This Week in San Diego Tech News - July 8, 2024

Hey, how's it going everyone? Good to be back with you. Neil Bloom and Fred Greer from this week in Senior Tech News. Thanks for tuning in. Hey Fred, how you doing?

Hey Neil. I'm doing pretty great. How about yourself?

Doing great as well too. Thank you very much. How was your fourth of July? Did you have a good one?

Yeah, stayed in San Diego, America's finest city. It was a lot of people traveling into San Diego to spend 4th of July here. I got a chance to check out the fireworks near ucsd. How about yourself?

Nice. Yeah, I had a good one as well. More active than usual. I got a little small town feel parade that I watched midday and then by night joined some friends on a boat in San Diego Bay to watch the big bay boom fireworks from the water. So. Which was super fun. So yeah, America's finest city holds up to its name, that's for sure. And now like summer just kicked up a knot all the way to 11. We're like deep into summer. I feel like the fair coming to an end. It's hot, we're in the pool, we're in the ocean and some people are on vacation. I definitely feel like you're getting a significant amount of people's out of office now being like I'm on vacation, which I'm kind of happy for. Like people are out doing the summer as they should and you know, there's the other people who are busy working but probably will be out next month, so. So is that what you're feeling too? Some people out, some people in working.

Yeah. So I'm writing a few stories and a few people are, are taking vacations and it's definitely still busy, time would say. But yeah, definitely vacation is full effect in San Diego.

Yeah. Well, let's dive into some of these, some of the news here.

Startups get the party, Startups get the party started. Startups get the party Startups get the party started.

You want tech and tacos, Tacos and tech, you know we got tacos and tech is on SM for the green guacamole keeper Countins counting beans Contador quentan frijoles found us tryna raise some queso la vida San Diego school of rappy rapping fire tortillas round jalapenos in these modern times a craft beer and coffee My coding yoga posse fold the body origami we be surfing coronado eating tacos El gordo the tacos stand in puesto lucha libre and sombrero got a shout out to cost angels by the ocean Watch the sunset entrepreneurs trying to get funded when San Diego Startup Week is popping in the summer. Oceanside, the Tijuana SD be full of hustlers from couch surfing to penthouses right on the beach. Tech leaders who believe stars are within reach. We interview and founders who be shooting for the moon. SD TechOS with your host, Neil Bloom. Come on.

Startups get the party. Startups get the party started.

Welcome to the Tacos and Tech podcast where we interview tech leaders in the San Diego tech ecosystem. We also read the latest tech news on this Week in San Diego Tech News. Follow us and subscribe online to your favorite podcast network. Well, let's dive into some of these, some of the news here because we got a mix here, as always, of big bio, small bio, big tech, and small tech. And by the way, I'm going to start using the, I think it's small tech is the way that Andreessen Horowitz just put out an article talking about the difference between kind of startup and big enterprise. They call it big tech and small tech. And I'll actually link to that article that Mark Andreessen put out, kind of using a nomenclature around that. But anyway, let's dive into some of the news here of kind of biotech. Big bio meets startup bio actually is kind of a cool story here about Eli Lilly, Pfizer and J and J. You want to take us through this first story?

Yeah. So the headline is from the Union Tribune, written by Natalie Rocha. Here's why Eli Lilly, Pfizer and Johnson Johnson are in San Diego looking for the next big drug. It's a pretty great piece. I recommend checking it out, but essentially highlights that, you know, big pharma companies are investing in creating new accelerator programs to, you know, startup companies that they can eventually acquire or partner with. I've had a chance to write about Eli Lilly most recently about their Gateway program where they're looking to fund, I think 10 to 12 companies in the next two to three years and there will provide them with mentorship and resources to get their companies off the ground. But I think, you know, the signal here is that San Diego has a strong life science presence. We're number three behind Boston and San Francisco. And these accelerator programs are great for the ecosystem because they help start companies and connect them to potential partnerships and investment opportunities.

Did you get to tour Eli this place?

Yeah, I got the tour Eli Lily's corporate location. They're not building, they haven't finished building where the, the gateway labs will be yet. I think it's to be Constructed at the end of this year but I see rendering and that's actually ever rendering in the article. Highly recommend looking at that. It's a pretty cool, pretty cool space once it's completed. That's cool.

