2020 Startup Talks 2
The next, startup speaker, is, michael schrader, ceo. Of vaxxes. Well thank you all for uh joining the discussion today my name is michael schroeder i'm one of the co-founders, and ceo of axis. I'm going to talk to you today a little bit about our, mimics, platform, which for the first time enables. Self-application. Of vaccines, and other biologics, in a shelf-stable, patch. I'm going to talk about a little more on the context of our lead program which is a single-dose. Self-applied. Shelf-stable. Covet and influenza, seasonal protection, vaccine. So quick introduction to cobalt i think is something that's on a lot of people's minds right now, our hypothesis, from the start when we jumped into the covid race back in march, is that covet, is not going to go away anytime soon and that, in fact we're going to have a need for. Regular, revaccinations. In the future. We've seen with chronoviruses, historically, is. Antibody. Protection, tends to wade. Wayne relatively, quickly even after a, pretty potent infection, so, we have combined, covid, and a seasonal flu vaccine, into a patch. That basically, is designed to protect against this. And we do this with the platform, i'm going to talk a little bit more about which is the mimics, patch platform, so this is a, platform that brought together a novel material technology, from tufts and a new delivery. System. From mit, into a system that you see here, in the center of the screen you see a white device with a great button in the middle this is the applicator, for size perspective, it's a little larger than a quarter in diameter, so relatively, small. If you flip that applicator, over on the underside you'll see there's a patch contained within, and that patch as you can see here contains an array of very very small needles, which i'll show in more detail in the next slide. Essentially, this platform, is is, unique, in enabling, single-dose, protection, and we do this with some pretty unique immunology, of slowly releasing vaccines in the skin. It's unique in offering protection against strain drift. It's unique in offering, shelf stability. And, simple administration. Ultimately we see an opportunity to go after a 10 billion dollar plus market here in looking at the flu and covered markets. Combined. So this is a closer image of our patch. What you'll see here is a needle that has a clear central portion, and a blue tip. I'm going to go ahead and click play and you'll see what actually happens when these needles. Enter the patient's, skin. So what we've done here is basically, load, the vaccine, into the blue tip in a sustained, release polymer. This clear central portion of the base does not contain the vaccine. It's simply a fast dissolving, polymer and sugar blend, patch is applied to the skin, fluid in the skin very rapidly dissolves, that central portion the needle embeds those blue tips in the skin, those, slowly release over about a two week period of time essentially, fooling the body. Into thinking that there's an actual infection, so very different than a traditional vaccine, injected into the muscle, which is not really an immunologically. Active organ, and cleared out of the body in a day or two ours sits in the skin for about two weeks, again stimulating, very very potent immune responses. The beauty of this system as you can imagine, is now we can move, vaccination. Out of, the healthcare, system and into patients homes, so the idea here is having an app, basically allows a patient to directly order their vaccine, the other scenarios we're imagining our insurance providers shipping these vaccines directly, to all of their insured patients. The patient takes out the applicator, applies to the forearm as you see here that patch is left on the skin.
The Patch, the applicator, can be thrown away immediately, the patch has to be left on the skin for only five minutes this is the magic of the system as that blue tip separates, in a five minute window, after which all of this can be thrown away in a traditional trash can you've got no sharps hazards. Remaining. The beauty of this system again without going into too much detail is that slowly releasing a vaccine, in the skin for two weeks, fooling a body into thinking there's an infection. Leads to, dramatic, enhancements, in uh immune response, so you see here antibodies, against hiv. Not only an improvement in the quantity of antibodies, but we also see a shift from non-neutralizing, and neutralizing, antibodies. We see dramatic, enhancements, and t-cell responses. And ultimately what this leads to, for a product like a flu vaccine, which is not very effective, is better protection. What it leads to for a product like the covid vaccine, is that we can now enable, protection with a single patch instead of two or three separate injections. So as a company, our lead program is a pentavalent, vaccine again combining four strains of flu with a covet vaccine, and that will enter the clinic early next year. We're following that in-house with a melanoma, therapeutic, so applied directly to a melanoma, tumor slowly releasing, a couple of different compounds, directly into the tumor. From a partnership, perspective. We actually do not have a ton of bandwidth at the moment we've had a lot of inbound interests you can imagine dude covered a lot of emphasis around that program, but we are also, you know also looking for partners who see value in applying this platform, to to enable better vaccines or therapeutics. Or even creative applications, think of nutrition. Supplement, delivery. In this, simple convenient, format, happy to talk to partners, who see opportunities, in that space, so with that happy to take questions. Great, thanks michael. Um so maybe you can expand a little on the, partnerships, what current ones might look like and you can touch on some um global ones as well. Yeah so the the two partnerships, we have in place right now have a very similar structure, we actually approached, partners to see if they would be willing to provide us with their vaccines. And let vaccis, own the development of the product so we are a full-blown vaccine developer. So in the case of these products we've got molecules, coming from partners they're providing regulatory, support, support on uh you know assay protocols. We're driving the clinical development, activities. And then on the back end we own the products, and as you can imagine there's a couple different structures to this some of these partners are global partners, who have asked.
