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00:05Hey, everybody, George Cram here, coming back to you with another episode of The Patient
00:10Pod.
00:11I have a great guest with me today, David Craig.
00:13He is the current CEO and co-founder, if I'm correct, or founder?
00:17Co-founder.
00:18Co-founder of a breakthrough biotech company called Sarcomatrix.
00:25They're basically building and establishing a new therapeutic and a new novel approach
00:30when it comes to muscular dystrophy and any type of biological component revolving around
00:35the muscle.
00:36I'll let David talk about that.
00:37He's the specialist, not me.
00:39But as we start with these episodes, I'd love to kind of introduce David.
00:44And then, David, why don't you take us back to the start, man?
00:47Where did this all begin?
00:49First of all, George, thanks for having me.
00:50I really appreciate it.
00:51I look forward to spending a few minutes with you and your audience.
00:57So my dad's a pharmacist, and I followed him to pharmacy and happened to go to South Dakota
01:01State University.
01:03And even when I was there in the mid-80s, I knew that this evolving technology of biotechnology
01:09was the place to be.
01:11So when I had the opportunity to jump on board with Amgen as their fourth sales rep that they
01:16ever hired, I did that for a couple of reasons.
01:20First of all, I really wasn't that interested in being a pharmacist, and this was a nice
01:25way of getting into the business.
01:27So you went to pharmacy school, did that, and then you realized you didn't want to be
01:31a pharmacist.
01:32Yeah, not only did I not want to be a pharmacist, but to be a pharmacist, you have to be
01:36very
01:37exacting and not make mistakes.
01:39And what I found is that I'd go too fast.
01:40I was a little sloppy, so I think it's probably best to keep me away from the general public
01:46as a pharmacist.
01:48But into the business, I got to launch Epigen and did a marketplace as one of 40 original
01:55representatives.
01:56And I was only in the field for a little while until they said, oh, oops, well, we need to
02:02train the next wave of sales reps.
02:04Why don't you take sales training?
02:05You get a good background, et cetera.
02:07So I came in-house to do that.
02:09And then one thing I learned about startups, and I hardly encourage any young kids to do
02:14this, is whenever someone says, oh, we need to do X, Y, Z, just raise your hand and do
02:21it.
02:21And even though you might not be 100% qualified, just grab it and run with it.
02:26So I ended up building sales operations, back office infrastructure, designing data sets,
02:33IT background, IT infrastructure, and then moving into strategy.
02:38And that was all at Amgen in a five-year period.
02:41I love how you call it Amgen a startup, right?
02:44Everybody knows it's a startup.
02:45Like massive.
02:46But at the time, 100 people.
02:48I mean, that's...
02:49Yeah.
02:49It was in a crappy tilt-up buildings in Westlake Village, California.
02:54Nothing special.
02:55Like, it was growing so fast.
02:57I was stuck in one of those temporary trailers for a while, and all the desks were facing
03:05me in the front, and I felt like a teacher or something, but you do what you got to do.
03:10And you look at it today, and I can't believe it really landed where it's at today.
03:16Back then, we thought we had a really cool drug.
03:18We're going to do something special.
03:20George Rathman was the CEO, and he was very inspirational.
03:23You know, he was really focused on the patients, and he'd give you these just tear-jerking emotional
03:31speeches about how there's a disease out there in the world, and we have the technology to
03:37solve it, and it's our responsibility.
03:39And every day when you walk into this office, I want you to ask yourself, what did I do today,
03:44or what am I going to do today to advance this drug to the market?
03:48And I've really helped.
03:48Well, that's really been a guiding star and guiding light for me, frankly, through my
03:53whole career is hyper-focus on the patients, deliver a really good drug, and a lot of the
03:59other stuff will take care of itself.
04:00Isn't that nuts?
04:01Like, that man, he still holds real estate in your mind, even from the 80s, right?
04:09Oh, yeah.
04:10The impact of what, like, a good leader can do to an organization, in a way.
04:15And so, I mean, obviously, when I look at your resume, I mean, there's a myriad of different
04:22companies, but, you know, tell me a little bit about, like, so from Amgen, it sounds like
04:25you got some great learning experience, kind of raised your hand on some projects that you
04:29might not have been qualified for, but, you know, what did that lead you to next?
