Biotech by the Bay

Last weekend I tweeted a lot of links for the Startup Lessons Learned Conference, and I have often linked to other lean startup articles over the last few weeks. I’m sure many of you are wondering why I keep linking to things that seem so tech-centric. I must admit I probably have an unnatural obsession with the lean startup idea, but this is only because I feel that it has amazing potential to change more than just tech startups. I will attempt to share my ideas relating to a variety of lean principles in future posts, but today I wanted to focus on Steve Blank’s idea of Customer Development.



Steve Blank first began to teach Customer Development at U.C. Berkeley’s Haas Business School in 2004. His ideas have evolved over the years, but the core principles remain the same and were captured in his book The Four Steps to the Epiphany. In the spirit of full disclosure I must admit I haven’t even read this lean startup Bible yet (although it is sitting on my bedside table). Who has time for books right? Thankfully, there a variety of resources to learn about Customer Development in a shorter form, such as Steve’s blog, these slides or this video.





image credit: Pharmalot

Twitter? The more cynical among you are thinking, “Twitter is the place where I can learn what Bob had for lunch and that Jane is having the worst day ever. How could that be useful for my start-up?” Others may be thinking, “That’s great for tech companies or web start-ups, but pretty useless for my platform/diagnostic/pharm/cleantech company.” As few as three weeks ago my personal opinion of Twitter was very close to those stated above. Although I am admittedly late to the party, I have finally come around on Twitter and it’s usefulness, especially in the world of life science start-ups. Here are the Top 6 reasons you and your start-up should use Twitter (in no particular order):

1. Access to industry news – Twitter is most useful as a link-sharing service. This to me is the killer app of Twitter and the feature that finally converted me to using it. There are a bazillion sources of information available on the web and it can be very difficult to filter out the important pieces that you need on a day to day basis. Twitter is a way for you to share links to important information and to have a feed of information filtered through your friends and colleagues. As a start-up working on a biologic therapeutic you may want to follow @FierceBiotech for general news in your field. Any company looking for regulatory approval may follow @FDA for any up-to-the-minute updates. The possibilities and sources are endless, but you can tailor your feed over time so that you are getting links from sources you trust and with topics that are important to you.
2. Recruit employees - What is your preferred method of recruitment? Do you really like getting flooded with off-target resumes from craigslist postings? Most start-ups would prefer to hire someone through a referral from someone they trust. Word of mouth and emailing people can work, but Twitter is a way you can get the word out to a larger network and yet still be an avenue to decent referrals. A quick note on Twitter that says you are hiring and either a brief description or better yet a link to the job posting could help you gain access to a wider net than just emails and phone-calls.
3. Sales leads - This item clearly only applies to the subset of life science companies that have a product to sell. Research platform companies and others may find Twitter to be another avenue to generate sales leads. If you have a product that a customer really likes and they use Twitter to tell their colleagues, then you have just secured a seal of approval and possible referrals. You can even provide discount codes and other promotions to help with your sales process. There are some companies taking advantage of this, but life science companies are still well behind the curve. It obviously won’t replace a direct sales team, but it can be a great complement in a greater sales strategy.
4. Customer service – Again, this is more applicable to companies with products for sale. However, this could be an important avenue for those that are testing products with customers as well. Some customers will prefer using Twitter to contact you. The benefit of using this avenue is that the majority of messages (if not sent as direct messages) can be seen by the public. This is a great opportunity to show the world how great your start-up is at customer service.
5. Share resources – This idea gets back to the discussion of a start-up community that I discussed in a previous post. While you clearly won’t want to tell the world the details of your patent application, there are many resources out their that can be useful to life science start-ups whether they are virtual or physical. Someone may have had success hiring someone through Jobs Now SF and they could pass that info along. Someone may have seen the seminar at QB3 about risk and insurance and they could pass that info along. Someone may have found a great discount program on antibodies or an upcoming auction of surplus lab equipment. We all have limited time and resources that make it impossible for us to know about all of the useful resources out there. If the life science start-up community used Twitter for such purposes everyone could benefit.
6. Public relations – This could be a positive or a negative depending on whether or not you are in stealth mode. There have been recent discussions for and against having your start-up in the public eye. I think it depends on the company which works best, but for those that want a public face, Twitter is a great tool. The obvious reasons like generating sales and customer service were discussed earlier. So why have a different point here? I think even a therapeutic company with a product that is a decade away from hitting the market could still benefit from positive public relations. The most basic example is access to funding, as when it comes to funding sources, the more the merrier.

