Common Pitfalls of Early-Stage Biotech Companies

In a conversation with Pharmaceutical Executive, Yerem Yeghiazarians founder and CEO of Soley Therapeutics, discusses the company's innovative drug discovery platform, which leverages stem cell research and AI/ML technologies. The platform, developed over 25 years, focuses on understanding cellular responses to stress and identifying novel molecules that drive desired cellular outcomes. The company aims to transform drug discovery by identifying drugs at the cellular level and then matching them to diseases and patients. Yeghiazarians emphasized the importance of a strong team, deep science, and adaptability in overcoming challenges in drug development.

A transcript of Yeghiazarians’ conversation with Pharmaceutical Executive can be found below:

Pharmaceutical Executive: What are the most common pitfalls early-stage Biotech companies face, and what lessons would you pass on to founders navigating those first critical years?
Yerem Yeghiazarians: Again, as I answered your question previously, drug discovery is challenging, and it's not a one man, one-person, one-woman sport. It's a team sport. The most important thing is knowing your own limitations. What are you confident in and what do you need help surrounding yourself with the best people who have been there, done that, and that's multitude of talents, right? You need investors, obviously, you need people who have been drug developers, you need people who've taken drugs to clinic, you need excellent researchers, you need phenomenal engineering to actually set up the inventory management system, security, everything.

So, I think you need to really have a good plan, and when you go into this, what are you confident that you yourself can do and be very hands on? At the early stage, you got to be hands on, you got to be get involved with everything and everyone and I interview every single person that we want to hire. In fact, we had an open position just to let you know, about a month or two ago, and we had over 800 different candidates for that one position, which tells you something, and we ended up hiring one person for that, and we're ecstatic with the person that we ended up hiring, but I was extremely hands on with every hire.

Building the team is critically important, and having a vision, sticking to your vision and not to keep deviating and changing with what some other company may be doing , or what someone else is doing. Have your own plan, and in our case, have a strong foundation to what you're doing.

To us, its the foundational science, and we haven't deviated from that, because every time somebody else does something, and I go, maybe I should be doing this? You change direction, you rechange direction, you change direction again. That's time, that's effort, that's confusion, and a waste of money.

All of a sudden, six months, twelve months, goes by, and you waste a lot of money, and I go shoot, what do I do now? So, stick to your guns, stick to your plans, and build a good team. Surround yourself with people who've been there and done that, who can complement the skills that you bring to the table. It's a team sport, and listen as a CEO, as a founder, listen right? Listen to others, you're going to hear on the same point, many different point of views, and people will disagree with each other too, but you know, at the end of the day, some decisions will need to be made, but if you're as well prepared and well read and talk to a lot of people, don't be shy about talking to people. I love talking to people because I learn from everybody, and then hopefully you make the right decision, but that would be some of my advice.