04:33Well, I figured out that this kind of commercial operations back office thing was a little
04:39niche that not a lot of biotechs had.
04:41So, well, first of all, at Amgen, after five years, the majority are stocks best, and I
04:47was a little greedy and young.
04:48So I said, okay, I got to, you know, this stock option thing is a good deal.
04:52I'm going to re-up for this, right?
04:54So I went to Sequis.
04:56It was Lipism Technology at the time that they transferred into Sequis.
04:59Sequis, and they had an AIDS drug for Kaposi sarcoma.
05:05We advanced that, and after a couple years there, I was recruited into Gilead Sciences,
05:10and I was actually recruited before John Martin was there, the CEO that really expanded everything
05:16before he passed it on, and Michael Reardon was the name of the CEO.
05:20So it was...
05:22Did you move up to the Bay Area for that?
05:25You're right.
05:26I did move up to the Bay Area.
05:27Actually, I moved up to the Bay Area for Sequis and then Gilead Sciences, yeah.
05:32So I was at Gilead when they were about 100 people, too, and back then, I think it was
05:36pretty...
05:38They had brought in a commercial lead, Mike Inouye, a very experienced Merck guy, and a
05:44very small, skeletal commercial team fairly early on.
05:48And what that allowed us to do is really plan ahead, do really good budgeting, be very thoughtful
05:56about what to build when, and really learn how to scale infrastructure in a cost-effective
06:04way.
06:04And then not only that, but build infrastructure in such a way that it's a great foundation
06:09to grow upon.
06:11So I like to think that even today when they look at the CRM system or customer relationship
06:17management system that they have at Amgen or at Gilead Sciences, I helped design that
06:22in the early 90s.
06:24And then Siebel Systems bought it, and then Oracle bought Siebel Systems.
06:28So I like to think that I left a little bit of a thumbprint on...
06:31Yeah, it's like your signature is still in the concrete over there, huh?
06:35Yeah, yeah.
06:36Well, man, I'm like, if they could do this, it would have been really smart to follow you
06:40around.
06:41I mean, Amgen had 100 people, Gilead had 100 people.
06:45Like, man, what a...
06:48Well, in Acceler X, and then most recently was Portola, and we helped Bill List grow that.
06:54So, no, I would encourage anyone that has commercial experience, if you can get on board in, like,
07:02late phase two, early phase three, or 18 months, 24 months before you think that you're going
07:07to launch, it's a really nice inflection point where a lot of the risk has gone away already.
07:12You know, you're trending toward regulatory approval, so there's probably 80% probability
07:17of success there.
07:18And you get to learn what it takes to build things from scratch, which I think is fundamentally
07:25different than if you're at big pharma and you're doing project management or product
07:32management line extensions that, I mean, the thing about a startup is you learn how to set up accounting
07:37systems and distribution, and, you know, you can have an impact on the clinical study design so that
07:43the messages that come out resonate not only with clinicians, but patients and, you know,
07:48all that good stuff that is really interesting and great learning across the breadth of things
07:55that I've done.
07:56It's funny you say that.
07:57So, you know, where I sit, as I work with a lot of, you know, pharma people, both on the
08:01commercial and the clinical side, but when you reach a point when the company's so large,
08:06the commercial and clinical teams don't necessarily know, talk to each other, and they could be
08:11working on the same drug.
08:13And so it's like funny because you're like, man, in my mind, I'm like, you know, as we're
08:18running a startup, I'm like, how the hell do you guys do that?
08:20Right?
08:20Like you guys don't know and talking to the commercial team and, but it's kind of how it
08:24is.
08:25But when you're at a startup, it's like, you don't really have a choice.
08:27It's like, hey, we're all in this together and you all got to work together.
08:31And I understand like the linearity of like, hey, we're all in the same boat and we got
08:36to make sure everything's successful.
08:37It doesn't matter what my title is.
08:39Right?
08:39No, that's a great, that's a great observation.
08:41And I can tell you like a classic thing, the silo issue that you run into.
08:45So let's say that medical affairs comes in early and they set up a CRM system or some
08:52type of tracking system for contacts and messaging, right?
08:56It's not uncommon that the commercial space will come in and they'll spin up their own
09:00CRM system without talking to them.
