🧬 Mark Kotter - bit.bio - Part 3 | Success in Academia vs. Industry | Vital Things All Founders Should Know | The Importance of Company Culture | bit.bio & the Operating System of Life

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Part 3 of 4. 

My guest for this week’s episode is Mark Kotter, neurosurgeon, stem cell biologist, and CEO and founder of bit.bio. Bit.bio is an award-winning human synthetic biology company providing human cells for research, drug discovery, and cell therapy. Bit.bio applies a patented safe harbor gene targeting approach to inducibly express transcription factor combinations that reprogram human-induced pluripotent stem cells into highly defined and mature human cell types. Bit.bio spun out of the University of Cambridge in 2016 and has since raised approximately $200 million from Arch Ventures, Foresight Capital, Milky Way, Charles River Laboratories, National Resilience, Tencent, and Pulau Capital, among others.

In addition to bit.bio, Mark is also the co-founder of Meatable, scientific founder and chairman of rejuvenation startup clock.bio, and co-founder and trustee of Myelopathy.org, the first charity dedicated to a common yet often overseen condition causing a slow-motion spinal cord injury. Mark has also been a professor and researcher at Cambridge for more than 15 years. His diverse experience as an academic and serial entrepreneur offers a wealth of insights aspiring scientist founders can draw from. 

Please enjoy my conversation with Mark Kotter.

00:28 Intro

01:55 Explaining the technology they developed while at the stem cell institute 

03:26 An unexpected gene expression discovery and dealing with the issues that followed

05:32 Comparing what it means to be successful in academia vs industry

06:53 The dangers of having a misalignment of objectives while building a company and other lessons learned by Mark 

10:18 Vital things that founders need to address before taking their idea from the lab and building a company around it

14:08 How Mark and his COO’s skill sets compliment each other 

15:29 The importance of company culture and how it can affect both building a company and investing in one

17:55 Benefits to the relentless objective-based focus that some founder-led companies have over professionally managed ones

19:44 Parallels between Excedr’s all-in origins and bit.bio’s complete dedication to its mission

21:47 What Mark’s operating system of life is, what are its applications, and why it fuels bit.bio’s culture

24:07 Outro

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Cambridge Stem Cell Institute https://www.stemcells.cam.ac.uk/ 

University of Cambridge https://www.cam.ac.uk/

Single Cell Analysis: Considerations & Applications

Lab Equipment for Genetic Engineering Research

What is Live-Cell Imaging & How Does It Work?

Common Lab Equipment for Life Sciences Research in 2024 https://www.excedr.com/blog/common-lab-equipment 

Kathryn Corzo https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathryn-penkus-corzo/

The Biotech Startups Podcast gives you a front-row seat to the business and science of building a biotech. Hosted by Jon Chee, CEO of Excedr, the show features honest conversations with founders, execs, and investors about their work, their companies, and how they got there. From scientific breakthroughs to startup lessons, each episode explores what it really takes to grow a life science company—from pre-seed to IPO.