From Seed to Sale: What VC's Want in Biotech Startups
Dr. Andrew Snyder (Monash University) joins the show to discuss the current biotech landscape: rising M&A and IPO activity, where clinical-stage assets are attracting buyers, and which therapeutic areas are gaining momentum (oncology, rare disease, metabolic/diabetes). He explains how AI is being deployed to speed research and data synthesis, the potential impact on drug development timelines, and why early-stage funding needs to return to replenish pipelines. They also touch on psychedelics research, recent breakthrough drugs affecting patient access, and the broader implications of drug-pricing policies on the industry. Practical advice for founders: tell a differentiated story, show a clear path to clinic, and demonstrate how quickly you can get safe patient data.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
But like let's hold on three two one Joining me now is Dr. Andrew Snyder of Monash Universit.y
Oh, I should also say full disclosure. He is my brother. Dr. Snyder. It's great to see you Thanks for joining us this morning Jeff. It's always a pleasure to be on your show It's great to great to see you as always As I think the audience knows and of course you and I know we're not in the same Locale, I'm in Charlotte. You're in Boston and you're doing Boston and biotech things, but it's always good to connect.
Okay, Andy Um, I want to ask you about Biotech last two times we had you had you on the program I think things were flat in terms of interest and funding But I think things have kind of shaken loose.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
There's a bit of a biotech recovery You know I'm not gonna say the word recovery, but well, I will say there's a lot of work.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
No our word. That's fine Go ahead.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
There's there's a lot of deals taking place in our ecosystem right now we see uptick in Initial public offerings. There's some really notable examples Where I am in the Boston area we see uptick in M&A Where Companies like Eli Lilly are going on a shopping spree with their cash in hand and retooling their pipelines With assets along the way we see the XPI index, which is a sector spider ETF that tracks the larger biotech indices as Performing really well, and so there is this uptick in activity alas It's kind of a world where there are haves and have-nots
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Okay. So are there particular segments of that market? So biotech is a very Broad term that refers to a lot of different things.
What's you mentioned Eli Lilly you talked about some M&A things and IPOs What's moving in terms of the sectors within Biotech.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
Well, I'll just say look if you have a clinical stage asset, right and it's showing promise in a sizable indication that's obviously Going to be on the radar for large pharma as they retool their pipelines and try to fend off the risk of patent cliffs Okay, so that's number one is Clinical stage as far as sector, you know, we know cell and gene therapy has run into Somewhat of a downturn, but there are exceptions to that as well And so I don't know that there's a hard and fast rule that I can think of As far as one sector over another we know Oncology rare disease diabetes, you know metabolic disease.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Those are doing pretty well right now All right, let's as a follow-up to that let's talk about AI you can't go anywhere without reading seeing or hearing about Artificial intelligence. I've been reading a little bit up a little bit on biotech. Certainly.
I'm not an Expert like you are but AI is being deployed to read through thousands millions of lines of data in order to Identify disease, but also probably to help out with some of these clinical trials you're talking about It's pervasive in our industry and that's a good thing if we can do things faster if we can read out data faster That's great.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
If we can synthesize things faster, that's great. Are the next set of ideas going to come from AI? I don't know that's controversial.
Is it going to help us speed things up? Absolutely. It's going to speed certain parts of the process up its impact in our industry Isn't known yet, of course because we're just now deploying the tools The hope is that number one it can help us synthesize Data sets together to find new targets and new ways as to new ways to attack disease that we can get to the point where There are fewer failures in our pipelines and ultimately save money for all of us
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Save money and save people's lives Let me ask you I had reached out to you when the president signed an executive order about Psychedelic research. I think that was more tailored towards PTSD and mental health. How do you translate that?
Into the broader biotech sector biotech sector clearly The executive orders was focused on these so-called psychedelics and PTSD But I have to think that based on your first comment things are really opening up in terms of research and potentially government funding I'm not sure about the government funding right now.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
I would say look I think the R&D we do pays off. You heard recently about a new drug from Revolution Medicines That has an impact on pancreatic cancer it has such an impact that now it's being discussed that they will be able to do a kind of a right to try or one of these things where This this open access policy where they can sort of give this away to Patients with a high degree of unmet need this is very good when things like this happen
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
And what about you know the expansion? I don't want to get into Pharma policy because I think that's not really your area But you know, there's Medicare and drug pricing that's going on more favored nation most favored nation drug pricing I have to think that that creates more opportunity as well for some of these some of these larger pharma companies you mentioned some of these patent clips, but being able to offer most favored nation pricing and Under the Medicare this new Medicare plan. I think it's called Trump Rx that could also creates opportunity Yeah, I mean Jeff to be honest.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
That's a little bit out of my lane. I'm Those are areas of policy That I don't have a great deal of knowledge I can only speculate that look The United States pays for these drugs at full price most of the rest of the world doesn't pay the same rate and so This is this this changes the dynamic and things are going to have to change in the future In order to make this a sustainable path
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
So you mentioned kind of maybe you didn't use the R word but I will maybe a potential recovery the deployment of AI that will help speed up the Hopefully help speed up the drug the drug process the drug creation process What are you looking for? What do you look at in the next six to twelve months? What's on your radar screen?
What are you thinking about as you're talking to partners clients, etc.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
This is this is a great question I spoke to an investor this morning here in the Boston area They're early stage venture studio launching companies and he told me he hadn't seeded a company from 2022 until now That it was hard to seed companies We need that to come back, right? We need to be active for people to be active in that ecosystem There are good ideas that aren't getting funded. You know, if you are buying the clinical stage companies, right?
which is what's happening when the clinical value is is real and There's not gonna be anything left to Replenish the pipeline if we don't invest in the early stage. So I'm looking for you know as those M&A and IPO returns come in Are we going to deploy those two early stage startups? And what is that going to look like in the next?
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
six to twenty four months Yeah, any any So if someone's out there and they're they're looking for funding What do you what do you tell them in terms of how do you how do you get? The funding because you said that as you said, there's people on the sidelines. They've got cash The cash probably isn't earning a lot of money and either price price sitting and earning in a modest interest rate in some money market It got somewhere.
So clearly there it's a wait-and-see But what do you tell someone who's looking for the the funding looking for the money? How do you how do you how do you get over so to speak with these venture capitalists, you know You've got to tell a differentiated story.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
You've got to tell the path to the clinic You've got to tell all you've got to check all of these boxes that are gonna help them de-risk this right and You know, it's just a case where you've got to find the right investor at the right time so obviously you need to keep knocking on doors, but You know, the story has to be differentiated, you know, why now what problem are you solving? Why now? How fast can I can I get to those patients?
When am I gonna get that answer in people that this is going to work? I think that's what I'm hearing people are looking for with these early stage ventures how soon can you get this into people safely and To test this hypothesis.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Yeah, really important Look I think every time you and I talk the tree seems to be shaking some things loose. That's good We want to unstick the market that's good for everybody, especially those patients that need these vital jobs. Dr. Snyder my brother Andy great to see you Thanks for joining us and we look forward to having you back on the program again very soon Jeff.
Andrew R. Snyder, PhD., Monash University
It's always my pleasure Thanks and see you soon.
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This story was originally published May 11, 2026 at 4:30 AM.