Episode 79: Unlocking Startup Success in Biotech and AI with the Tulane Ventures Fund

Starting a company is hard, but the Tulane University Innovation Institute is here to help. Learn more from today's guest, Dr. Kimberly Graham.

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Serving the entire Gulf South, but recorded in the heart of New Orleans.

Welcome back to BIO from the Bayou. I'm James Zanewicz from Tulane Medicine, and today's guest is one of my favorite friends and colleagues, Dr. Kimberly Graham. She is the David and Marion Mussifer Chief Innovation and Entrepreneurship Officer at the Tulane University Innovation Institute. The Tulane University Innovation Institute is a university-wide endeavor dedicated to helping Tulane students, faculty, and community innovators, as well as innovators throughout the New Orleans region, the Gulf South, and all around the world. They help them develop their entrepreneurial ideas, their startup companies, and themselves as talent. Welcome to the show, Kimberly.

First, let me just say I'm thrilled to be here with you. I really enjoy working here at Tulane, and you're one of our gems here at the School of Medicine. And I love the fact that you are giving us an opportunity to talk about some of the fun things that we're doing. So thank you.

That is so great. So how did you get here? How did we get you to Tulane?

Wow. So that was a really interesting story. Well, let me back up a little bit and say, you know, I was working on my PhD, and Tulane, as Tulane will, did a research project to try to figure out how an innovation institute would be successful here. And so they hired a search firm and gave me a call as I was going through my qualifying exams, which was a very difficult time of life. Yeah, right.

Easy time to look for a job.

And I wasn't really looking because I was really focused on doing well. And if any of you out there have taken qualifier exams, intellectually, they're probably the most difficult thing you'll ever do because it's very comprehensive. And the long and short of it was I answered the call because the Tulane leadership and the committee that put together this amazing job description about how they wanted this effort to be a beacon of light for New Orleans. And that specific word was very special to me because I thought, this is what my work is about in my life. I want to give everyone access to the American dream and be able to take their ideas and have access to capital so that they can do something with it to make impact.

And I think that's a great segue. So you talked about capital and you have Tulane Ventures Fund, which supports opportunities for startups and early-stage small businesses that kind of falls under the, the TUII, the T-U-I-I umbrella. Can you share the inspiration behind launching that venture fund, any challenges you found along the way, and how it can help address those gaps that we see out in the world? Well, uh, so a 3-part question.

Yeah.

Super easy.

You might need, we might need to go back to a couple of them.

Yeah.

So let me start with just saying that Tulane's motto is not for oneself, but for one's And so, before I actually started my first day of work, an opportunity for submitting an application post-COVID, because so many businesses had gone under because of what happened to our country, the US Treasury wanted to stimulate the economy. And so, each state had to figure out a process. We submitted an application, and the long and short of that was that they would match dollar for dollar An investment fund, and the investment vehicle for us was a seed fund, a venture fund. And so we put together an investment thesis that supported those that have challenges with access to capital. And the investment thesis was mainly around life science, healthcare, of course, energy, and artificial intelligence and machine learning. So that was sort of the inspiration, knowing that we had to build founders, build startups, they would need this access to capital. So it was actually serendipitous that I was coming on board to be able to help to support and build that.

Well, 'cause someone had to drive it and we had no one to drive it at that point.

Right. And, but usually capital follows deal flow. And so it kind of happened in the opposite direction, which put a lot of eyes on us very quickly because it was something Tulane hadn't done before. And Frankly, I had not spent a lot of time in New Orleans, so I didn't have an assessment of the volume of the deal flow, the quality of the deal flow. So it was a, a bit of a risky thing to do for Tulane to back $5 million to create this $10 million seed fund.

And what were some of the challenges you had as you pulled this together? 'Cause obviously you're not here yet, you're figuring out what do we have, what are our areas, how did you overcome these bits to make this happen? 'Cause it came together and it came together really quickly, but there had to be some bumps that, that you bounced over in some way.

