#3 Intelligent Founder: Fran Guillén, General Manager & Investor of Plus Vitech

Hey there. Welcome to the Intelligent Founder podcast. We're here to chat with some super intelligent and savvy entrepreneurs and business leaders who have built amazing companies using their big brains and strategic think. Hello again. Today I am really happy to meet with my good friend Fran Yen. He's a general manager and investor of Plus White Tech Home and a Spain based company developing treatment for cancer. Fran is a computer Engineer and has 15 years of experience launching and developing amazing projects. And recently Fran has published his book called Paso do Gigante. Sorry for my Spanish, a fable about entrepreneurship. France has won the biggest hackathon in history called EU versus Virus organized by the European Commission as well as he is the winner of the startup competition of the World Business Angel Investment Forum in 2020. By the way, today he is a senator and my colleague in World Business Angel Investment Forum. As a serial entrepreneur, Fran has founded several companies throughout his life and currently he is the director of impulsesave, a business accelerator program in Spain. Fran is the author of the podcast Accelerating the Impressors and also an advisor and investor in several startups like Opposite, Taurus, Brio, Argo, Agro Incrementa and more. So please meet Fran.

Hello.

Hi. Hello Fran. Good to see you. Good to have you on my podcast. Thank you very much. Thank you for your coming here because it's amazing. I know how you are a busy guy, but I like to talk to you all the time. I like how you smile. So talking to you just improve lives and create excitement. Thank you very much Fran for coming to my podcast.

It's a total pleasure, thank you very much. Leon, my friend, it's a real dream to talk with you and to talk with about these kind of things, these kind of projects that make life like an exciting flavor, amazing.

As I understand. We will talk today about your new company that you joined and I'm just interested. You manage accelerator, you have, you invested, you have several startups and suddenly you somehow entered into startups like a general manager and start to manage startup which you invested in. I know another guy, Elon Musk did the same. So tell us more, tell me more. How did it happen?

Yeah, sure, yeah. Leona asked. You know, this bread changed my life because I'm a serial entrepreneur, investor and all these kind of things. But like five years ago I met one guy, medical doctor, physician that told me a story in a winter night, very cold in Sevilla in Spain that the. Yeah. Break the all the barriers in my head. I want to what can be done in the health sector because this guy discovered and that told me that night discovered one particular treatment that is currently approved, but not for cancer disease. And he discovered how to use for cancer in a spectacular way with a. Yeah. Cases in advanced stages that are like a miracles. Okay. So from that moment I said, oh my God. I had to make a decision now because with this information that came to me, you only have two choice. So say hey, okay, good luck, but I'm still part of the problem or okay, I'm going to try to help you with all of my capabilities, you know. So I started investing help to collect other investors, friends, businesses, angels, some funds and of course helping with the management part because you know, normally physicians, doctors are you know, really, really good in science. But the business part is another thing. Okay. They have to be careful. And so. And that's my role here and today talking with you. It's a pleasure to transmit this information to other people. And let's see if they can help us also in this mission. That is really exciting.

Wow, Fantastic. So as I understand you joined this company and what did make you so much excited at this company? I know you plan to make some presentation and today you are behind raising new rounds for this company. But really what did make excited?

Sure. I think to be honest, this is like some thoughts that previously I share with other people when they also this information, this project. Because at the end of the day we are humans. So cancer is so terrible. We in some way or another experienced some bad processes with cancer with families or friends. So when I met him and he told me that kind of things, the first step. Wow. I think I met that night I told my wife very late at night. But I came home to say, wow, I think I met the guy how to cure cancer. You know, it's like, you know, maybe it's like too much, you know, but it's the first thought that you have or maybe maybe in the future I have cancer or some of my relatives. So at least I have the phone number, you know, so was like, oh my God, this is something unique. And then of course I saw the evidences. Okay, so I'm not an expert, by the way, I'm not a scientist, I'm not a. But only engineer. But I have a lot of friends that are in science. Actually my sister is a doctor in biotechnology. So I presented the evidences to her. And with those particular evidences, even in humans is something that you can't say at least I couldn't say no. So that's for me the reason behind all of this.

Thank you. Okay. So I'm eager to learn about your company. So could you share the screen and give some presentation pitch? You name it, yeah.