09:03And then you've got all these integration issues.
09:05In theory, trying to integrate two different data sets is five times as hard as if you
09:10have commonality between the two.
09:12So I just, you know, at times, if you could get a longer term IT strategic plan, if you
09:19could get both the commercial and the clinical using the same CRM, you're just going to have
09:24tremendous efficiencies that you, that you often don't have.
09:28And then you're going to get in the argument, well, you need to separate communications on
09:33medical science, liaisons, et cetera, versus commercial.
09:36Well, you can do that within the systems with different instances on the database.
09:40So it doesn't necessarily have to be a separate system, if you will.
09:45But so, okay, help me understand this.
09:47So you kind of started on the commercial side, you started joining companies, but then you
09:52started getting some clinical experience.
09:55And, you know, what led you or like, where did you find most interest?
10:00Was it on the clinical side, the commercial side?
10:02Was it a blend?
10:03Like, help me if you understand that a little bit more.
10:05I think it was a blend.
10:06But after you do kind of the same thing two or three times, like I'd done, I was at Gilead
10:11Sciences and I was running their com ops, working on the commercial side.
10:15And I remember the day that I went to Jeff Bird, who was number three in command, I think
10:21at that time, or number two, run the CFO.
10:23And I said, and I knew he was a bicyclist, right?
10:26So I said, you know, Jeff, I really looked, I'm looking to broaden my horizon and my experience.
10:32And I got to tell you, I feel like a domestique right now.
10:36You know, I'm the bike rider that, you know, feeds all the other cyclists and, you know,
10:42kind of behind the scenes, getting a lot of heavy lifting done.
10:45And he got that and he said, okay, well, why don't we try strategic marketing or global
10:51marketing?
10:52So it was a, I got to jump into the marketing field right then.
10:56And that was a great experience because what I like about strategic marketing starting there
11:00is that you have an opportunity to partner with the clinical side and the science.
11:06early on to help design clinical trials, groom KOLs, if you will.
11:13And what I, what I really tried to do there was to spend a lot of time researching and
11:21understanding the science so that I could have really articulate and meaningful conversations
11:26with my clinical colleagues and the research colleagues too.
11:29And, uh, it's just a, a, a 60,000 foot level of view of everything.
11:35And then John Martin used to have these quarterly business reviews and it was like, they used,
11:40we used to say it's like defending a PhD and he would expect you to know 60,000 feet all
11:46the way down to tarmac level on everything.
11:48So you, you, you damn well better figure out, uh, everything that's going on in the program,
11:53keep on top of things, engage with your colleagues, et cetera.
11:57And that was a tremendous, you know, two or three year period where I learned just a tremendous
12:02amount about what it takes to advance a drug to the market.
12:06So it sounds like you're kind of like putting all of these different experiences, like in
12:11your tool belt, right?
12:13Yeah.
12:14And it kind of leads me to ask like, so now you're on your own, right?
12:19And so tell me a little bit about what you're building.
12:22Well, I'm at Portola sciences and they got bought by Alexion.
12:26Okay.
12:271.4 billion.
12:28And then AstraZeneca bought Alexion six months later.
12:32So someone's got to stick around and do the asset transfer.
12:35So for a two and a half, three year period, I did the asset transfer.
12:40And, um, I, I just, uh, a couple of thoughts about that.
12:44Number one, um, if you, if you're an acquiring company, don't assume that the previous company
12:51was a bunch of knuckleheads that didn't know what they were doing.
12:54Okay.
12:54Because they likely did know what they were doing.
12:56And, uh, so instead of kind of reinventing the wheel, why don't you at least spend a little
13:00time adopting their strategic plans, marketing plans, et cetera.
13:03Cause I go through this dynamic where the acquiring company comes in, um, and, and you do
13:10have to do the communication and here's all the background.
13:12And usually after you explain the why, the strategy, the market, the product, et cetera,
13:18the acquiring company will go, okay, you guys doing a pretty good job.
13:21Let's advance it from there.
13:23But that process might take three to six months at least.
13:26So once I get it done with Alexion, I have to go through the same thing with AstraZeneca,
13:30which isn't necessarily bad.
13:32I get done with that.
13:33And they offered me a job in their strategy group out in Gaithersburg, Maryland.
13:37I live Lake Tahoe, Nevada.