Others Are looking for licensing. Uh royalties, everywhere we choose to sell the product so that's one model we are operating under currently that we really like, the other model we uh, you know operate under is kind of the more traditional, approach, where a partner has a molecule. They want to launch a product under their brand, that uses our platform. We have shied away from those, uh up until now quite frankly we think the development base many of these partners just doesn't align with the rate that we can move internally. So we've shied away from those but uh we do have, i'll say two discussions, ongoing right now that look like they may result in partnerships, in that space, again where we're providing the platform. Uh we're supporting those partners, you move the manufacturing, of our patch into their facilities, and ultimately on the back end we draw royalties from that final product. Great, what is the regulatory. Timeline. Yeah so this is actually the beauty of covet is the the path into the market is much much quicker with covit. Essentially, you're looking at a traditional, vaccine approval process for a product on our patch so it's a full phase one phase two phase three, it's a drug device combination, product which certainly has some complexity, to it it will not be treated, as a standalone, delivery system, using you know kind of a 501. Uh pathway, so it's going to require full phase one phase two phase three and you know eventual. Uh approval, as a new vaccine. Okay and a final question. Um could you talk a little more about any side effects or how safe it is for the skin. And the level of risk. Yeah so that's that's really the beauty of this is is uh, we've done now work in. Probably eight different animal models, uh everything, from you know mice, guinea pigs, pigs, primates, you name it along the way a few others in there that i've skipped over. So we've got a tremendous, amount of data showing that this is very safe very well tolerated. Uh, certainly until we you know do that first deployment in humans next year this will be an open question, that's the primary focus of our phase one clinical trial next year but everything that we're using in this in terms of materials are well validated. Uh there are a number of other microneedle, companies that have come before us that have really validated the concept of skin delivery so there's a lot of precedent we're building on here certainly that phase one will be the. Key validator. Thanks michael back to you marcus. Thank you ariana, thank you michael. The next presenter, is paolo, garcia. Co-founder, and ceo. Of kaido pen. Thank you marcus. And we are kairopen, and we're shaping the future, of engineer, cell therapies, with our, non-viral. Delivery. Flow fake technology, we span out of mit, in 2017. And currently, our team has four members, that are, connected, to mit, including, our co-founder. Colin buoy who is a tenured professor, in mechanical, engineering. Imagine a world in which your own cells become living medicines, to fight, cancer, genetic diseases. And infectious, diseases such as code. These personalized, therapies, are a reality, today. And the main step, in, being able to, to engineer, those cells is to introduce, genetic material. For coding the desired therapeutic, effect. The process, generally uses. Viruses. And this, takes on the order of three to four weeks. It doesn't, enrich, all of the patient, population. And and really it has resulted, in medicines that are effective. But that have a high cost of manufacturing. And our goal is really to shorten, that manufacturing. Time period, and reduce, the cost, by implementing. Our non-viral, delivery. Technology. The secret sauce of our non-viral, delivery solution. Is combining, fluid, flow, with electric fields, in order to open up, cells and introduce, genetic material. Into them without compromising. Cell health. We have adapted. A commercially, available liquid handling system to drive samples, through our flow cell, and this gives us high throughput capabilities. And later this summer we will be beta testing, our scale up device. That has the potential, to process. On the order of a billion, cells, per minute which is, more than enough for a therapeutically. Relevant, dose. Of cartesian, cells for example. The important thing is that between the two platforms we use the same flow cell same electric fields, same materials, and geometry, same buffers same flow rates, in order to process the cells, and this gives us seamless, scalability. For therapeutic, applications. Here i am showing, a video that demonstrates, the simplicity. And elegance, of our flow fact approach.
