Episode 1 - Jane Lapon - Atorvia Health Technologies
The guest for this episode is Jane Lapon, CEO of Atorvia Health Technologies. A pharmacist, Jane worked in the NHS as a Pharmaceutical Adviser with responsibility for UK drug budgets before transitioning to industry where she has held market access and leadership roles for Bristol-Myers Squibb, BTG, Boston Scientific and, most recently, Photocure. Jane’s current venture Atorvia Health Technologies is developing therapeutics for organ failure, starting with the kidney. Passionate about “paying it forward”, Jane mentors up-and-coming talent and life-sciences leaders on market access and is active in industry groups building communities of like-minded leaders.
This interview was taken during the third session of the CDL (Creative Destruction Lab) - Berlin Health stream, and that's the reason for the background noise and the lack of formal introduction.
About the podcast
These conversations bring forward deep tech founders while they take their first steps. I believe in showcasing the diversity of examples and role models we experience each day so that many more scientists feel confident and excited about starting their journey as founders. This podcast is separate from my roles at the DEEP Institute and Creative Destruction Lab.
Full episode transcript
Francesco: [00:00:00] What has building a startup taught you about yourself?
Jane: Oh my goodness. I did not know that I could be creative, scientific, resilient, and cover business and look at a topic I didn't know a huge amount about before and then learn about it to stand up in front of 250 people and talk about it.
And then be grilled by VCs; I had no idea I could do all of that. And that's just one day.
Francesco: So you feel it brought you out of your comfort zone big time.
Jane: Totally, totally. And in a very practical way, because I've been working, I'm not an academic, and I've been in the industry for 20 years.
I've worked with a lot of people, I've touched a lot of products, [00:01:00] I've done that whole kind of traditional pharma thing, but I've never, I've always had people that I could rely on, people who were in the team, but without actually having to do it myself. And it's very, very different. It's very different when you're, you're leading somebody versus having to roll up your sleeves and go, okay, we're looking to talk to the FDA:
'Who's done, that?' No, none of us have. Okay. So how do we do this? And, and it's the, I think it's also the creativeness, but it's also part of the team which is a whole other topic. But yes, I feel I have, I know I've got so much more courage than I did before. And just the, I mean, resilience.
It's kind of always been there, but just the ability to be able to be multiple things, I didn't know I had it in me.
Francesco: That is interesting. So, in this process, is there anything that you have to forget from your previous experience actively?[00:02:00]
Is there anything you say like: okay, this is no longer helpful? I need to do, I need to do something else.
Jane: Yeah, very much so. Because again, coming from that pharma background, where you're saying it's a process. So you do things in a set way, with selected people, in a specified order. Although I worked in market access before, bringing products to market, looking at geographic expansion, and getting reimbursement for things.
And you have to be creative with that, but there is a set process. You know, you know that you're going to have to do a submission for this. You know, you'll have to set up your studies like that. And then all of a sudden, I need to take away all of that process and all of that rigidity in how you do things and become an awful lot more fluid.
And I said something about being creative before; a lot of that comes from, well, I know that worked. And I know it worked. But it's about finding [00:03:00] either a smarter way or a faster way, or a more creative way you see what I mean?
Francesco: How do you couple that fluidity with actually leading forward? You need to be able to change and adapt the process, but at the same time, there is a pretty clear milestone like the runway. How do you experience it and navigate it?
Jane: The one thing that CDL has taught me is about focus. And it's also about what not to do as much as it is about what to do. And that takes a lot of discipline. That takes an awful lot of discipline, but it also takes a certain type of personality. And I'll come back to the team because the team is the most important thing.
But, it's almost that if you're not clear where you're going and you don't have that focus, then you can't possibly move things forward. So the blueprint is really about, [00:04:00] it is about that flexibility, but if, if you're, we started the CDL process, you know, great ideas:
I have some great ideas. I know where we want to go. There's so much more that we can do with the technology that we have. But it's, we've got to start somewhere, and you've got to prove yourself, and you've got to prove you can do it. You've got to be credible in it and, and, and, and, and, so it was really about.
And I love the whole CDL. You've got three things in these next eight weeks to deliver to advance your business. And there will be other things you have to do, but we're focused on those three things. And I've got down the road, two sessions later, Monday mornings, calls with the team. What are we not doing this week?
It's just amazing. It really is. So I know I'm going all over the place here with the answer, but it's exactly what it is: the blueprint is about focus. It really is.