13:39I talked to my family, decided to take the exit package and look for another opportunity.
13:44So that other opportunity was the University of Nevada.
13:48So I've been leaving my family during the week to go to the Bay Area to work and come
13:53back on weekends for years.
13:55Um, so I, I went to the University of Nevada, which is just short 45 minutes away to see,
14:00met with a licensing agent to see, you know, what's going on.
14:04And her response was, her name was Grace Chow.
14:07She says, thank God you showed up, David.
14:09And I said, well, why is that?
14:11And she said, well, uh, we, I, we've calculated that they've spent over $200 million in NIH
14:17grants across multiple labs here on the life science side.
14:21And we need to get these drugs to the market to learn, earn our license fees.
14:25So I'll make you an entrepreneur in residence.
14:28She anointed me that day.
14:29And, you know, you have free reign to talk to all the labs.
14:33And what I'd like it is assessment, strategic assessment of what's here that we could move
14:38forward.
14:39And I have to tell you that if you have an opportunity to work with a theoretical second
14:44tier university, like University of Nevada, you're, you're going to be very, you're a bigger
14:51fish in a, a, a much smaller pond.
14:53But I, I, I believe in my heart of hearts that there's just tons of technology that's
14:59on these, uh, second tier universities benches that needs to make it to the market.
15:04Cause once I got done at University of Nevada, there's dry devices, drugs, they've got monoclonal
15:10antibody experience.
15:11And then the thing that was first up was the muscular dystrophy space at the Dean Birkin lab
15:19with 20 years of experience in research and their expertise is integrins and laminins and
15:26then muscle structure.
15:27And they were very thoughtful about spending their NIH grants to the point where most of
15:32the preclinical work had already been done with the exception of a large animal study and
15:37dogs.
15:38And then with two 28 day rat and, uh, dog studies, we can be in the clinic, uh, almost a,
15:47you
15:47know, we're ready to go into the clinic pending funding.
15:49So that's where we're at right now.
15:51So it was just a really unique opportunity.
15:53And then the other thing I would say, George, is I'm a big believer in stars lining up and
15:57you're at a certain place for a certain reason, whether it's spiritual or whatever.
16:02Um, I happen to have family members that have muscular dystrophy.
16:06And at the time, three years ago, my, my niece, Chloe was, she was still with us.
16:10Unfortunately, she passed, uh, February 20th of 25.
16:15And I was really, but when I got started, I was really hopeful that I could bring a drug
16:18to the market that would help my niece, my brother-in-law and everyone that's dealing
16:24with muscular dystrophy.
16:25Cause I've been aware of, uh, the, the, the, the significant impact that that disease has
16:30on patients' lives.
16:32Uh, and I, I was aware of that for, for a long time.
16:35And, and, uh, my, my niece, Chloe is now my guiding star that gets me up at five every
16:40morning and makes me want to like crush all the barriers that are in the way and get this
16:44thing to the market.
16:46Yeah, man.
16:47Well, I'm sorry to hear that, but it's almost, you know, it's like, I don't want to say serendipitous,
16:53but it's like, you have a reason for what you do.
16:56Oh, I believe it in my heart of hearts.
16:57There's a reason why I'm 40 years of experience, university of Nevada, muscular dystrophy, the
17:03Birkin lab, you know, it all lined up and it's been really special.
17:07So, so tell me where are you guys at, um, from a clinical development standpoint, you know,
17:13how many different, uh, therapies or studies you guys have in the pipeline or even as much
17:19as you can disclose, I guess.
17:20No, no, no, this is great.
17:21Um, actually, so the Birkin lab has been so prolific that they have a whole portfolio of
17:27small molecules for a variety of different muscular dystrophies.
17:30And they also have a whole protein program when, but if you look at like our experience,
17:36especially at Portola, if you're developing a protein like in DEXA and small molecules at
17:42the same time, those are two different companies.
17:45The manufacturing process is different.
17:47The regulatory process is different.
17:49The science is different.
17:50So we had to pick one or the other.
17:52And the easiest thing to do is the small molecule.
17:55So we have a small molecule codename S969.
17:58We're ready to go into clinic in phase one right now.
18:01Unfortunately, the funding environment has been really challenging and that's holding us
18:05back a little bit.
