going to be raising funds to invest in companies in this particular space...”
• Virtual Health Is a Lot Easier to Understand than EHR-Based Digital Health
• Ryan Hess Is Targeting Behavioral Health Because Payors See It Driving One Third of their Total Spend

Topics: software, product, fundraising

A curious but orderly mind prepared to take advantage of serendipity has taken Adam de Sola Pool on a remarkable journey during his career.

His father, Ithiel de Sola Pool, the brilliant political scientist (look up Six Degrees of Separation or Convergence) took young Adam to many different countries. These travels sparked in Adam an interest in geography which led to a job on Wall Street. From Salomon Brothers he went to the EBRD to restructure companies emerging from communism. This grew into setting up Central Europe’s first cleantech fund which produced excellent results. Now Adam is an investor and advisor in the Boston area; much respected for his fresh approach to building young companies.

Topics covered in this charming interview include:

• Adam de Sola Pool Bio
• From Geography Major at University of Chicago to Wall Street
• From Salomon Brothers to the EBRD
• Adam Poole Has a Chance Encounter in the Bathroom & Gets a New Job
• Overheated Factories in Poland
• Adam Pool Discovers that Local Businesses Can Be Extremely Profitable
• How Adam de Sola Pool Got into Angel Investing
• Adam Pool Compares & Contrasts Angel Groups in Boston
• Adam Pool Talks About Squadle, a Promising Startup Just Added to His Portfolio
• Adam Pool Looks for a Defensible Market Position in the Startups in Which He Invests
• Adam Pool’s Favorite Pivot
• Adam Pool’s Approach to “Inoculating” Startups Against Risk
• Adam Pool’s Poetic Statement of the Need for Founders to Give Way to Managers as the Company Grows

Topics: cleantech, founding story, angel investing strategies, portfolio, returns

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Podcast Sponsored by:

• Purdue University's Entrepreneurship Center
• Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson

Greg Raiz founded app-building colossus Raizlabs and sold it in 2017. He’s now the head of Techstars Boston and has big ideas in mind. Be you founder or angel, listen to this luminous interview for practical advice and inspiration on building startups.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Greg Raiz, Founder of Raizlabs, the App-building Colossus and Head of Techstars Boston
• Founding Story of Raizlabs
• “As soon as engineering starts to implement, they learn things, they discover things through the process of implementation that impact the design.”
• Steve Job’s Launch of the iPhone Galvanized Greg Raiz to Build Apps for the New Device
• RunKeeper Put Raizlabs on the Map, Then Came Rue La La
• The importance of Focus on Building a Brand
• “I think a lot of early-stage founders, they tried to boil the ocean.”
• “Amazon's master plan may have been to dominate e-commerce but in their first several years of Amazon's history, the only thing they did was sell books.”
• “Founders really need to think about the long-term growth and trajectory of their business and what elements are okay to outsource.”
• Raizlabs Was Sold in 2017, This Intensified Greg’s Angel Investing – Why Raizlabs Ran an Accelerator
• Fintech Startup Own Up Grew Out of Raizlabs’ Accelerator and Has Gone on to a Series B Round
• Greg Raiz’s Big Ideas for Techstars Boston: (1) Save Lives, (2) Save the Planet and (3) Improve How We Work and Live
• Sal’s Story Illustrating How Our Lives Have Improved Since the 1980s
• “It's funny we sometimes don't reflect on how fast society and technology can change the day-to-day of interactions.”
• Techstars Boston Is Leaning into the Coming Decade of Biotech
• “I think biotech and medical specifically, Boston has one of the hottest markets, if not the hottest markets for many of those technologies.”
• “...we have an incredible Fintech sector. We have an incredible robotic sector. We have incredible 3D printing sector...”
• Sal Daher Talks About One of the Big Differences between Biotech Investing and Software Investing
• Sal Daher Expresses a Need to Train Angels in Biotech Investing
• “I want to accelerate companies that are really important and meaningful and I expect to get a capital return to allow me to do more of that.”
• Check Out Greg Raiz’s YouTube Channel – Half Ideas
• What Are Half Ideas?
• YouTube Is the Number 2 Search Engine
• It’s Hard to View or Listen to One’s Early Content
• How Greg Raiz Discovered Computer Programming
• The Vast Horizons of Software
• How Bad User Interfaces Create Inequality
• PURE GOLD: Greg Raiz’s Parting Advice to Angels & Founders

Want to get rich and to pass money to your kids? Listen closely to Howard Stevenson. Here’s condensed wisdom from the heart of the investing world delivered with dry humor and charm. Professor Stevenson was a co-founder of storied Baupost Group and helped hire its legendary manager Seth Klarman. He began the study of entrepreneurship at Harvard Business School and eventually became HBS’ biggest fundraiser.