To Deliver genetic material, into cells. We process. These cells by aspirating. The cells, that are in combination, with the payload of interest that payload can be mrna. Dna, or crispr. And it is resuspended, in a proprietary. Buffer that maintains. High cell viability. When the samples are flowing, out of the, devices. That's when we energize, the tips with low energy electric fields, in order to introduce, the genetic, material, into them and they go directly, into growth, media. Our goal. Is really to improve patients, lives through automated, cell engineering. And as a case study here, we are showing. Some preliminary, results, that we have achieved. In engineering, b cells. With. Our technology. These results. Are just the first step in this journey and this demonstrates, the ability for us to deliver. With high cell viability. And high transfection, efficiency. With mrna. What we did is we leveraged the power, of our high throughput, platform. And our scientist, james. Took a cell type that we have never worked with these are the b cells, perform, four experiments, in less than two months, and now, we have defined, a starting, protocol, that we can use, with potential. Partners. And what we are seeking. Is industry, collaborations, with iop, members that are, interested. In accelerating. Discovery. Of, future, engineered, cell therapies. Being able to accelerate. Into, the clinic, with a manufacturing. Platform, that scales. And expanding, beyond. The traditional. Primary, t-cells. We. Start, the most. Therapies. With. Applications, in stem cells natural killer cells b cells, and macrophages. And what we want to do is also identify, complementary, technologies. That can help automate the process even further and reduce the cost associated, with these promising, therapies, so that many more patients can benefit. From this revolution, in medicine, and would love to connect with you and take any questions. Thank you. Great paolo. Thank you. First question. How does your non-viral, delivery, tech, scale up to be able to handle the one billion cells. Great question and our technology, is based on continuous, fluid flow and this is using, very high flow rates, and so just to give you an example these fluorides, can be on the order of 20. Milliliter, per minute, and if you have, a, volume, of 10 milliliters. Containing, your 1 billion cells. You can process those billion cells, in 30 seconds. If you're interested, in processing, 5 billion, cells. Then we just flow for a little bit longer, for two and a half minutes, and we can process. And, because our systems, can scale with time, and not with larger, vessels. Okay. And how does your gentle delivery, process, impact, cell viability. When we. Tune. The flow rate, and the electric, fields, appropriately. We actually do not have. Any. Deleterious. Impact in viability. So, our technology. Can achieve, high cell recovery. High cell viability. And high gene editing efficiency. So that you result, in high yields. From the input number of sales and that's something that we don't have to compromise, on. Okay. And, turning to covet 19.. Um. What are some of the things that you're thinking about or how to pivot. Um to try other tests, or other, things that you're, working on or thinking about. So, really what we what we have is a, technology, that can.
Deliver. Genetic material, into the cells, and what we're looking for is for partners. That perhaps have some payloads. In order to code, for. The production of neutralizing. Antibodies. And so we would facilitate. The delivery. Of those payloads. So that the cells can produce, neutralizing, antibodies. As a potential, treatment. Great. And a final question. Is the flow required, for enabling, intracellular, delivery, of genetic. Payloads. If we just use the fluoresce. That we are employing, we do not get delivery, if we just use the electric, fields that we're using. And we don't get delivery, either. It is the synergistic, combination, of both types of energy, mechanical, energy and electrical, energy, from both processes. That allows us to, actually deliver. All the way into the nucleus. And, at. A test. And, stable gene editing. Great thanks. Our next speaker, is, jack baron. Co-founder, and president. Of, sweetwater, energy. Hello everyone, as marcus said thank you, my name is jack barron. Sweetwater, energy, has developed, a platform, technology, that is truly a breakthrough, in efficiently, breaking down, over 90 percent. Of a given sustainable, biomass. Into high-value, building blocks. That economically. Replace petroleum-based. Ingredients. And products that we all use every day. At lower cost. Our goal is that green, no longer comes at a premium. The global problem that we address, is current biomass, processing, is inefficient. It's high waist and high cost. And carries a substantial. Negative environmental, impact. Because of the inefficiency. Sustainable, products made from wood and crop residues. Simply can't compete economically. With low cost oil, in markets for fuels. Chemicals. Paints, and all the. Markets that we've come to know, oil participates. In. As a result, green solutions, often carry a premium. Enough, to address global climate, change. But they must. Green solutions, must in fact be cost effective, with petroleum. To get to scale. Our solution is that we've developed, a platform, technology. That produces, sustainable. Products. At scale. With lower cost. We're using patented, modified. Twin screw extrusion. To break down biomass. In less than 20 seconds. We have a team right now in estonia. That is actually proving our technology, at commercial, scale, today. For a plant that will in fact prove the technology. By the end of this august. In less than 20 seconds our technology, breaks down biomass. Into cellulosic, sugars. For transportation, fuels. And for biochemicals. We produce a lignin. That is unlike the lignin produced at pulp and paper facilities.