18:06But that being said, um, yeah, we've, we've packaged up all the preclinical data.
18:12Uh, we do have to do a 28 day dog and rat safety study that allows us to enter phase
18:18one
18:18trials.
18:18We designed our protocols and our strategy to go to Australia to take advantage of their
18:23tax credits.
18:24Um, and we're very tightly, um, connected to all the patient support groups.
18:31And what comes out of that is patient registries and that helps us accelerate, um, uh, recruitment
18:38into these clinical trials and it really helps a lot.
18:41So, uh, that's where we're at with our, with our lead compound.
18:45And I think our strategy is let's take it through phase two.
18:48And that's a really great inflection point for a couple of different things, either co-development
18:53with big pharma, a buyout by big pharma for that asset or an IPO.
18:58But in today's day and age with the patent cliffs that the big pharmas are dealing with,
19:03uh, they're really looking to fill the pipeline in, you know, two to three years.
19:08And we're probably, uh, three to five years away from getting out of the market.
19:14So we're close, but not quite there.
19:16Still got a lot of work to do, but the pathway, you seem to have a pathway.
19:20We do.
19:21We do.
19:22Oh, go ahead.
19:24Oh, I was going to say, um, well, actually, why don't you finish your thought?
19:26Then I'll ask the question afterwards.
19:28Well, we've actually taken advantage of the current adaptive clinical trials and everything.
19:33And so you look at muscular dystrophy.
19:35A lot of people think that Duchenne is muscular dystrophy, but there's actually 30 different
19:39types.
19:40And Duchenne makes up about 25% of all muscular dystrophies.
19:44And the reason why we talk about it is there are drugs on the market for muscular dystrophies.
19:48Now, the limitations of the drugs on the market with muscular dystrophy is none of them really
19:53support cardiac muscle in the average lifespan of a DMD individual is 27 to 29 years, and
20:01they universally pass away from cardiac failure.
20:04And so that's just a huge unmet need.
20:06So we've used adaptive trial designs and studied about and designed a basket study across Duchenne,
20:14Becker's, and some subtypes of limb girdle muscular dystrophy.
20:17So that it opens up the indication when we get to the market.
20:22And then more importantly, I think it's just where the science needs to go to really help
20:26patients.
20:28And it helps with trial recruitment too, because a lot more different types of patients are
20:33eligible for the clinical trials.
20:35So that's our thought on how we get to the market in phase two as quickly as possible,
20:41ideally in three, three and a half years.
20:42Yeah, man, I learned something new just now.
20:47So, well, okay, the question I have for you is, so, you know, we have an audience listening
20:55in, and I'm sure there's people listening in going, man, I'd love to start my own, you
20:59know, you know, pharmaceutical biotech company, but I don't even know where to start.
21:04You know, if you were to talk to somebody like that, we're like two to three nuggets, or at
21:10least two to three milestones that you would recommend for them to start planning out.
21:15So first of all, I think technical background going into business is a really strong foundation.
21:22So I added an MBA along the way.
21:25And if you look at like John Martin, he went back and got his MBA and Craig Gibbs over at,
21:33you know, he kind of did the same thing, strong science background, add to the MBA.
21:40So what I'd recommend is, I think I waited too long before I jumped out to be a CEO.
21:46Not that it's a bad thing, but, you know, I'd like to have done this two or three times
21:50as opposed to, this is probably my last hurrah, if you will.
21:54But after 20, 30, 20, 25 years of experience, what I'd recommend is you go to either a big
22:01university like UCSF and do one of their entrepreneur in residence programs, if you can convince them
22:10to jump on board with this.
22:11And what that does is, I think it's about a six month time period.
22:15They pay X amount of dollars per month, which isn't a lot of money.
22:19And at the end of that, your responsibility is to deliver a business plan, pitch deck, you
22:24know, and then really deep background information about the asset that you're trying to advance
22:29to the marketplace.
22:30And that can jumpstart into, you know, moving that asset to the marketplace as a senior executive.
22:38The other path I see a lot is PhDs that have, are leading a lab.
22:45And the only thing I caution there is that, recognize that the business side is probably
22:52much more complex than you anticipate it would be.
22:55And that it's not a bad thing to bring on a very scientific focused business partner relatively
23:01early.