His book “Wealth & Families” gives invaluable advice on how to make money and keep enough of it to hand down to the generations. My personal favorite is illustrated by this quote from the interview:

“Whereas, some of my colleagues were going off consulting ... They were making a lot of money every day, and they go their XKE [Jaguar XKE, a coveted sports car of the era] quite quickly. I went off to places like Lima, Ohio, and I was paid $300 a day, but I got 1% of the company.”

Howard Stevenson was forgoing high current income, and consumption, for the ability to own promising assets that would build his wealth in the long term. This approach contributed to Professor Stevenson becoming rich enough to need a family office to manage his money.

iTunes Page for the Podcast Where You Can Review and Subscribe

The topics covered in this dynamic conversation include:

• Howard Stevenson Bio
• How Howard Stevenson Started His Career
• Fear of the “Velvet Rut” Causes Howard Stevenson to Leave a Tenured Position at Harvard Business School
• Howard Stevenson: “A lot of people are fairly miserable in their job, but they fear change more than they look for the optionality that comes in change.”
• After a Sojourn in Entrepreneurship & Real Estate, Howard Stevenson Was Lured back to HBS
• Sal Daher: “There are not a lot of people that would turn down tenured positions at The Harvard Business School…” Howard Stevenson replies: “That's sad. I'm a trustee at Olin College, and they have no tenure. It's amazing what that does, because people are there voluntarily.”
• Howard Stevenson on Building Wealth: “I've always been experimental, because I don't believe I understand and can predict the future. By the way, when you look that the facts, very few people can.”
• Howard Stevenson’s 400x Investment in a Company with a “Stupid Business Plan”
• Howard Stevenson’s Four Criteria for Investing
• Howard Stevenson’s Portfolio Returns; Warren Buffett-Like
• Howard Stevenson on whether Entrepreneurship Can Be Taught
• Howard Stevenson’s Definition of Entrepreneurship
• The Best Due Diligence Is Time
• How Baupost Got Started and How Investing Wizard Seth Klarman Was Hired
• How Howard Stevenson Shops for Cars
• Howard Stevenson’s Advice for How Young People Can Build Wealth
• Mitt Romney & a Young Colleague on Spending
• Why You Should Review this Podcast on iTunes – It Really Helps Us iTunes Page for the Podcast Where You Can Review and Subscribe
• "Most of the wealthy people I know, are better at making money than managing it."
• Howard Stevenson’s Journey in Investing Began by Reading Graham, Dodd & Cottle in 1961
• "I was smart that I recognized the quality of the people. But, whether it was coming out at 2X or 400X, wasn't in my control."
• Talking to Your Kids About Money

Sal's Investment Syndicate List: Click to Join

Sponsors:

• Purdue University Entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Thrice-exited founder Jon Hirschtick of SolidWorks and Onshape fame, talks about the promise of cloud-based technologies and how to build successful businesses in the space. Jon’s a good sport and a fun guest.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Jon Hirschtick, Founder of SolidWorks and Onshape
• “...the problem we were solving with Onshape is around the use of CAD, Computer-Aided-Design t”
• “...I had a year off and I could see the emergence of cloud technologies and I thought back to the problems I had seen users having.”
• “...Onshape is the Google Docs of CAD...SolidWorks was the Microsoft Word of Onshape. What came before SolidWorks was like the Wang Word Processor of CAD.”
• “...Marc Andreessen, he was an investor in Onshape”
• It Was hard to Raise Money for SolidWorks but Its Success Made It Easy to Get Onshape Funded
• Jon Hirschtick Was on the Famous MIT Blackjack Team
• SolidWorks Was Jon’s Idea of Taking Computer-Aided Design from Specialized Work Stations to Desktop PCs
• Jon Hirschtick Proved All the Naysayers Wrong on SolidWorks
• Why Jon Hirschtick Thinks Boston Is a Great Place to Start a CAD Company
• New York’s Unlikely Rise as a Startup Hub
• “...Boston city government is not perfect but...compared to San Francisco and...New York City, we're models of efficiency, we're Singapore.”
• Jon Hirschtick Thinks There’s Room for Improvement in Massachusetts’ Non-Compete Law
• How Cloud-based Technologies Drive Innovation
• The Way Data Is Organized Is Archaic, It’s Trying to Emulate Paper Records
• The Cloud Shatters Barriers Imposed by Paper Emulation, Making Fast Iteration and Communication Possible
• Saying Goodbye to Version Control
• Jon Hirschtick’s Most Important Factors of Success by Founders
• Jon Hirschtick: “...it's easier than ever to start a company and harder than ever to build a great business.”