Finally I will use 23andMe as an example of a company using Twitter. I’m not saying they are the perfect or only example, they just demonstrate a lot of the above points. One look at their Twitter profile, and you can see examples of sharing relevant research links, discount codes, and customer service interactions. Also, 23andMe has had no problem in the realm of public relations. You may not have a web-based, consumer-oriented genetic testing company, but I think even your life science company can find value by being on Twitter.

photo credit

While I have spent nearly a decade of my life working and training in the life sciences, I have always been a bit of a tech junkie. This is confirmed by one look at my Google Reader, where sites like TechCrunch and Mashable share space with Science and Nature. Reading about and being surrounded by tech start-ups has led me to think of a few things that biotech start-ups could learn from the Tech world:




• Establish better online resources

As I became more interested in getting involved with biotech start-ups I was drawn to sites about venture capital funding and start-up advice, such as Venture Hacks or Both Sides of the Table. These sites are treasure-troves of information for an aspiring entrepreneur, although the majority have a strong tech emphasis. While many of the principles are similar, such as principles for raising capital, I often wish there were similar resources that emphasized biotech specific issues. For a start it would be great if biotech entrepreneurs and investors began to blog about their early stage ventures and shared advice and experiences specific to the life sciences. In the Bay Area and a few other locations there are quite a few real-world workshops and seminars for this sort of advice, but it would be great if there were ways to get this information regardless of location.

• Build better communities – both virtual and real

I am also continually amazed at the strong sense of community that exists in the Tech world. There are both virtual and real-world communities for every tech topic under the sun. There are more and more bio specific meetings of this kind, but there are still nowhere near the number found in the tech world. I have been part of the small start-up community that exists at the Mission Bay campus of UCSF. Between QB3 and other entrepreneurship resources at UCSF there is a strong start-up culture and opportunities to interact. While this community has many positives, it is still small and limited compared to the large number and wide-ranging interests found in the Tech world. There are signs that things are starting to change. Through Twitter I stumbled upon Bradley Miller’s blog and his Bio+Tech effort. His introductory post about his vision for Bio+Tech sums up my thoughts about community much more eloquently than I have done here.

• Get younger

I mean this both literally and figuratively. The world of biotechnology start-ups is often ruled by intellectual property and access to capital. As such, most start-ups have senior scientists from academia or industry at the helm. Unlike the many examples of tech start-ups like Facebook, there are no college kids forming the next Genentech in their college dorm rooms. There are definitely some very trivial answers why that is the case, such as lack of sufficient training, experience, funding and/or space. But are there, or rather should there be, so many obstacles to the formation of innovative biotech companies? The great lure of Silicon Valley has always been about the possibility that the next Apple or Google is lurking in a garage somewhere. Start-ups in the life sciences need this youthful optimism and creativity as well. Again, just as with my previous two points, there are signs of change. One need only look to the garage biology movement and groups like DIYBio to see that in the next few years the next Genentech might be formed in a garage or dorm room. These sorts of changes are encouraging, but much more must be done to help get more young, innovative people access to the resources they need to make an impact in biotechnology.



I do not intend to trivialize the resources and communities that currently exist in the world of bioentrepreneurship. I know I have probably missed many such resources. If anyone is aware of any that I have missed please add them to the comments so we can continue to share and connect as a community. I will attempt to post more in depth discussions of some of these topics in future posts and will file them under Tech Lessons.