23:02And that helps.
23:04And because I tell you, as an entrepreneur in residence at the University of Nevada, I
23:10won't name names, but there's a couple of, there's a couple of researchers there that
23:16raised a significant, like $5 million plus.
23:21And it didn't, it wasn't allocated as effectively as it could be to move things to the marketplace.
23:28Let just, let me leave it at that.
23:32Yeah.
23:32Some of the scientists love diving into the science and just staying there.
23:36And it's like, yeah, well, I get it.
23:39You know, if you've spent 20 years going very deep in one, one area, I think that what I
23:47found is that, you know, this whole kind of publish and if you publish, they will come
23:51approach, you know, I get the desire to publish, but you have to recognize that, listen, if you're
23:57working in, you know, muscular dystrophy and muscle wasting diseases like we are, and you're
24:03reading muscle wasting type journals, you know, that's an echo chamber that you're talking to all
24:09your friends about.
24:10Yeah.
24:11Within that echo chamber doesn't mean that the rest of the world knows about it.
24:15So you really have to, you know, boil down the technical science into much more digestible,
24:20understandable from a business perspective.
24:23And then also from a lay person's perspective too.
24:26And, you know, doing that isn't necessarily easy, but it's really important.
24:31And then I think, you know, the other path is if you're in pharma and you really want
24:39to be a CEO, try to get into the business development team because the exposure you get to deal
24:46structure, how to, how to, and, and, and exposure to hopefully VCs and individual investors
24:54through that is just completely, it's invaluable.
24:58Oh, totally.
24:59And if you start on your own, like I did, yeah, I think you have to recognize it's going
25:04to take two to three years to build up the relationships within the VC community and the
25:09investor community to the point where they're going to actually give you some serious money.
25:13Now, I know that there's people, you're going to hear stories about how, oh, I just showed
25:18up with a slide deck in 2017 and I got $60 million.
25:22Those days are long gone.
25:24As of 2020, it's gone.
25:26It is a whole different environment.
25:28So just plan that it's going to take a lot longer or a little bit longer than you would
25:32anticipate to set up those relationships and get the money in.
25:37Yeah.
25:38No, I think that's well said.
25:40I mean, especially from where I'm sitting, it's, if I knew even a fracture of what I know
25:44now when I was starting, I would have saved myself from falling on my face several times.
25:50But we all do that, right?
25:53We get into it as a, what do they call it?
25:57Unconscious incompetent.
25:58I know it sounds negative, but you know, you don't know what you don't know.
26:02But I think the beauty of that from an entrepreneur's perspective is, you know, you put the blinders
26:06on, you start solving problems and you realize, wow, this is much more complex.
26:10And then along the way, if you're a real entrepreneur, you're going to love it because you get to learn
26:15so much.
26:15You get to do many things and you kind of reinvigorate.
26:19Well, personally, from my personal experience, reinvigorated myself to really want to do good
26:24things.
26:25Yeah.
26:26Yeah.
26:27Okay.
26:27So the last part of, I do this with every episode is I call it the hot take.
26:32Okay.
26:32What it is, is there something that you are seeing in the market that you don't believe
26:38other people are seeing, or they're a contrarian thought or idea that you have that you think
26:44others would disagree with you on?
26:46All right.
26:47Here it is.
26:48The Gartner technology cycle is an adoption of technology into any marketplace, whether
26:54it's an iPhone or AI or whatever it is.
26:57And basically the stages are the slope of enthusiasm, the apex of enthusiasm, the slope
27:03of disillusion, the standardization of implementation and market realities, and then the adoption
27:09into the marketplace.
27:11So my controversial thing, and I've felt this for about a year now, is that CRISPR gene
27:17editing therapies are in the slope of disillusion.
27:20And I know people don't like to hear that, but the reality is if you look at gene therapies
27:25that are successful, the ones that are really successful today are isolated into the central
27:31nervous system that is immune competent, if you will.
27:34So you don't have all the issues with an immune response and flare and all that stuff that
27:39comes with it.
27:40And then the treatments, especially in Duchenne muscular dystrophy, are extremely challenging
27:48from a genetic perspective because it turns out that the dystrophin gene is the largest
27:54gene in the human genome.