There were so many bumps along the way and potholes and everything else. I will say this, that we have amazing leadership at Tulane and we have an amazing support network. And that support network is made up of people like you. It's made up of what I call our X-Factor Tulane alums, and it is made up of people that really want to see New Orleans thrive. Right. And so this broader entrepreneurial ecosystem. And so the challenges really were with the level of sophistication around venture funding at the state level, managing this process to be able to give us the opportunity. And without getting into the weeds here, you have to build a structure and you have to have a contract in place and you have to negotiate that with the state of Louisiana. And so we are not New York City and the financial capital. And so you have folks having conversations and using words they might not know the full definitions of.

And it's new.

It's so new. And we were doing it along with some others. And in Louisiana, many of them did not get their funding. And I think what helped was I had experienced this at my former university, winning an I-6 grant through the EDA. And so I had gone through all the building blocks, worked with general counsel's office, done the things, built the parts, and I was able to accelerate that process the best that I could, even though I was working with a state government that really this was very new to them.

That is so interesting. And I know you mentioned healthcare, AI technology, and climate innovation as 3 of your areas. So I'm curious how you chose those and how they aligned with the strengths you see at Tulane and in our region.

You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that Tulane was founded as a medical school to combat infectious disease. And so I think that helped me to sort of be my North Star in thinking about it. And then when I got here, my team and I thought, well, we better go through all of the research portfolio and try to assess what the volume looks like. And so, in doing that, it's about 86% of our inventions come from the School of Medicine and the Primate Center, or are healthcare-related, right? So, you get some bleedover from the School of Public Health, as well as the School of Science and Engineering. That's right. Yeah.

That's right.

And so, So it made sense that biotech and the health sciences, healthcare was going to lead the effort here. But energy was such a big deal because of the state we're in. And this fund funds startups across the state of Louisiana. It's not only for Tulane faculty and students. And so that seemed very appropriate. We were awarded— we're one of the lead partners in a National Science Foundation FUEL grant. And this is one of the ENGINE grants.

We're just like Like a year into that, right? Or so?

Right.

Yeah.

Just now we're just doing the 1-year report and it's all around energy and decarbonization, and it was $160 million, one of the large ones. And then the state matched another $68 million. So that helps us to create deal flow for our innovation pipeline. And then of course, your favorite topic, artificial intelligence.

I love it. Right.

And so that is something that I think overlays really all of the different kinds of research verticals here at Tulane and makes a lot of, sense with Meta, one of the big things that— big announcements that happened recently, moving to the state of Louisiana. And why? Because they probably need some of our energy.

Energy and our data.

That's right.

Because our data is so valuable here, which is why companies keep coming, is we have that diverse population of not only ethnically diverse, but we're urban and rural. Like, we are all the things in this state. And we may not have the most cutting-edge computer science. We have great computer science too. We're not MIT. We're not Harvard. We're not Stanford. But we have data they don't have.

That's right.

And that's why every company is coming to folks like you, guys to try and locate here so that they can be next to us.

That's right. I just had a really interesting meeting with the Navy yesterday, basically the same conversation, and how can we be working with you at Tulane in creating a tech bridge here in the Gulf South? And so this idea of all these major initiatives sort of converging together so that there's a there there really, really is getting interesting for us.

Just before this, I got off a call with Yas from Heidi Health, and he's going to come in for Bio in the Bayou, and I want him to meet you because They do some really cool stuff in the AI space around healthcare, but are looking at a bunch of different verticals. And he's based in Melbourne and London right now, but the company is also in the US. And one of our alumni works for them in New York, which is how I got plugged in. But like, these are people that I just think can do so much with the fund that you have and could potentially be investments if they wind up in Louisiana, right?

That's right. That's right. It's funny how that happens, though, that kind of demand pull, because they want to be here for our exciting culture and the things that make Louisiana great. But when we start talking and having these deeper dives into the kinds of things that they need and we can help them to problem solve and now fund it, they want to be a part of what we're doing. So it's exciting times.

And once you fund them, you're not done. You're not getting— because the Institute is not just a venture fund. It's a lot of things.

That's right.

So what are some of the kind of resources, support services that you can put into a company that you fund as well as other people? Do you mentor them? Do you, do you provide coursework? Like, what are some of the things you guys do?

Yeah.

