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What’s Inside The road to commercialization Research Views Responding to the reader Cellular construction Staying alive Stroke: brain attack Research outside the lab 2005-2006 Lionel McLeod Scholarship winner AHFMR announces $48 million for health research Reader Resources The road to commercialization An internationally recognized researcher on inflammatory diseases, Heritage Scientist Dr. John Wallace is not used to identifying himself as “the weak link in the chain”. But in 2004, when he embarked on commercializing the results of his research, he stepped into a role for which he had no experience or expertise: president and CEO of Antibe Therapeutics Inc. As the founder of a start-up company with precious little capital, however, Dr. Wallace had no choice but to run Antibe (pronounced “ON-teeb”) himself. To bolster his on-the-job learning, Dr. Wallace received help from AHFMR’s ForeFront program, which assists Alberta innovators who are commercializing health-related research. ForeFront supports researchers in developing business and entrepreneurial skills through access to expert advice and specialized workshops, and through funding to attend investment conferences. AHFMR offers Technology Commercialization (TC) project funding in conjunction with the ForeFront program. To date, Antibe has been awarded $685,000 to advance its lead drug to clinical trials. AHFMR Research News caught up with Dr. Wallace and Dr. Andre Buret, his colleague at the University of Calgary and Antibe’s vice-president for basic research, as they were reflecting on some of their experiences to date. Q In February 2005 you both attended Invest Northwest in Seattle, the leading investment conference for the life-science community in the Pacific Northwest. Sixty-six companies presented at Invest Northwest 2005; two were from Alberta. You had a twenty-minute opportunity to present your business plan to an international audience of investors. How did it go? A (Dr. Wallace) I’d never given one of these presentations before. I didn’t know what to expect. I’m a scientist, and this is a different pitch. I was the second speaker that morning; the first presenter had organized his talk in a way that was completely opposite to mine. I thought “Uh-oh.” But in the end the presentations went well. We got good feedback. We came away feeling good about where our company is. Q What did you expect to get out of the conference? A (Dr. Wallace) I had zero expectations. In terms of attracting funding, I was pretty sure we wouldn’t be successful. We’re a young company. For venture capitalists, we’re premature. We went in with our eyes open. We knew that for what we’re selling, probably no one was going to be buying. But it was a good experience. The presentation was good practice. It was a huge plus to see what other companies are doing. The networking was also excellent. Eventually we want to license drugs; so if people say “I’ve heard of Antibe,” that’s a good thing. We basically wanted to know: are we really out of our depth or not? This kind of meeting is the best way to get that information. Q What kind of lessons did you learn at Invest Northwest? A (Dr. Buret) The path we’ve chosen for Antibe is one that’s based on scientific evidence. A lot of biotech companies choose the path of commercialization based on marketing, without scientific strength. That’s a big difference. We saw some of that in Seattle. I don’t think it means that the scientifically based approach is more likely to be successful than the marketing-based one—it’s just another path. What I learned is that I’m comfortable with our approach.. A (Dr. Wallace) While the experience at Invest Northwest reinforced the idea that having solid science is extremely important, it also demonstrated clearly that to raise money you need an element of showmanship. Q Considering that’s what sells, how are you adjusting your plans? A (Dr. Wallace) Well, one of the things I did was fire myself as president. We hired a CEO, Daniel Legault, who has previously served as president of a number of companies. And a CFO, Alain Wilson, who has extensive experience in repositioning, restructuring, and business turnarounds. If I had remained CEO, I would have held the company back; I don’t have the business expertise. So Dan is working on our presentation for future conferencesand he will be the one presenting, not me. He wants just enough science to get their interest, not reams of slides. Whereas my talk at Invest Northwest was probably 40% science, his presentation is more like 25% science, the rest focused on market positioning and financing. A (Dr. Buret) The other thing to remember is that marketing is expensive, money-wise and time-wise. I mean it’s a lot of work, especially with very restricted financial means. Also, I’m not comfortable going out there and standing up in front of an audience and telling a story that will be covered by the media as “we found a cure for cancer”. I think there are too many people doing that now. A (Dr. Wallace) Publicly traded companies work hard to bolster stock prices. The ones I talked to say they have to issue a press release every six weeks. But after a while you don’t get the little blip in the share price, so you have to think of something else to do. Q So what has that taught you about going public? A (Dr. Wallace) From day one, we’ve known that if we go public, it will be under a CEO who has run a public company. That’s when we let go. I have friends who take companies public, and they say “you don’t ever want to do this”. That’s Dan’s attitude too. His job as CEO is to get us positioned, and then we’ll bring in a CEO who is experienced with public biotech companies. Q So this is on your radar screen? A (Dr. Wallace) Yes, although people tell us to “get acquired before going public”. Everything we do now to promote the company positions us for acquisition. However, we are doing some small things in case we decide to go public—for example, having financial statements audited. The point is that we keep both options open. We don’t have to select one right now. It’s realistic to be flexible. Q You took three weeks out of your schedule to take the executive development program at Queen’s University. Why? A (Dr. Wallace) Two reasons; one is historical. After I finished my B.Sc. I got accepted into an MBA program, but I never did it. The itch to do an MBA has always been there, and this program represented a taste of what it would be like. The second is that I felt the need for more basic business skills. It was an incredibly intense three weeks: week 1 is strategy and planning; week 2 is finance and accounting, week 3 is leadership. It was really good, and we had unbelievable teachers. Q Are you a better manager now? A (Dr. Wallace) Yes, I’ve changed things both in the company and in academia. In particular, I’ve changed the way I communicate, especially in terms of mentorship, coaching, and active listening. Some of the skills—like negotiating—I haven’t had the opportunity to practise yet. But we’re going to be licensing a drug soon, so I’ll get a chance to do that. Q What is holding Antibe back? A (Dr. Wallace) Our limitations are time and money. If we had more money, we would hire more people. Hiring Dan and Al hasn’t given us more time; it just means that collectively we’re doing more. They’re doing the fundraising and preparing the materials—all that stuff. And Andre and I are doing the science, more of it. There’s no question we’re getting more science done. Our progress has been substantial. Q Has your attitude changed? A (Dr. Wallace) I think we all have more confidence. Partly because we’ve had feedback on patents, which we didn’t have a year ago. Also, we’re just that much more mature as a company. We have a clearer idea of what kind of information we need, and the places to get it. We feel more comfortable talking to people about the company, about potential licensing. A (Dr. Buret) I think our attitude reflects the company’s evolution. We’ve moved from the science, and the excitement of original data, to the company structure and strategic planning of product development. At our scientific advisory board meeting, everyone got together and prioritized what we have in the pipeline. Dan has developed the business plan. We have much more strategy now. Dr. John Wallace is an AHFMR Scientist and a full professor in both the Department of Pharmacology & Therapeutics and the Department of Physiology & Biophysics at the University of Calgary. He is the chief scientific officer of Antibe Therapeutics Inc. Dr. Andre Buret is a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science, and an adjunct associate professor in the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Faculty of Medicine, at the University of Calgary, and the vice-president for basic research at Antibe Therapeutics Inc. Back to Top