27:57And especially here, you cannot get that entire gene into one of the delivery vectors, like
28:02an AAV vector.
28:06And because of that, there's just a bunch of things that come along with it.
28:09And unfortunately, there's been several patients have died in clinical trials.
28:14And we just have a way to go with gene therapy.
28:21Um, so I, I look forward to the day when it works across the board, it's really safe.
28:26There aren't any issues with it.
28:28Believe me, I love that.
28:29I love the idea of curative treatments like that.
28:31It's just, we're a little early in the, uh, evolution of that, uh, to really say that
28:36we don't have a lot of work to do.
28:38We have a lot of work to do there.
28:41What do you call it again?
28:42The slope of disillusion?
28:44The slope of disillusion on the Gartner technology.
28:46I actually, uh, just so you know, George, I wrote up an opinion piece and I sent it
28:50to stat first, uh, about a year ago.
28:53And the editor got back to me and he goes, David, I think you're absolutely right.
28:57I can't, but I can't publish this.
28:59And I'm like, I'm like, dude, why can't you publish it?
29:02Because do you realize how much investment's gone into gene editing and how many people I'd
29:07piss off if I, if I published this?
29:09And I'm like, well, that's, that's irrelevant.
29:11It's a, it's a lot.
29:12Now, that being said, I was at, uh, a treat NMD, uh, a very technical clinical development
29:19meeting over in Lisbon a couple of weeks ago, and the muscular dystrophy community has realized
29:25that there was too much hope that the current, the current reality is that it's incremental
29:31improvements.
29:32And we, we sat together and talked about, well, how do you talk about this in the marketplace
29:38where we know that patients are exposed to the communications so that you can balance
29:44this hope message with the realities of the treatments.
29:48And what we kind of came up with was, well, let's treat it kind of like we did with oncology
29:52therapies in the late eighties, early nineties.
29:56You know, back then it was taboo to say that you could cure cancer.
29:59And we never said that.
30:01Uh, and then we would position it as, listen, we have a potential drug that's going to be,
30:06uh, incremental improvements.
30:07And it's probably combination therapy that it's going to take to solve this complex disease.
30:12I think the muscle wasting space and the muscular dystrophy space has really come to that conclusion.
30:17There's no silver bullet.
30:19Treatments are going to be incremental.
30:21It's complex disease.
30:22And it's going to take combination therapy to solve for everything.
30:26So I think we're in a better place now where, um, it's a better alignment of hope and reality
30:33as we go forward.
30:35Man, David, what a, what a nugget you just dropped on us.
30:38I love it.
30:40Well, this is great.
30:41So I, David, one thing that I, um, I also would love to, uh, do, uh, offer is in our,
30:47in our, uh, audience, there's a fair amount of VCs.
30:51I mean, I'm connected with a decent amount.
30:52Um, and so, um, knowing that you're probably always in fundraising mode, I mean, if somebody
30:57wants to reach out to you, what's the best way for them to get in, get in contact?
31:00Um, you can call me and my phone number is, uh, 415-246-3311 or drop me an email, david
31:09.craig
31:10at sarcomatrix.com.
31:17And I'd love to talk to you.
31:18We're actively, you're absolutely right.
31:20We're raising money right now.
31:22We've got a, a, a seed plus early A round open.
31:25And I think if you get involved right now, you're going to realize you're going to get
31:28a big third of the company for very reasonable, uh, reasonable investment with all the anti-dilution
31:36protections and, uh, uh, the protections that you would look for from an early investor.
31:40So anti-dilution.
31:42Oh, man.
31:42Oh yeah.
31:43That's right.
31:44Yeah.
31:45All that good stuff.
31:46I, I negotiated the term sheet with the, the Don of, uh, of family and individual
31:52investing, uh, Howard Lubbert out of, uh, Philadelphia.
31:56And he's known, basically known for putting together really well, great term sheets, early
32:03investors with all the protections that you would expect.
32:06So, uh, if anyone knows Howard, he's blessed this, he's going to invest and we're in good
32:11shade.
32:12Cool.
32:13Cool.
32:13Well, David, thank you, man.
32:14Appreciate the conversation.
32:16And, uh, for those listening, uh, we'll see you at the, uh, at the next episode.
32:20So, but David, thank you again.
32:21We'll see you at the next episode.
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