So our Our charter really is about the development of translation and commercialization, and then this sort of like an innovation entrepreneur program. So both co-curricular and helping our academics to embed innovation entrepreneur best practices within the classroom. So we're doing a training, a faculty development training for a week, right? So you can be anywhere and learn about these things and figure out how to incorporate that into your syllabus. So that's important. And then funding and the outreach and the expression of the impact, right? How does it get out in the world? And that can take a bunch of different paths. But it's really sort of a one-stop shop for all things. And so to do that, it's a big portfolio of programming. And suffice to say that I think the backbone of it is our mentoring. We have about 80, maybe closer to 90. So we work with our advancement office to do a lot of outreach to Tulane alums because they have relevant degrees from our university to help us.

Mm-hmm.

to create great founders in areas that are relevant for the science that we do. And so a lot of people across this nation stepped up and said, yes, I will mentor. Yes, I will help you to do a technology review. Yes, I will connect you to my investment network. We have the chairman of the board of the School of Public Health, who's a medical doctor, and met his wife here, who's also a medical doctor.

Of course, yeah.

Right. And so he's getting honored. And then he's willing to come back and be our keynote at one of our— at the TRX event this year, but he invited me to this thing called Medical Mondays, and it's all these VCs from across the nation that are looking at deal flow, and he's now not just a medical doctor, but an entrepreneur and an investor, and very well connected, and willing to mentor our teams that get spun out from the School of Medicine and everywhere else. So it's just this sort of culture of integration and collaboration, and just really caring about It's about people.

Yeah. What I've noticed too is you guys have really ramped up, and I'm gonna give a shout out to Jean, who's in the room with us, but you've ramped up your PR for these people you partner with and invest in.

Yeah.

Like, you have a whole initiative around bringing attention to them for future investment, for business opportunities, for that kind of stuff. And that's something that I've seen the Institute start in like the last year.

Yeah.

And it's really nice to see like your social presence, the pieces you're doing are just incredible.

Well, thank you. We appreciate you saying that. You know, I mean, at the end of the day, our job is not to just fund them. It is also to help them to connect for their next round and to support their development to grow and scale. And so we're trying to be very well connected and help them in very intentional ways to do that. So it was really important for us to be able to tell the story, but also investors like to understand really early on who they are, you know, what work's being done, are they doing some compelling science, are they coachable? And we really help them through these programs to develop their skills to be able to answer the investor's questions. investor questions, build a team, and sometimes maybe even find the right CEO to lead it because we've got these rockstar faculty who, they're doing all kinds of things.

And they often don't want to be a CEO.

That's right. That's right. And they're lifelong scientists or physicians and love that work and want to mentor the next generation of physicians and doctors. And so, so we're doing our part to kind of go out there and bring people back to us with the technology and work with these great physicians to develop these companies.

I want to talk a little more now about the investment, because obviously the Tulane Venture Fund cannot do it all on their own. What are some of the strategies you have to get other necessary levels of funding, and how do you attract the rest or teach people how to get the rest of the funding they need to move these companies forward?

Well, let me take it in a couple parts here, and the first part is our companies have to be the best they can be, right? And so to make sure that they're telling a compelling story about their science, that they understand what a pitch looks like, how to develop an appropriate advisory board, these are just some of the components. But not every company is an investable company. Not every company is a venture-backed company. So helping them to understand that and laying that And so, that groundwork is really important to us. This is not going to sound very sexy, but we created a startup guide, and there's an inventor checklist, and there's a startup checklist.

It's simple, right? It's like, but it's putting it all together in a way that's digestible. Right.

It's a roadmap. It's a roadmap. And if you've never done it before, there's a lot of technical things to know, and there's a lot of business things to know. And so, it gives them the opportunity to kind of flip through and say, oh, that's why that has to work that way. And we surround them by the right people, usually people that have been there and done that, that can help guide them along the way. And then we offer them little, we'll just call it competitive funding, some non-dilutive, to help validate and de-risk the technology through different stages. In this world, we call them technology readiness levels. And so how de-risked are they? Do they know the regulatory process?

Do they know there is a regulatory process? That's a good start, right?