Topics: founding stories, fundraising, software, venture funding

Sponsors:

• Purdue University Entrepreneurship
• Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson
• Sal's Syndicate: Click to Join

Ty Danco is an outlier in a population of outliers. His interests are varied and pursued passionately. He’s founded two fintech companies, he’s invested in a gazillion startups and he’s been a hugely generous advisor to companies, in fact the chief advisor at Techstars. Oh, I forgot to mention he’s an Olympian and also deeply involved with crypto-currencies. In this really meaty interview, Ty and I covered a wide range of topics. He explained his ideas in his affably quirky way. This was a super fun conversation.

Quotes:

"Danco, why are you here? You're a marketing guy." And I said that I was here to see Lever Brothers and he goes, "You idiot, you signed up for Lehman Brothers."

“So, I took a leave of absence from school, and Wharton let me make up my remaining credits over the summer, and so I tried doing all three things at the same time. It was a success on paper, I did make the 84 [Olympic] team, I did complete the MBA, I did work at Lehman Brothers, but in truth I was overwhelmed, I did everything badly.

I ended up breaking my heel and didn't compete in Sarajevo. I learned nothing in my last classes at school and I was just lost and floundering my first year on Wall Street. So, there's a pretty obvious lesson there about the need to focus and my inability to multi-task. That's maybe why they say focus on one metric that matters, don't try to do five balls in the air at once.”

Topics covered include:

• Ty Danco’s Bio
• How Ty Danco Stated His Career – Lehman Brothers vs. Lever Brothers – Olympic Team
• "Danco, why are you here? You're a marketing guy." And I said that I was here to see Lever Brothers and he goes, "You idiot, you signed up for Lehman Brothers."
• Ty Danco Doing Too Much
• Ty Danco and the Importance of Focus
• Ty Danco on the Cover of Sports Illustrated
• Ty Danco Moves from New York City to Burlington, Vermont
• Ty Danco Discovers that, Thanks to Michael Bloomberg, It Was Possible to Do Investing in Vermont
• Ty Danco Founds His First Startup - eSecLending
• Ty Danco Recalls Wall Street Misogyny of the Past – Women Found a Haven in Hugely Complex CMO Deals
• Ty Danco’s Company is Hit by the Crash of 2008
• Sal Daher Asks for you to Review the Podcast on iTunes – It Really Helps!
• Why Ty Danco’s Second Startup Failed
• Ty Danco’s Angel Investments
• Ty Danco Thinks Crypto-currencies Are Worthy Alternative Investments
• Ty Danco Believes One Can Eliminate Many Losers - But at a Cost
• Ty Danco’s Philosophy of Angel Investing
• Why Mass Medical Angels Is the Only Angel Group Ty Danco Attends
• Why Ty Danco Does Not Invest Based on Cold Calls
• Ty Danco Reveals the Secret of Getting into Techstars
• Ty Danco Likes VCs Involved in Every Deal, Why?
• “Virtually all of my deals, 99% of the deals come not from me directly stumbling over something, but from a lead from my network.”
• Boston Angel Pantheon: Michael Mark, Joe Caruso and Jean Hammond
• What Are ICOs and Why should VCs be Scared of Them?
• Some of Ty Danco’s Favorite Startups
• Ty Danco’s Categorization of Mentoring Styles
• What Sets Accelerators Apart in Ty Danco’s Estimation
• Ty Danco Takes a Page from Manu Kumar in Starting His Next Venture

Topics: fintech, crypto, angel investing strategies, techstars

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Sponsored by Peter Fasse, Patent Attorney at Fish & Richardson