So do you know that one out of three people, one out of three people will suffer from cancer? According to the World Health Organization, it's terrible because not only general cancer, we are talking specifically lung cancer. More than 2 million people suffer from lung cancer every year. And only 80% of them, less than 20% of them survive. Clearly that is because current treatments are not enough and not effective in the long term for several types of cancer and also because they have dangerous side effects. You all know about chemotherapy, of course, surgery and radio. But chemotherapy, current rats are very toxic. And yeah, so it's a terrible problem. So in this lung cancer area, almost all the majority of the lung cancers are specifically non small cell lung cancer. And the current drugs for this type of cancer are not enough. As I said, chemotherapy and even immunotherapy are not good enough because they are not effective and also toxic. Okay, so the quality of life patients are not so good. Okay, but then as I said before, my partner, Dr. Vicente Salinas, discovered working hospitals for 20 years, he discovered that we can use a mechanism of action, we call this PPT1 drug to affect this mechanism of action. And this like here, this is a very simplified scheme. But this is the tumor cell that have a specific receptor called Neuroining1. And this receptor is over activated when the tumor grow. Our tumor is growing. It's very, very activated, very intensive with the, that is activated. But the idea here is to block this receptor with an antagonist. Okay. We used an antagonist called a prepitant. It's a well known antiemetic, but is antiemetic use only. So now it's approved only as a side effect treatment for chemotherapy. You know, treatment side effects is like a nausea, vomiting and this kind of things. So this is antiemetic and it's not approved for cancer treatment, only for the side effects of the chemo. So it's, it's funny because we use a drug to treat cancer that isn't only approved to the side effects of the other cancer treatments, but the things that it works, it works. We need much higher dose and specific ways to deliver this drug to the patients. But the results are really amazing. So we are repurposing this drug, it's an oral drug, by the way, to treat cancer. And this drug is already approved in the fda, ema, other regulatory agencies as a low dose antimetic. But as I said, we are repositioning much higher Dose for cancer with a specific pathway called 505B2 that is accelerated procedure for this kind of treatment. And the effects are amazing. These are only two examples of results that we have in vitro at the left and in vivo at the right with mice. And the reductions you can see is huge. But we are not only talk about results in vitro or in vivo, but also we talk about results in humans. And this is a specific case of a terminal non small cell lung cancer patient, stage four. So it's last stage, with no other options for him. And you can see the big tumor in the left gland. And at the only four months with our treatment, we have a complete remission with this patient, which is only the scarf. And this patient is still alive. So we have results in humans because we can deliver the current drug to this patient in off label treatments. Off label composite we use. And not only in lung cancer, also in breast cancer and other types are really effective even in metastasis stages.

So.

All is good news. But we still need something. Why? Because we need a new formulation. The formulation that is currently approved is not enough for cancer treatment in a proper way, okay? Because it has a low bioavailability profile and proper pharmacosynetics. So you need too many capsules, an insane amount of capsules every day to treat these patients properly. So no agency going to approve that. No, it's not affordable. It's crazy. So we need a new one. But the problem is that the characteristic of the API of the principle is ingredient is too much complex to formulate better than the current version. So we've been talking with a lot of formulation experts worldwide and no one could develop a better formulation that they currently approve and in the market. So because we need a more efficacy drug, you know, so after years talking with them, trying to experiment the most advanced technologies, no one could do that until last year. Last year, November, we met a company are really specialists in nanotechnology. And with nanotechnology we can reduce the sample, reduce the molecules and the drug is much more effective. And you can deliver much more quantity of drug, more dose in the same capsule format. So that's really, really good news in two ways. Because we can deliver the drug in a much better way than the current form. And the regulator is going to see much better to approve that. But also at the same time protects better what we have done, okay? Because not only we have the patents for indication for this kind of tumors, but also we have the formulation patents and also its trade secrets. So we have the methods of Reuse and also the new composition. And also. But not today. We'll take another 20 minutes for this. We have developed a companion diagnosis test with liquid samples, liquid biosip to test if by blood the evolution of the treatment and the evolution of the patient.

Okay.