Oh, yeah, right, right. And so, these are all the building blocks. And so, we try to, in informal ways and formal ways, to get them there. Not everybody can sit in a classroom all day and learn all these technical aspects. And so, it's interesting how we're reaching them and touching them and giving them opportunities to do that. One of our favorite events that we're partnered with the School of Medicine on is our open mic night, Medical Innovation Challenge. And so, it's great.

I love it.

We were like, not sure how this might work when we first started. Is anybody going to show up? There's so much to do at once.

A lot of people showed up.

Right. And so, you get all these people pitching their ideas and the excitement around that. I mean, they just put a 3-minute pitch together on their concept, but the excitement personally validates them as humans to say, I want to go do that. I met the most cool people at that event and I got the greatest feedback from that panel. What's my next step? And part Part of it is creating momentum and enthusiasm for— doing deep technology startups is hard, and it's risky, and people have to find that space and not be risk-averse. And in a world that has a set of challenges all on its own, they have to be inspired to do it. And so part of our job is to just let them know they have a safe space for doing it, they have access to resources, and they have access to people in our community that care about the development of that. And if we can keep lining, you know, shots on goal, we're gonna win here in New Orleans.

And that community is a nice support network that you've built for them, which is really nice. 'Cause a lot of times people will quit because they just don't have sounding boards.

Yeah.

People to prop them up. It's lonely. Yeah, it is.

Doing something—

And you made it not lonely.

Right.

Which is great.

Look at me.

I know, right?

Look, Mom, no hands. No, you know, it is, it's a very lonely thing when you're trying to do something that's blue ocean or, or people tell you that you can't do it or that, you know, that's a crazy idea. Why don't you just go do that? Because that's a sure thing. The American dream is really about the possibilities and, My family are immigrants here, and coming here back in the day and getting access to education and getting access to resources really develops the human spirit.

Well, and you mentioned that it's hard to do this, but it's also really hard to get grant opportunities, grant funding. You've done this, and you referenced earlier being successful. Could you tell us a little bit more about your plans for how you're going to go out and get additional, perhaps, funding, grant funding to grow the fund, grow the institute's programs? What are you looking at?

Well, like a true entrepreneur, I have got multiple—

All the irons in the fire.

Yeah, multiple irons in the fire because, you know, you have to. Ultimately, tomorrow is not promised. And I think we've assembled a talented team. Recently, we organized around an EDA grant to create opportunities from here all the way to Baton Rouge to Lafayette and have our own bio tech corridor type thing, and that means partnering with others. It means sometimes following instead of leading, but organizing around big ideas to be able to get grants that are meaningful for our region is a powerful way to say we win together. The state of Louisiana is a smaller state from a population standpoint, so we have to sort of cobble things together to have volume. And so I'm excited about working with others on things like that. I believe that one was a $10 million grant. We're still waiting to hear about that. But we try to build a narrative that creates larger strategy. And one of the exciting things about that particular one is we got the state to step up and help to fund undiluted capital for startups.

Oh, wow.

First time ever. And I said to the folks at the LED, not to put you on the spot, but—

But—

But, right? And so we're going to hear back. And I told them, regardless of whether or not this is funded, because it's competitive and we're always competing Texas for EDH grants.

We should still do it, yeah.

Right, we should still be doing it. And it's got, you know, a great structure and it just helps to build the story around opportunity. The other idea really is to lean in on our alums, right? And so I'm gonna say it again, they are the X factor. I've worked at 3 different universities and we have special people that have graduated Tulane.

So for our alums who are listening to this, if you wanna help, you know, get in touch with Dr. Graham.

That's right, we're calling. But we're doing these roadshows and we tested it We've got alums that host us in these different cities. We did one in Chicago. Coming up in a couple weeks, we're going to New York City. And one of the Tulane board members, actually 2 of them, were so excited about our work and the fact that we've gotten some traction that they're hosting us. And they invited all their venture friends in New York. And we're bringing BioFoundry and Chandler up there to do the 3-minute pitches that we help them to really mastermind. And, you know, so we're bringing them and just kind of informing them formally talking about that and seeing if folks are interested in, in us creating another fund. I will say they are. And so being limited partners and things like that. So life sciences and, and biotech is expensive. And so we do need to be thinking about what the next steps are for our companies to be able to stay here.