Yeah the story is actually goes back a bit JLabs or Johnson and Johnson's startup incubator meets co working space. Jansen Labs or JLabs I believe Sandig was the very first one that is now a global platform of kind of this cowork meets co lab co incubator kind of space. I feel like they are the first to kind of break the the recent mold in San Diego and now you see these other companies kind of taking cue from it. You've also seen a bunch of other style of like maybe non big bio but these co lab spaces like Bio Labs and Grad Alexandria's Grad Labs and there's the other one I'm lab Fellows which is kind of like a platform for hire to build out your co lab co working space that UCSD has actually taken them on. So it's really cool to see the density happening where you're a startup founder in the bio space and you have a variety of places you can go and start actually another one Aquilius, a brand new spot here out in Rancho Bernardo also offering incubation co working co lab space. So there's a lot of different flavors here but to see the strategic big bio get behind it. Eli Lilly, Pfizer and J and J is super smart because they get an inside look on who is working on these stuff anyway you'd be working on it at a lab. Might as well be inside the premise where we can get to know you and help you and it's, it's mutually beneficial. So this is great to see. I hope this spills over more into the the tech world as well too. So good one here on you Fred and Natalie for both covering this. Want to take us into our next story?

Yes, our next one is kind of a tech tech company. They've been around for I think some time now, 2014. The company's called Liquid Instruments. The Sandal Business Journal wrote an article about them closing a $12 million investment round. I remember writing about them back in their Series A when local investor Anzu Partners let their Series A round. That was 8 million series series series A funding. And you know for for this company they're a battery tech company and seems like they're using this funding to expand into international markets including Australia. San Diego is has you know not only Just tech, but like, you know, hard tech, including electric batteries. I think we're talking about another company later today about electric, you know, electric companies. And so yeah, it's just great to see another company, you know, raise funding and find continued success.

Yeah, this is a really interesting part of the battery space. This is the diagnostic side so you can test your batteries to determine, you know, what's the health status of them, which is equally part of the market. Especially something that I've learned a bit is that batteries for specific use cases aren't all the same. Meaning maybe car batteries are only good until they have maybe 90 life. They're no longer good in a car, but they can have a second life and a third life. The only way to know that is to know your ongoing healthier battery. And that's not something we're used to in the car battery world at all. I don't know how many years I got left on my battery right now. But in lithium ion and these follow ons, there actually is a way to do it and it looks like liquid instruments. Sorry is that. And it's great to see Anzu Partners local investor getting in on a local deal. We love hearing that. Take us through a CPC CPG company. Consumer Packaged Goods Carlsbad, North County. Kind of the place to be it seems like these days for a consumer packaged goods product, especially apparel. What do you know about Huega House hats?

Yeah, so he got House or Huega House just basically has a hit with consumers. The Business Runner did a piece on them. They basically doubled the revenue up from half a million to now almost a million dollars for 2024. San Diego is home to several consumer companies, Viewer clothing, blenders. Hugo House is a pretty cool company. They've, you know, leveraged the power of social media partner with celebrities and they're finding some success. And they started with $10,000 and bootstrapped it by the two owners, Jonathan Ruly and Jake Ryan. Carlsbad Co. Super cool. Going to be keeping a close watch on them.

Yeah, it's definitely keep a close watch on them, especially because of this clustering of apparel. I mean you got Vori based there, you got Prana, you got all these golf companies, you've got the legacy surf brands and Spy eyewear all right there in North County. And in Solana beach you got San Diego Sports Innovators which is like this incubator for sports innovation companies too. Really cool to see this. And I'm excited to check out the hats because I could always use another hat. You see Me, I pretty much wear a hat every day and I love actually unbranded hats as well. So shout out to the companies making those for us. Let's dive back to battery. Maybe we should have organized these better because the next few stories are going to be battery tech or clean tech. Aptera, another Carlsbad company, has long been known to be building this three wheeled vehicle, all electric vehicle. And what's unique about them is they actually have covered the vehicle in solar panels. Well, they've got a whole IP platform around the solar panel aspect, designing it into products. And They've monetized this IP portfolio, licensing it for $130 million already to bring these solar panels into other products, including a trailer that's been built just to be pulled by the Aptera three wheeler, which is pretty cool. Check out the SD Business Journal article to see a trailer that's designed for almost like this indoor motorcycle meets, you know, with a trailer behind it as well as other like baggage and other devices that you would take on with you alongside your Aptera vehicle. So it's great to see the. Well one Aptera continues to need capital to finance its manufacturing, which it's sold. It's got a whole bunch of pre orders. I think it's tens of thousands if not maybe close to 100,000 pre orders. It's now got to deliver those vehicles which usually takes building out a factory factory which I think they're building in Carlsbad as well too. And therefore they're monetizing and getting more revenue out of that. So that makes sense there. It also makes sense to just see that and why wouldn't you want to be charging your own car on your roof if you can and not have to plug in? So it's super smart that they've built that in there. So pretty cool here. Do you know anything else more about Aptera that you want to share?