So we can adjust how they the physicians with a software platform that we have developed to adjust the quantity of drug that you need in every stage of the treatment and every depending of the tumor, depending of the patient. The biomarkers that we have in this companion diagnosis test at the software platform based on our past evidences with our treatments, of course we have a freedom to operate by our patent attorneys from London, one of the best in Europe for biotech companies called J Camp. And now we are running a phase 2 clinical trial. We are running a phase 3 clinical trial in Turkey with prestigious Turkish hospitals with 24 terminal non small cell lung cancer patients. As I said, is the most typical lung cancer and they are terminal. So it's the last stage. Because this treatment is so effective that we can position it in the last stages. That's a very, very interesting opportunity in the sense of business and also for patients with two prestigious TD research organizations are in Turkey and also in Spain supervising all the process. The business model here is typical. Like other startups in pharma industry and biotech licensing and partnership to Avid Pharma we have the best experts that we know. Very, very well known in Europe for this kind of deals is Dr. John Lander. Joined the company several months ago, worked like 15 years in Roche in oncology and also pharma and make like thousands of deals with the startups with this kind of technologies. Now it's starting to explore possible licensing agreements because his opinion we can do that in the next year or less than two years. So we are very near his opinion to that huge success as an upfront plus royalties agreement. And it's also a very good opportunity for investors because we can have a window to exit very, very soon. As I said, less than two years. As you know, the deals in cancer are huge in terms of small molecules that examples of Pfizer and Roche acquisitions and licenses upfront and projected deal values are mind blowing. But let's pass this information. This is an exit case. Also a very, very interesting case of a company from Sutherland that repositioned a traditional drug called Plarimidine and also an oral drug, but they repurposed for rare disease and they reach phase two trial that we are. And then after one year the company was sold to Merc. So it's also a huge success. A comparable case that we said in the business startup world. So until now we receive it, we have received like about 3 millions then between private investors and also grants and public funding, financing. The company was launched like 10 years ago. A lot of experiments and patents were down in that period and now we are running a phase to clinical trial, as I said. And at the same time we are developing the NEO formulation with nanotechnology and the companion diagnostic test. And with this information, as I said, our advisor is pretty sure that we can have a very good deal licensing that and going to the next stage with the help of a big pharma company or even selling all this technology to them and then call them, they they gonna go ahead alone. The team is fantastic. But what can I say? We have a company based in Spain, but also a subsidiary company in Boston, Delaware and the headquarters in Boston companies in Delaware, typical structure. Vicente Salinas is here, the founder. I'm medical doctor, specialist in pathology in cancer and also I have a background of a serial entrepreneur, angel investors. Wef that you mentioned. Carmel Lara is also the manager of the company. Maria, Ph.D. in biotechnology, in vitro, in vivo and diagnostic techniques. A Guillermo CFO with a lot of experience in finance. Diego physician took. We have a very good team. But for me the most exciting part of this screen is the advisory boards and the pioneers that we have. Gary, Gary Sigler by the way, is one of them. Is the former vice president of the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. And you know, it's the most important institution of cancer in the world. Also Sahil Lasse from Turkey is an oncology, very well, very well known former MD Anderson in the policy world. We have also Prussian Misla, National Gas Institute and Jarrett and Roch Tatiana work for more than 10 years for Novartis executive. Also the former director of innovation, Roche Diagnostics in Spain. So it's a lot of people that really, really endorse this technology and these projects. I'm really, really happy, helpful, thankful to them on that. And also at the same time we have very, very good partners from all over the world in terms of CROs scientific, regulatory and legal patents. But I have to say that this year we won the most important accelerators in biotech in Europe, in Spain called Access Health. And also we just entered in the program of Mass Challenge accelerated one of the most important ones in Boston, future developments. Of course, as I said, we have this precision medicine system. It's a complementary technology, it's not the main project. The new formulation of the drug approved for cancer. But this is a very good way to complement that for helping physicians day to day. And also of course we are still looking for ways to accelerate the project to go in parallel with a pipeline of breast cancer, lymphoma, osteosarcoma, other treatments that we have pretty good evidences of effectiveness, even human patients too. So that is in a nutshell the project Leon and some I contact details. So you can have any questions can write me or send me an email. We are now rising a new investment run by the way to go for this next 12 years with these final steps of the Phase 2 trial and the nanotechnology new formulation. And after that, as I said, we probably have a window to exit for the investors pretty soon.

Wow. Fantastic. Fantastic. So amazing lineup of. Amazing lineup of professionals I see there. That's something really. Thank you.

I think so too.

Yeah.

Took a lot of years to convince some very good people because they are very busy people and a lot of projects are. They received a lot of proposals but we are very happy.