Ours Is suitable for resins. Paints, coatings. Polyurethane. Foams. Perhaps most exciting, we make a microcrystalline. And nanofibrillated. Cellulose. Our partners, globally, are beginning to use that technology. To, create, low, low weight and low cost, packaging. Processed, wood products. Furniture, and cabinetry. You can even find specialty, cellulose, like ours and food products. And the japanese, government, recently, produced. An electric, vehicle, whose body was made from nanofibrillated. Cellulose. Like ours. At five times the strength of steel. And one half the weight. Working with multiple industries. Packaging, and paper is one area we've focused. We have multiple corporate partners now globally. In the us. Europe southeast, asia and south america. Our partners, are working with us to collaborate. Using this platform, technology, to create new products of their own. And enhance. Savings. Sustainability. Performance, and profitability. Specifically. In the paper industry. One partner is lightweighting, their product. To enhance strength and reduce, cost. They have over 150. Paper companies, around the world that they're working with they estimate, that our technology, can help each of their customers, save up to five million dollars per year. Another partner is using our nanofibrillated. Cellulose, to act as a coating. To reduce or eliminate, petroleum-based. Ingredients. Saving costs and improving oxygen, barrier performance. In packaging. We're seeking additional, collaboration. Opportunities, companies that are willing to use our building blocks. To create their own new proprietary. Products, and lower their costs. Companies that are focused on improving, existing, product performance. Cost and sustainability. Working, in industries and applications, such as packaging, and paper. Processed, wood for construction. Furniture, and auto parts. And cement, where one recent partner has had a breakthrough, using just one half, of one percent. Of our microcrystalline. Cellulose, in a concrete, mixture. They increased. The tensile strength of that concrete by 100, percent, double the tensile strength. We're working with partners in fuels, chemicals. Polyurethane. Foams, paints and coatings. I'm jack baron sweetwater, energy, thank you. Super jack thank you. The first question for you i know that climate change is a priority for sweet water and also for many or most of our ilp members. How the sweet waters technology. Can successfully. Address that. Thanks ariadna. First, we're replacing, petroleum. Products. Which of course allows. Our technology. To reduce the amount of petroleum, required. We're using sustainable. Wood. Plants as they grew. The value of our co-products, is so high. With microcrystalline. And nanofib-related. Cellulose, and even this unique lignin. That. Effectively, the cost of our sugars, is extremely. Low, so creating transportation.
Fuels That can compete. Effectively, with petroleum-based. Fuels, without incentives. Is one thing this technology. As it's adopted, globally. Will allow. Great. Another question, white has, taken so long for a platform, tech, to be developed. That effectively, competes. With fossil fuels, and products. The problem is challenging. Mother earth takes over 100 million years to break down oil into a usable, product. Um, and, to break down, plants and animals. And we're using, this platform, technology, in just 20 seconds, but it's a competing, problem, that we had to fix. And that is you have to have a thorough process, to get to products that allow you to compete economically. And it had to be gentle, enough. So you have to be able to create products that in fact can separate. Wood and crops into component, parts, to compete economically, with oil. Okay next question. Can you produce biofuel, competing with the current oil prices. Yes, short answer is absolutely. Um, the technology. Is true biorefining. So, based on producing, multiple, products, at a given facility. We're creating, these specialty, cellulose, products the lignin which are saleable, and we're working with partners on, uh contracts, around the globe for that, and we have contracts, now. For, uh, ethanol. Which, obviously, is, a drop in fuel, and we're working with other partners for drop in hydrocarbons. Well beyond ethanol. Great and a final question, can you talk a little more about plastics, and the polymer, industry, for example. Sure, our lignin, is a natural biopolymer. And it has highly reactive. Hydroxyl, groups, so it already, is um, working in polyurethane. Foams and as a polymer, replacement, from the petroleum, industry, that's today. Many of you are probably aware of pla, polylactic, acid, and products that are made from fermentable, sugars. Ours are some of the most fermentable, sugars our partners tell us that they've ever encountered. From cellulosic, sources, sustainable, sources. Okay thanks jack. Thank you back to you marcus. All right thank you ariana, thank you jack. We're going to go to our, last startup presenter. This is adam behrens, co-founder, and ceo, omori. Formerly, known as cambridge, crops, thanks marcus, i'm really happy to be talking today, um, as marcus mentioned, we recently rebranded. Mori, um, i'm, adam baron's, co-founder, and ceo. Formerly, was an mit langer lab postdoc. I co-founded, this company with vendetta, morelli, a couple years ago out of mit central engineering. Maury exists because of food waste, today about one third of the food produced globally is wasted, that represents about a trillion dollars in economic, losses.