They raise some funding. They raise over 120 million. They have about 100 employees based in Carlsbad. They have an interesting founding story. I think they almost the company failed and the founders kind of re, re started the company and now they're, you know, finding continued success. So yeah, they're, they're a great company in San Diego.

Yeah. And actually I interviewed CEO, co CEO, there's steo Steven, Chris. I had Steve on the podcast but I haven't released the episode yet. So that will be coming out soon. And in fact the city of Carlsbad is hosting a clean Carlsbad, clean tech founders happy hour at aptera's office on July 29th. You can find a link in our show notes here. But we have found like we keep talking about a significant amount of clean tech, whether it's battery diagnostic, electric vehicle companies in Carlsbad. And so the city wants to gather those people together to get on a quarterly basis here. And speaking of another battery tech, Sonocharge, which is a UCSD spinout company in the battery tech space, raised an 8 and a half million dollar round and they are built and I believe it's a seed round I think is their first raise, first equity raise. They've done some grant funding and what's what's unique about sonarcharge is that they're actually a semiconductor platform technology that can enable batteries to last two to five times longer, can charge two times faster and actually be safer. And so this is all because of specifically the chipset that they're building here. On their website they say they're backed by Temasek, which is the Singapore sovereign wealth fund, Khosla Ventures, Calci and UC San Diego. So we there is an official article out yet. Maybe you'll see that soon on the Business of San Diego podcast by your own Fred Greer here. But this is a kind of inside scoop here that we're sharing about another battery tech cleaning tech company here in San Diego that's racing. Funny. Have you come across them in your UC San Diego days?

Yeah, I was actually looking up the CEO. Looks like she was a PhD at UCSD as a graduate researcher before spending off this company all the time. There's companies started by former UCSD alums and I'm not surprised that they've also received some grant funding and some funding from ucsd. So I definitely will be digging deeper and looking to do a story sometime in the near future.

Yeah. And I'm going to reach out to Ann CEO to invite her to that Carlsbad clean tech event. So this is how we make the community work. We promote what's happening and then we connect people to make sure that they're sharing notes here. Last story here. We love a good exit story if you will. An IPO coming on the market. It is Life Sciences, which is pretty much I feel like we've almost had one a month now this year, maybe at least a few in a row. And I know you're covering Life sciences right now for the business journal Take us through this new IPO coming up.

Yeah, so the headline was through Fierce Biotech and it was a son a Samuel company called Art of Bio Biotherapeutics they're looking go IP looking to IPO to fund their NK cell therapy. The article goes into detail, but essentially they had a partnership with Merck a few years ago where you know, they were gonna mark were gonna pay $30 million to this biotech company in San Diego to get, you know, about 2 off the shelf tumor cell therapies that fell through and now they're looking to go public to fund that new program. The CEO, I reached out to him, he actually can't comment right now because of the period of the filing. But I'm looking to have more details on this about ipo, you know, in the coming weeks.