Francesco: You were touching before about the [00:05:00] creativity and curiosity, but also focus and how do you navigate the feelings attached to it because I can see at some point it might feel it's driving you into two directions.
And for scientists, especially for scientists, it could be tough to understand that because it's, I mean, curiosity is what's driving you, right?
Jane: So I have a little trick. So there's the most scientific person on my team, he is brilliant. Yeah. We had an opportunity to present ourselves.
It was a startup event that was going on at one of the universities in Toronto. And it's all about, you know, it's Entrepreneur Week, right? So we're going to go there, we're going to sit and they were, okay. If you're happy to do this, we will do a pull-up, you know, the pull-up banners, right?
But all I'm thinking is, oh, create something massive. Well, isn't it? And if you know, look, we need the design by the end of the week. And I was at the conference. And I'm like, you [00:06:00] know what? I'm giving it to my scientist to do. So there he is, and he did it. He did, he, he created, he, and just, it was almost that it brought a little fun back into it, took him out of his comfort zone, and again that, oh, I can do this, but it was that, I don't know, and it's tangible.
You see it, it's a week.
As a scientist, I can see this; I can see that here; here is the evidence. And it's hard, but I do things like that, I'll throw curveballs at people that are just taking them out of their comfort zone. But, it's also the big picture and the small picture; you need both.
And I think that what helps with the creativity is we've got these deliverables, we need to focus on this, this is going to take us to the attainable next step. But also, here's the big picture. You know, at the end of the day, we are on this journey to solve the issue of organ failure. And to get [00:07:00] there, we need to do these little steps and we have to focus.
So it's that kind of the big and the small, and then throwing the curveballs just to have a little bit of fun along the way. Yeah, because
Francesco: otherwise, you become, it can become strictly cynical like you're building something to build something. The good thing about working in health is that everything has an extremely clear value proposition.
Yeah. That's about whether can you make it work. Yeah. What is the business model? Can you make it work? But it's pretty clear the value to society or people. And so that is, I think it's really nice that you're bringing it in on a kind of daily, weekly basis. [00:08:00] How can you keep all the company in contact with the, with the market, with the need?
Jane: Yes, it's so important. And, and I think having, having done... and digital, I've worked in digital as well. And I think that's the classic example because you get so obsessed with developing the product that you're actually developing something that nobody actually wants. And it's just, it is about staying close to, close to the customers, close to the market and actually what, what do the patients need?
What do the providers, what's going to help them? How are we going to: Science is great, you've got a good idea, but if nobody wants it, and you can't do anything with it, then what's the point? I had a quote I always use with somebody who used to be the executive chairman of whatever position it was.
For, NICE, the National Institute of Care Excellence in the UK. So these guys do all the guidelines and make all the funding decisions. And his, his famous quote was:
'just because industry develops something new, doesn't [00:09:00] mean that the healthcare service wants it or needs it.' that was your, the sort of mantra you're up against all the time.
Because it's, you know, you can bring something to market, but if nobody's going to pay for it and nobody's going to use it, what's the point? So, a long way of saying, I absolutely agree with you. And how do we maintain that? Well, we have a clinician on our team. Right. So, so there. He's an academic scientist and a nephrologist, and every Thursday afternoon, we know that Steve is seeing his patients.
Oh. So he still has clinics. He keeps us extremely focused and very, very grounded in terms of the patient's needs. And then in terms of keeping up with the market, it's, it's, I mean, I find it fun, but things are changing so fast. It's being able to navigate that whole, oh, how do you spend your time?
But if we don't keep up with what's going on in the market, and if we're still focusing on developing something without talking to customers, then, you know, [00:10:00] really, and then we wonder why nobody wants to cut the check.
Francesco: Is there anything that you feel brings more joy or energy into building into your journey? Especially in health, the journey is long. If everything goes right, it's going to be a 10 to 15 years journey. I feel that it's so undervalued keeping the joyful and almost playful perspective in it that can give you the stamina to keep at it, so it doesn't become like a chore. So, is there [00:11:00] anything you feel is just giving you so much energy and joy right now?
Jane: Three things. One: the team that we have is, and who you work with and who you have on the journey with you is so, so important. Like it's really, really important and we are very, very different people. We have very, very different backgrounds and that I think, I think is essential. I mean, you know, we challenge each other, but, but it's that, but we enjoy each other's company as well.
But it is also about purpose. So what is our purpose and what brings you purpose? And bringing that to work with you, and, and if you are following your purpose in life, then that work is part of it. And then I think it's also about, it is a journey, and you have to enjoy the journey.