As A company we're looking to recapture, a lot of that lost economic, value as as well as create more through extending, shelf life. To extend shelf life we have to directly address why food goes bad. The three mechanisms, that we care about are dehydration. Gas exchange, in the form of both oxygen, and ethylene transport. And microbial, growth. And we directly attack all three of those mechanisms, by forming a natural barrier, on the surface of the food item directly. It has barrier properties, as well as some chemical properties, that allow us to directly address all those mechanisms. The basis of that barrier is a protein that we extract, from silk. Why it works so well is it's able to self-assemble. On the surface of a food item. And form, great barrier properties. A big differentiator. Is its film forming ability. It's amphiphilic. And it has relatively high molecular, weight which allows us to form barriers, across a wide variety of substrates. Hydrophobic. Hydrophilic. Whole produce cut produce and even protein. The last feature, of the the protein that's important to our application, is, that it decurs, deters microbial, growth. The silk films that were forming on the surface of these food items, do not allow for easy cellular adhesion. Having a great microbial, effect antimicrobial. Effect. At the end of the day what we're doing is making a water-soluble. Powder, that we're shipping, to our partners. At our partners, either packing, or manufacturing. Sites, they're simply, redissolving, that powder into existing unit operations, where food items are being sprayed, or washed today. Again we work across category. Um generally we like to form really deep partnerships, around single food items, as well as more platform, plays. Right now we're working, really hard on leafy greens. Both improving supply chain efficiencies. Quality and shelf life. Allowing for the decommodization. Of fruit and vegetables, and putting them in a value-added, form like taking a vegetable, and making it a cut vegetable, while still having the parent shelf life of the, parent ingredient. In whole produce we're able to maintain quality, allow high quality produce to be shipped to. Further terminal markets. And also are deeply exploring, the protein, space we're extending, shelf life and reducing, strength for a variety of our. Partners. At mori we deeply care about food waste. Food waste from a bottom line perspective, most directly, affects retailers. Food service. And, consumers, and so it's really important to us that we also affect. The supply chain in a positive, way and then so we end up. Looking for other very important value propositions. That affect those stakeholders. The first of which is packaging. Through creating barrier on the surface of a food item directly we're actually able to take some of the barrier of performance, away from the packaging, allowing for transitions, to be made without a reduction, in performance, and at a decreased cost. From logistics, perspective, we're allowing things to be shipped more densely. Shipped hotter. Or even provide insurance against when the cold chain does break down i'm sorry let's put forward. And lastly we're providing access to new markets, and enabling, new product combinations, all together, by making ingredients, that weren't shippable, shippable. Now. We're currently. Converting, from pre-commercial, pilots into commercial. Deployments, next year alongside, ramping up our production, and we're still looking for deep partnerships. And fruit, vegetable, protein and processed food categories. And the more medium term we're looking for manufacturing, and distribution, partnerships, especially internationally. And are generally, interested. In a more medium to long-term. Joint development, arrangement, as we push some aspects of our technology, into the pre-harvest, and direct packaging, space. Thank you for your time. Adam, thanks. Hey first question for you. Um can you talk a little about any added cost to cover the foods. Yeah so so we end up um, charging, on a. Per pound food item basis, and generally, we're adding, single digit cents per pound of food. Next question, how much shelf life extension.
Are You. Seeing. Sure, um so it really depends on the context, of which it is applied, but, but generally, we're seeing, 50 to 100, shelf life extension, um and that could be. You know at the top of the supply chain where we're adding weeks, um or at the very end of the supply chain where we're adding days. How about any side effects. Or safety. Concerns, that you've addressed. Sure yeah so we actually. Self-designated. Generally recognizes, safe in early april, after expert panel review. Really important, that this can be broadly applicable, for all food categories. A very deep, um investigation. Into anything like allergenicity. Toxicity, or otherwise. And we have extremely high safety margins. That make this really a complete go-ahead, for the full public. Great thanks adam. And now we will, have a final poll for the. Audience.
2020-08-07 16:59