Awesome. Love to see it. We've already shown that one the biotech market is hot right now. Whether it's fundings M and A ipos. Like it's just having a moment which is great. I hope tech can catch up soon. And related to that, I have been really enjoying listening to two podcasts talking about kind of the tech and SaaS market. One is Sasters podcast, so I'll link it here. They've got a good recent like what's happening in SaaS right now kind of comparing the IPO window and also the BG Squared podcast which is Bill Gurley and Brad Gerstner kind of do a weekly what's happening in in the investment world. I'll be honest, they're like all they're talking about is AI right now, which is okay, it's been like 11 weeks straight of like how excited they are about AI, which I get it, that's one side of the market. The other side of the market is what's happening in SaaS and tech, which is kind of the opposite of AI. So anyway, I'll link those here in the show notes just because it's fresh in my ears and every time I'm reading a biotech article I'm like great, where's our tech world right now as well too. So thanks for covering those Fred. We got some events coming up and as always find the full listing of the next few weeks worth of tech events happening in San Diego on the Social Coyote Shout out to leader of the pack Jonah Peak here and what's called you Jonah Hill for some reason. And I recently hung out at a few different coworking spaces. I hung out for half a day at Aquilius, which is we just mentioned kind of this co working co biolab space in Rancho Bernardo. They do a monthly symposium that will start linking here. They have a different topic each month, maybe One month it's agtech. One month it was psychedelic tech or psychedelic research. Another month it was cancer research. So anyway, we kind of talked about how do we get people to cowork that whole day so they can cowork and get work done in the morning, stay for the content in the afternoon. And I believe you should be seeing more events from them around that. So look for the Aquillius coworking community coworking days coming up and sdx which is this AI community in San Diego are now announcing publicly their events which some are private, some are like you know, small gathering of experts for say review of white papers. Others are community coworking days and I just hung out at their new space in Liberty Station. Fred, you should go hang out there too. So look out their, their spots. It's a cool old school like you know, I think it was the house that someone in the Navy was built for. I think maybe the head of the Navy's Liberty station presence 100 plus years ago. And now it's a split use between the Data Science alliance and sdx. So it's cool to have that under one roof there. Some events coming up. San Diego founders hike July 12th that is coming up this Friday bright and early come do it. I'm teasing out would anyone want to do a weekly, I don't know, I, I do it monthly. I could use some exercise every week. Anyway if you heard this, write me if that's of interest. Maybe it's a Friday hack. Some other events coming up and actually I'll personally be up in LA for B Capital's Founders dinner. So we hosted B Capital and LA Fund in San Diego a few weeks ago and now they've invited me and Fred invite up to you as well to come up and experience the LA tech scene. So that'll be a personal thing I'm up to in some of the portfolio companies from LA are joining us there and then some Carlsbad Tech events coming up and I just have these because I'm helping the city of Carlsbad organize these a little bit. July 16th is a tech so kind of more software focused founder gathering at Airspace Technologies office. They're a series D software company in the logistics tech space and they're opening their doors to invite everyone kind of in the local community to come see them. And then a few weeks later is the Carlsbad Clean Tech Founders event at Aptera Motors. So it'll be cool to come see where the offices, the headquarters of some of these, these later stage companies. So Come on out for those. Any other events on your radar, Fred, or what else you got going on?

I'm looking forward to the founder psych. I think two people reached out to me on LinkedIn asking if I was going to be there. So I look forward to reconnecting with the startup community and getting active and burning some calories at the same time.

Same. Yeah, there's been a few people who have asked to meet and I was like, hey, come, let's meet during the hike. So I've got pretty much got three time slots during the hike for me, so come grab me either on the, on the uphill, the top or the downhill. And let's, let's meet. If you've been trying to get a hold of me or Fred, make sure you come find us there because the summer is a great time to come see that. I'll probably jump in the water after as well too, which should be a good time as always. And really what we really enjoy is this time together with you, Fred, and the community giving us feedback on what they like hearing. So make sure you are following Fred on the business of San Diego Substack as well as reading him in recently in the San Diego Business Journal. Support local journalism through both. You can also find me on Talkers and tech podcast, fresh fru, tech.com and LinkedIn and X. And as always, thanks for the time. Thanks to all of you and thanks Fred.

Always a pleasure, Neil.

Cheers.

Startups get the party Startups get the party started.

You want tech and tacos. Tacos in tech you know we got tacos in tech is on smash for the green guacamole keeper Countins counting beans Contador Quentan Frijoles found us trying to raise some queso la vida San Diego school of rappy rapping fire tortillas round jalapenos in these modern times a craft beer and coffee My coding yoga posse fold the body origami we be surfing Coronado eating tacos el gordo the tacos in puesto lucha libre and sombrero Got a shout out to cost angels by the ocean Watch the sunset La Jolla shows entrepreneurs trying to get funded When San Diego Startup Week is popping in the summer Oceanside to Tijuana SD be full of hustlers from couch surfing to penthouses right on the beach Tech leaders who believe stars are within reach we interview and founders who be shooting for the Moon SD TechOS with your host, Neil Bloom Come on.

Startups get the party Startups get the party started Startups get the party? Startups get the party started? Startups get the party? Startups get the party started?

You want tech in tacos? Tacos in tech? You know we got it, hey?

Startups get the party? Startups get the party started? Startups get the party? Startups get the get the party started? Startups get the party? Startups get the party started?

You want tech and tacos? Tacos in tech? You know we got it, hey?