You know, it's like, we think there, our end point is, whatever the end goal is I would love to say that I remember, but I don't, but there is a very famous poem that is the road to Ithaca. And you read the poem and the whole purpose of the poem is that the road to [00:12:00] Ithaca is the journey, it is the destination.
So the journey is the destination. And I think when you get into that mindset, it also helps you deal with things because we do get setbacks; things don't always work. But just thinking that we are here to enjoy the journey.
Francesco: It's basically like a daily focus on the journey with a clear compass on purpose with a crew that you enjoy spending time with. What's the last way you celebrated something together, and how you did it?
Jane: We had one last night. We're spread out. So we have to kind of contend with that not all of us are working in the same place. That some of us are virtual. And so we do make an effort to get together.
And when we do get together. We, we, we do, we, I mean, we did the classic, we went out for dinner last night, but the thing that we celebrated, and it was, it was, it sounds really funny, but we all got these and again, it was my scientist, [00:13:00] you know, and Mridul goes and gets us these business cards. They're the electronic ones that you can tap on your phone, and they come up with your contact. So we were like, this was a way of celebrating the fact that Mridul had come on board. And we were just playing around with them and wanted to tap everybody's phone with them. But it's a good challenge, in terms of you having to celebrate, you absolutely have to.
Especially now because we're developing therapeutics. So it's a long, long journey. And then, you come off the back of conversations with VCs who are like, well, you know, your next milestone is 18 months away. I'm not going to wait 18 months before I'm going to be able to celebrate something. So we do, we are having the conversation and yeah. Yeah. Verbally, well done, [00:14:00] we did this, let's kind of give ourselves a virtual high five on the phone, but also just having that almost like the mantra of when things don't go well, we have the debrief. We do the analysis and look for something we can learn, can we do something differently, and how do we move forward, but, but on the flip side is that when something goes well, (and it might just be something really small) like we finally signed the contract for this employee. We've got a new team member. Just verbalising it even is a good challenge to think of creative ways of doing it.
Francesco: Is there sometimes an issue where you're so focused on improving that you are actually always picking up what doesn't work and that can be improved?
And so the perception might be that nothing is working, but you build a team and culture mostly through celebration more [00:15:00] than, more than fixing things that are broken. It is more than celebrating daily effort and accomplishment. So I think it's really important.
And that's why I was asking something like that. It's super concrete because I think that there is something that everyone can bring on board also.
Jane: No, it's so true. It's so true. And I mean, just even sometimes pausing to have a coffee.
We'll do that. But then there's also the other thing, that good enough mentality. So I think especially. We're scientists, and always just looking for: ah, I need to, I need to prove this, I need to make this better. How can I, you know, how can I do this better?
And then you're looking at the data, and you're analysing it, and we can get into that paralysis where it's like: how on earth can we make this better? But it's that: this is good enough. We don't have to have 75 iterations of our pitch deck to be able to go [00:16:00] out and talk to investors about it.
It's that good enough mentality, and that's hard.
Francesco: Also, I think it's really interesting when you're working on something like therapeutics.
Balance the good enough on the business side where you can get things done and get things moving while keeping extreme quality on the product.
Jane: Yes. And it also speaks to the fact that having a team, it is so important to have diversity. And I mean, in terms of personality, as much as anything else, it is so important. Like if you're, I mean, I've seen businesses fail where you've got whoever has founded the company, or you have the CEO, and you've got little mini me's all around.
Or you've got the same personality type. So having that diversity where you can challenge and you can be [00:17:00] challenged. It doesn't matter who you are in the company, you've got a difference of opinion so you can have the conversations. It also helps you take stock of that being able to do that good enough. On the flip side, I'm extremely fortunate that the really techy people on our team are extremely good communicators.
They are brilliant at being able to take something really complex. And it's not about dumbing it down; it's about being clear and articulate about it. And I've found the value of just having somebody else who is not a "sciency" person, who doesn't have that same sort of analytical mind who just is able to ask the question.
So, you know, talk to me about what you're doing, and it makes us stronger as a team. When we go out together, it makes our story clear to investors. It makes it easier to go to pitch competitions or even just to in that whole "What do [00:18:00] you do? What is your company?" So we start off with this 25-page description of what we do, and then it comes down to six lines.
And then you end up with this, you know, that whole kind of, what do you mean you don't put the pivotal data in a pitch deck? You know, you're generating interest, but it's just, anyway, that whole. Yeah. Difference of approach. I think it's essential.
I really do.