Born out of COVID in 2020, TBD Angels is Boston’s newest angel group. In its first seventeen months it has already invested in forty startups. Members David Chang and Yael deCapo spoke about what TBD offers startups and investors.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Yael deCapo and David Chang of TBD Angels
• TBD Angel’s Process is Real-Time Not Batch
• “We try to match their velocity, which is pretty hard to do, but we occasionally succeed at that.”
• “There is a tool-based voting that if enough members vote that they're interested in hearing a pitch, we have an automatic way to schedule that pitch.”
• TBD Angels Invests via a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV)
• “It's a little bit of an experiment from our standpoint. We started this group in the middle of a pandemic, the beginning of 2020.”
• Sal Daher Thanks Matt Fates for Introducing Him to TBD Angels
• In Seventeen Months, TBD Angels Has Invested in 40 Companies
• Choice of Startups Is Driven by Member Interest and Not by Rigid Criteria
• Sal Daher Introduces His Effort to Help Angels Invest in Life-Science Startups
• Sal Daher Credits the Research of Jeff Behrens, PhD on Biotech Funding
• “...I think it's a great value to the founders also, that they have that broader reach and it's not so siloed...”
• Sal Daher Continues to Be Involved with Walnut Ventures Which Has a Lot of AI Expertise
• TBD Angels Has Investors and Startups from Across the Country
• The Singular Opportunity of Purdue University and Its 500 Professors of Engineering
• AOA Diagnostics - Addressing Ovarian Cancer, a Silent Killer of Women
• Kytopen - Scalable Production of Gene Therapies
• How TBD Angels Connected with AOA Diagnostics
• Brief Bios of David Chang and Yael deCapo
• What Moved Yael deCapo to Write Her First Angel Check
• David Chang and His Interest in Student Entrepreneurship
• Boston as the World’s Bazaar of Biotech Talent
• “...over a third of the CEOs that we've funded are women over a third, I believe are also people of color...”

Topics: angel investing strategies, biotech, robotics / AI

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This podcast is brought to you by Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson: https://www.fr.com/team/j-peter-fasse/

While in prep school Matt Singer performed at a religious ceremony and became fascinated with the impact his music had on the congregants. This fascination led Matt Singer to major in music at Yale, where he graduated Summa Cum Laude, and to think of how to make a life in music. Matt hit the streets soon after graduating to start his music business. For ten years he built Dawn Treader Production with marquee names such as Paul McCartney, James Earl Jones and the New York Philharmonic. Relying on the emotional connection possible on TV, he sold the CDs he produced by the tens of thousands on QVC. In 2007 he joined co-founder Amanda Eilian, in starting a company that is now changing the way large enterprises communicate with their customers and employees via video. Videolicious makes it easy for employees to produce polished videos personalized to particular clients that make emotional connections. The platform is now used by 4,000,000 users in 100 countries, it’s even taught at 90 schools of journalism. Backed by Amazon and VC money, this startup is poised for continued growth.

This is the story of someone who followed what seems to be an impractical passion but managed to create something that is useful to large numbers of paying customers. Listen to this candid and introspective conversation with a young man who thinks deeply but acts practically. In particular, I liked what he had to say about how founders can prepare their psyche for the arduous journey of building their startup:

“It turns out that anything that you accomplish in life actually brings a crush of responsibility, so you really just have to enjoy the journey because there is no magic carpet ride of happiness that comes with any accomplishment.”

• Matt Singer Bio

• Matt Singer Actively Looks for a Way to Turn His Passion for Music into a Living, and Succeeds

• The Story of The Talk Market Which Became Videolicious

• How Matt Connected with his Great Co-founder, Amanda Eilian

• What Videolicious Does Today

• Sal Daher Reads a Review from Listener ChangDS and Ask Listeners to Leave a Review on iTunes

• The Pivot that Turned The Talk Market into Videolicious

• The Vision Stayed the Same, the Implementation Changed

• Great Point about Finding Your Focus

• “From the perspective of entrepreneurs, I think it's just good to note that you can have a vision but there are a lot of choices along the way in terms of who should you really sell to.”

• Videolicious is Taught at 90 Schools of Journalism – It’s Becoming Ingrained

• Instead of a Sales Binder Videolicious Allows You to Send Your Customer a Compelling Personalized Video

• “Video is becoming the standard way that people create content.”

• Videolicious’ Board Has Been Very Supportive – They’ve Been Amenable to Reasoned Arguments

• “Yeah, you've heard that theme of focus, focus, focus, but exactly what that means is not always super clear.”

• "Wow. What do I need not only just to get in the door, but also to keep them forever?"