When you get back from New York, we'll have to do a whole Side Theater podcast about what you saw and what I've seen recently.

Yeah.

Compare and contrast. That'll be fun.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But I feel like we're off to the races. We're doing some great things with this fund and our, and our leadership is so open to that, which is—

And supportive. Like, this is a presidential initiative, which is unusual.

That's right. It is. It's unusual for them to be as progressive in thinking about venture funding and how we might be doing that in support of lots of other activities around this downtown campus.

Yeah.

So shout out to President Mike Fitz for his vision behind this and creating it and supporting it and continue to support it. It's really nice to see because it really does resonate throughout the institution when the president says, That's right.

We love ourselves some Mike Fitz.

All right, so before we wind up today, I want to ask what advice you would give to Tulane students, faculty, alumni who want to get involved in entrepreneurship, whether that be in sectors of healthcare, AI, and climate like we talked about, or anything else. Like, what do they do?

Gosh, well, just keep it simple. We have an idea bank. You know, just look at our website and just, you know, it's like your name, your email address, and what's your idea? And somebody from my team will reach out to you. That's really a low-hanging fruit. hurdle. But beyond that, leverage your local network. We have a number of entrepreneur support organizations that are great, and each one of us focuses on a different thing. We all work together. We put this event together, New Orleans Entrepreneurship Week, and it's a great time to celebrate innovators and entrepreneurs, and you get to meet amazing people.

And you do a whole innovation day at that, right?

That's right. Tulane Innovation Day. The other thing is engage in interdisciplinary learning. What we see is innovation happens at the crossroads of people that are really smart in a discipline, and they come together, and they problem-solve. And so, any chance you get to go into different labs or meet different people that have different skills, and maybe you don't speak their language, but you try to understand what their biggest challenges are and come together, it goes a long way. And then engage with your alumni. We have so many alumni that want to give back just because of our motto.

Yeah.

They will do anything. I mean, I mean, one of our startups that we created, Rani Brooks, we engaged Alan Kollawick. I'll call him out. Medical doctor, became a venture guy out in San Francisco, said he wanted to give back and help us start our fellows program, which Rani was one of our first beneficiaries. So we paid him to get his startup going, right, as a fellow. And we had all these milestones he had to achieve. The long and short of it it was. He did that. And Alan was like, okay, I think I need to step down as a mentor because I want to invest in him. And so these—

Perfect. That's what you want. These are the things—

engage in your alumni groups. And when we go visit or do roadshows or, right, it's the know-how and the willingness to help you. Those waters are very deep here at Tulane.

Yeah. Well, I want to thank you so much for taking time because I know you're swamped. You are pulled in all directions to all campuses and all around the state now, much less the to do things.

I love it.

And making time for this, I think it'll help get the word out. I want to tell folks, like, reach out to you guys, fill out that Idea Bank, get in touch with the Institute. They're really easy. Or, you know, find Kimberly at TRICS, our Tulane Research Innovation and Creativity Summit coming up. And when, when is that? I— it's coming up soon, right?

That's April.

April.

Yes, early April, April 8th through the 10th.

Perfect. And then we also have NOEI, which is before TRICS, right?

New Orleans Entrepreneurship Week.

And you'll be at that.

And Tulane Innovation Day is March 27th.

Perfect.

We got that. And then Kimberly is always at Bio on the Bayou, one of our favorite things in October. She and her team are always there making a presence where we pull in people from the Gulf South and highlight our biotech science.

Love it.

And you can reach out to her, find her. As always, we're going to have her contact info, links to the TYI, the venture fund, everything she's talked about. Our amazing producer Ian always finds all this and gets it in the notes. It looks fabulous. It looks like Elaine and I do a lot of work, and it's all Ian's. We always give him a shout out.

Thanks, Ian. Appreciate it.

Thanks, Ian. I want to encourage everyone, please read the show notes this time. This is such an incredible asset for Tulane, for the city of New Orleans, for the region, and honestly beyond, because for folks who want to engage here, you're the front door to the region and they can do that through you. And it's a really easy way to make it happen.

Thank you, James. You're amazing. Appreciate you.

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