Let me add some better. So today you are focusing on one of the most aggressive cancers, lung cancer. And you are going to make the drug specifically for this. And what kind of risks investor could expect hacked because you are in the middle of beginning of phase two and it's not approved yet. So what kind of risks we can expect?

Very good question. Le. A lot of things could happen in a company, in a startup, as you know, but I think this particular situation we are in a pretty.

I don't.

Know if safe is the word, but it's not too risky position at other companies in this sector, you know, because pharma and biotech normally don't have market risk, you know, because if you have something that really cures cancer or any other disease, or even not cure or only improves in a way you don't have probably any market risk if you have the proper chance and a big pharma behind you, this kind of things. Of course it's much more difficult if you go alone. But it's not a demand problem. It's the most common problem in other startups in other sectors, not in health normally. So that's not the case here. Of course the case of risk is about the results of this phase two trial and the success in the formulation, in the new formulation. But for that I have two answers. They're pretty straightforward for me. One is that we have done this before in terms of effectiveness. This phase two is to prove the effectiveness in a proper way. Clinical trial Environment way, regulatory, official way. But we have done before with people that suffer from this. Exactly. Profile, tumor and stage. So it's not like when you are trying to launch something from scratch. When you are trying to approve a peptide or a drug. That's the first time in the historian somebody took it. Okay. So we have these evidence so we know what's gonna happen.

Okay.

Because we tried before. Okay. So for me that's the answer for the effectiveness risk. And the other part is the nanotechnology. Actually, I'm pretty sure that this is the greatest way in history that no one couldn't develop something like that. We found the old expert opinions set and we have simulations that are really encouraging.

Okay.

So they are very, very good at what we are. And they only did that. They do that only in. In one facilities in the world, one country in Europe. And they are all patented and trade secret protect. Okay. So I think that they are very low risk in that two sense. But of course you are such. You are right. All the products are some kind of risk. We are not in the market yet. All the companies in start mode. But it's not normal. If I can say that one company alone with the money that we had rise in Spain reached so advanced point in development of a new treatment. So as I said again, I think the next few months and even next year gonna be very, very exciting in terms of possible exit and a success of the company.

What have you talked with all your potential customers? What's their feedback?

Well, the potential customers you are saying about big.

Big pharma.

Big pharma. Okay, okay. I was thinking more about patients or physicians. Yeah, yeah. We have a letter of interest of some of them. We talk with them in the past, but we took it alone. Okay. So it's not the proper way to go. But still have a very very. I'm very exciting excited about this. We. This process was like two, three years ago. And now we are restarting this process, but with professionals. Okay. That's like why we would be. We count with this expert, Josh Lander. As I said, he's very, very optimistic about the situation of the company. Even if we don't go so far with this next one, two year is still enough. He said if we have some evidence in these first patients this POC of the nanotechnology formulation. So yeah, I think that Josh said that normally he received like one or two calls per week from big variables asking for new products in oncology. Because you know, the pipelines of the companies that are public are crazy race you know, they have to always present new things to, you know, to maintain the position in the stock market. So yeah, I think that they have generally very, very good interest in this kind of treatments. It's not my opinion, it's the opinion of one guy that made dozens of deals like this. This is really, really good opportunity. And as I said, some of them we touched these contacts years ago and very interested. But of course they in that moment ask for more data, more information. Now we are starting to this point interest.

Very nice. Now we're going to wrap up soon. Could you just remind in couple of sentences just in one minute all our audience, just very briefly, exactly like elevator pitch. Could you make it?

Sure, yeah. Plasmatic is repurposing a drug for cancer treatment in lat stage. We have evidences of effectiveness of total remission in very difficult cases in humans. We are developing a new formulation and a phase 2 clinical trial that could make an exit in the next two years for investors.

Wow, amazing. So it looks like amazing opportunity for investors because you are quite advanced. At the same time you still approximately low valuation. And I consider this like amazing opportunity. Thank you Fran. So we, we were happy to meet with Fran, union general manager, one of the most advanced and in each stage most advanced pharmaceutical company startup. And thank you Fran. Thank you, thank you very much. Hope and I wish you, I wish you huge success because I think this is what I doing is I don't know you can help so many people. That's amazing. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much again, very, very exciting talk with you again. I'm more than happy to explain or to meet people that can help us in one way or other to save patients from this terrible.

Yes, thank you, thank you.