• How Matt Singer Got Amazon as an Early Investor in His Company

• How Videolicious’ VC Backers Help with More than Money

• The Interesting Route Videolicious Took to VC Funding

• The Path Ahead for Videolicious – Making Video Creation Ever Easier & More Effective

• Matt Singer’s Three Bits of Advice for New Founders

• “Definitely finding a great co-founder is important… someone that you can really work with… work through thick and thin, because there's going to be ups and downs constantly and so it's great to have someone that can support you and you can support them.”

• “…thinking through the entire lifecycle of your customer from the acquisition to renewal.”

• Having a Long-term View Is Crucial in Selling to Enterprise Customers

• Because Everybody Works from Home, Videolicious Looks for Self-starters

• ” I do find that being able to tell the story and the vision is a good way to attract talent.”

• Other Startups That Matt Singer Admires – Companies That Make Using their Product Super Easy

• What Matt Singer Has in Common with C.S. Lewis

• “…most technology is pretty disruptive for your average employee. It's different than what they're used to doing. That's what you have to contend with as a startup, you assume that's a big jump, even if your product in the isolation is easy.”

• Matt Singer’s Parting Thoughts – A Truly Valuable Observation

• “It turns out that anything that you accomplish in life actually brings a crush of responsibility, so you really just have to enjoy the journey because there is no magic carpet ride of happiness that comes with any accomplishment.”

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Sponsored by Peter Fasse, patent attorney at Fish & Richardson

Brad Feld and Dave Jilk bring the wisdom of modernity's most unsettling thinker to entrepreneurship. Like the ancient Stoics, Nietzsche has much to add to the thought of people disrupting existing assumptions today. Brief excerpts from Nietzsche are paired with essays from founders who grapple with the ideas in question.

Highlights:

• Sal Daher Introduces Brad Feld, Co-Founder of Techstars
• The Entrepreneur’s Weekly Nietzsche: A Book for Disruptors by Dave Jilk & Brad Feld
• “…for every two lines of Nietzsche, there's probably two pages of Brad Feld and another entrepreneur talking about something really important.”
• “…I thought I knew something about Nietzsche, and pretty much everything I knew about Nietzsche was wrong.”
• “…Nietzsche was a Nazi.” - "Don't believe everything you hear about Nietzsche."
• Nietzsche’s Sister and Literary Executor Was Indeed a Nazi Who Tried to Co-opt Her Brother’s Thoughts into Nazism
• “Dave [Jilk] and I met at MIT, we've been friends since college. I met him on the first day of college.”
• Product Placement for Toscanini’s Ice Cream in Cambridge 
• Dave Jilk Is the One Who First Became Hooked on Nietzsche
• Brad Fled and Dave Jilk Edited Quotes from Open-source Translations of Nietzsche’s Works to Make Them Intelligible to 21st Century Readers
• LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman, Who Read Philosophy at Oxford, Wrote the Foreword
• “…page one would be the title page and would say The Venture Playbook, and the next 299 pages would be blank.”
• “The power of being an entrepreneur is finding your own way.”
• Nietzsche and Mentor Whiplash
• Silent Killers
• Fake It Before You Make – Bad & Good
• "If thou gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee."
• Sal Daher Talks About Sponsor Peter Fasse of Fish & Richardson
• Brad Feld on Angel Investing
• “…of the 40 investments, 20 of them were zeros, 20 failed. Three of them were worth each more than a hundred times my money.”
• One of Brad Feld’s 100X Investments Was Harmonix (Guitar Hero)
• “…recognize that being an entrepreneur…will be more successful for you if you view it as a life journey rather than a single company.”
• “Don't ask people to be your mentor. Do things for those people that engage you with their world…”
• Brad Feld on Biotech: “…life sciences is so big…picking a couple of areas or types of companies, where you can start to build both expertise and real networking...an understanding of what's real and what's not real”
• Adam Grant’s Give and Take

Topics: co-founder, management, Techstars, software, returns, angel investing strategies

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Bettina Hein is the founder of Pixability, one of the fastest-growing companies in Massachusetts. She was also co-founder of SVOX, a profitable Swiss startup sold to Nuance Communications for $125MM. This record may make her success seem easier to achieve than it was. Bettina Hein overcame numerous obstacles to justify the sobriquet “Fearless Founder”. Learn from her as I did. She is an exemplar of resilience, grace under fire and plain common sense. She also has much to teach us about how a startup might best raise money. Whenever I ask angel investors about a remarkable pivot by a founder, there’s a good chance Bettina’s name will come up. Don’t miss this charming and instructive conversation with a star founder.

Here are topics and quotes from the interview:

• Bettina Hein Bio
• How Bettina Hein Found Her Entrepreneurial Path in Life
• Bettina Hein Used to Write Computer Programs in Fourth Grade but Did Not Learn to Code in College; Why?
• Professors Discouraged Bettina Hein from Pursuing a Career in the Sciences
• “If I had to go back, I would probably get an undergraduate degree in either electrical engineering or computer science.”
• “I think I wanted to be an entrepreneur very early on. There's just that example that was set in my family. There's no one in my family that has had a nine to five job ever, except my brother…”
• Bettina Hein Founds an Entrepreneurship Initiative for Students at her University Called Start, that Leads her to Brains-to-Venture, Which Connects Her with Her co-founders in SVOX
• SVOX Has a $125 MM Exit to Nuance Communications
• Bettina Hein Starts Pixability – Looked for Co-founders But Could Not Find Any Willing Takers – How She made Being a Solo Founder Work
• Pixability’s Storied Pivots
• “We help large brands and their agencies place their video advertising and optimize it on YouTube, and we've expanded to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.”
• How Pixability’s Platform Impacts the Viewing Public
• “Consumers like it better, and brands get more out of it.”
• Sal Daher Reads an iTunes Review from HealthTech617 – Asks You to Leave a Review on iTunes
• Bettina Hein’s Advice on Fundraising for a Startup
• Bettina Hein on How Things Change Once a Startup Gets Venture Funding
• Bettina Hein Thinks Founders Are Scared of Having a Board So They Miss out on a Lot
• “Many beginning entrepreneurs are scared of having a board. They fear the meddling in their business. They fear that people will force decisions on them, on the board. I have not seen that ever happen.”
• “For me, often times the exercise of preparing for a board meeting is almost more important than the board meeting itself because it allows me to really think through the narrative of the company.”
• Bettina Hein’s Way of Balancing Work & Family
• Bettina Hein on Fundraising While Pregnant
• Bettina Hein on Marketing Technology’s Crowded Landscape

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, pivot, venture funding, boards, co-founders, raising money

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Repeat biotech founder Todd Zion on SmartCells (acquired by Merck for $500MM) and his current venture Akston Bio which is doing cool things with proteins. Todd has valuable insights on VC funding, angel investing and founding teams. This interview’s a peach!

• Intro of Todd Zion, PhD Co-Founder of SmartCells (Merck) and Akston Bio
• Todd Zion Was Fascinated by the Potential of Polymers to Do Powerful Things
• Smart Drug Delivery – Making Insulin Adapt to Blood Glucose Levels
• “…then got bitten by the bug, like I said, of the entrepreneurial spirit that runs quite strong through MIT.”
• “…with SmartCells, we made a conscious effort to build a company that could be capital efficient and achieve what angels want out of an investment…”
• Jeff Behrens’ Experience at Siamab Is Discussed
• Todd Zion Is Leery of Raising Big Money Because It Raises Costs
• “…you should always be betting on the jockey and not necessarily the horse.”
• “Sometimes you may throw out really good ideas, due to a lack of resources.”
• “…anyone with ten million spends the last million better than the first nine.”
• “...in a venture-funded world, there's a huge amount of price inflation.”
• “…if anyone wants a job at Akston, you can get a covered garage parking in the winter.”
• Akston’s Basic Technology: Coupling a Protein to an Antibody to Enhance the Function of the Protein
• Reversing the Body’s Autoimmune Response to Insulin Which Causes Type 1 Diabetes.
• The Importance of a GMP (good manufacturing practices) Facility of Your Own
• Creating an Ultra Long-Acting Insulin for Dogs & Cats
• Akston Pivoted to Making a Protein-Based COVID Vaccine
• From the Design of the Molecule to Human Trials Took Only 11 Months
• Advantages of Protein-Based Vaccines: Easy to Make, Easy to Store and Contain No Genetic Components
• Akston’s Protein-Based Vaccine Is Expected to Be as Effective as J&J’s
• Parting Thoughts from Todd Zion
• If It’s Easy and Obvious You’re Probably Doing It Wrong
• Advice Applies to Angel Investors as Well
• Making Money Is Important But, You Need Deeper Motivation or You’ll Quit
• Repeat Founding Teams Can Be Really Powerful – The Blues Brothers