Business Of Biotech

BoB In South Florida: Raquel Cabo, Miami Biotech Collective

• Ben Comer • Episode 274

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The Business of Biotech is on location in Miami this week! For the first episode in this four-part series on the biotech scene in South Florida, Raquel Cabo, Founder and President of the Miami Biotech Collective, talks about her experiences as a member of the founding team at Ovid Therapeutics, why South Florida needed an organization to connect regional drug developers, what Miami offers to biotech companies and operators, and what gaps in the South Florida life sciences ecosystem still exist.  

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Ben Comer:

Welcome back to the Business of biotech. I'm your host, Ben Comer, Chief Editor at Life Science Leader, and today we're coming to you from Miami, Florida, for a series of episodes recorded on location at the offices of Catalyst Pharmaceuticals. For this series, we're speaking with some of the people operating their companies and organizations regionally here in the Sunshine State. And I can't think of a better way to kick things off than by talking with Raquel Cabo, who over the summer launched the Miami Biotech Collective, a community of executives shaping the future of biotech in South Florida. Raquel has worked in patient advocacy, global market access, commercial strategy, and corporate affairs, and was part of the founding team at Ovid Therapeutics. I'm excited to hear about what Raquel is building with the Miami Biotech Collective, what's unique about South Florida as an emerging hub for the life sciences, and what comes next. I wanted to ask you first a little bit about your background prior to launching the Miami Biotech Collective. You worked for nearly a decade at Ovid Therapeutics, and before that, you worked in market access at GE Healthcare. You also worked at Columbia University Medical Center as a project manager in Alzheimer's research. What drew you initially to life sciences?

Raquel Cabo:

So I it was a bit of a surprise to me that I ended up in life sciences. My career hasn't been necessarily linear. I grew up internationally. I lived in the Middle East, in Europe, and before moving to Miami in the 90s. And because of my experience of moving around and going to a lot of international schools, I initially thought I was going to be a diplomat. I went to university, I went to the University of Pennsylvania to study international relations, and I went in with that goal. And then one day I had to take a core, uh core curriculum class in um abnormal psychology, so like clinical psychology, and I was blown away. I was fascinated. And that changed my career trajectory completely from international relations, international relations to healthcare. And um I spent some time also at UPenn working uh with Dr. Seligman's lab in positive psychology. And from there I was completely hooked. So that's why I ended up at Columbia University Medical Center working at the Sergeywski Center, leading Alzheimer's disease grants, working for a neuropsychologist, because I have a multicultural background, Hispanic, lived internationally, I was drawn to some of the work that they were looking at there, where they were trying to understand cultural and ethnic differences in the way Alzheimer's was being diagnosed. So I did work with the Washington Heights community with African Americans,, and part of the work that I did there was um supporting the neurologists. As they as a volunteer at the memory disorders clinic, I served as an interpreter. So I would go around with a neurologist every week and um help him treat people from the community who were diagnosed with Alzheimer's, and and you know, they were accompanied by their caregivers. Um, and we saw a whole series of cases. And it was really very difficult to see that the neurologist, who was so passionate and he cared so much about his patients, after each visit, he was like left like deflated because there wasn't any real good treatment to help those the patients and the caregivers. There was no resources for the caregivers, and you could really see the broad impact of the can of the of the disease. Um, and so for me that that really like struck a chord with me. And I from that point I decided to want to think about how I can make an impact at a more macro level. Um, and I felt that industry was the perfect place to do that, where working in within industry, we would able to bring treatments to help those large unmet needs that we're seeing on a day-to-day basis at in the in the Free Memories Disorders Clinic or in the Huntington's disease clinic that I also was um helping serve as an interpreter. Um and you know, my hope was then to be able to be part of a group of a team or group of people that were being able to make a real difference.

Ben Comer:

Yeah. And then you went to GE Healthcare and were working, I believe, in market access, health economics and outcomes research. Um we just had um Rob Abbott, the CEO of iSport, uh, on the last episode of Business of Biotech, and he was really making the case about the importance of HEOR, not just for big pharma, but for smaller biotech, in particular um for kind of painting the picture for investors, actually using it as a as a tool to attract investors. That that's a side note. But I'm curious about how you know you got interested in that particular that specific field.

Raquel Cabo:

Yeah. So um so it goes back to like when I was at Columbia and I was looking at well how where how how should I get into industry? What's an area that I could make a difference in an area that's emerging that you work that combines um that really captures your ability to articulate the value and the benefit of a medicine. And at the time, so like this was just after the um financial crisis. There wasn't like a lot of, it was a kind of a new and emerging field, health economics. And I spoke with one of my mentors who um at the time was, you know, I think he might have been the CEO of Eli Lilly at the time, was a one of my um friend's fathers. He said to me, look, look into health economics. This is a field that has a growing impact, is highly relevant, but there aren't a lot of players in the space. So um I lived in Tin and it ticked a lot of the boxes where you're using data, evidence-based approaches to help build a value story and help substantiate the benefit of a product and also help companies think strategically around well, is this product really delivering some mini meaningful value, or is this just incremental innovation? Um and so I went to London, I did my master's at the London School of Economics in International Health Policy and Economics. So basically, the birthplace of health economics where you know we're nice and then AHS, and you see it implemented every single day decision-making for medicines. And um, so that was a really amazing learning experience for me. Um and I spent some time at Medtronic in Switzerland uh working in the European economics team, health economics team, um, applying those concepts to like how devices, implantable devices are being reimbursed and marketed in different European countries. Um, and then at G Healthcare, it was the same thing. And and the way it was used at G Healthcare was helping the sales teams market their products in a way that was more focused less on product attributes, but more on outcomes. Like what is what are the outcomes, what are the benefits of applying these products or using these products in your hospital systems? How are you helping patients stay out of the hospital, get out of the hospital faster, um, you know, improve and basically improve whether that's like the clinician's ability to treat and serve the patients or the patient's ability to recover and get out more quickly. Um, and and then um when I met Jeremy, you know, he's also one of those individuals who's visionary and sees ahead of the curve. And as a company at the time, there was probably less than 10 employees. Um, but he understood the value of looking at market access and health economics really early, pre-phase two, especially for an asset that was move uh moving into a space where there had been no drugs before. And um and we thought very carefully about how do we make sure that our the evidence we're generating and the evidence we're collecting are going to support access and get past, you know, um, and help position the company favorably. Once, you know, should a drug get approved, get past the second hurdle, which is reimbursement and access. And many times it's not just about getting reimbursed, but it's speed of reimbursement in the US. Um in Europe, it's a lot about it's where, what type of reimbursement are you going to be getting? And it comes down to um evidence, and that takes time. And so you need to start early.

Ben Comer:

No matter how innovative your product is, it's worthless if patient can't patients can't access it, right? Yeah. Um I mentioned uh at the top that you are part of uh the founding team of Ovid. Um, and I wanted to ask you about Jeremy Levin. Something something of a legend in the industry. Uh, what what was it like working with him? What did you learn from him? Let me ask that.

Raquel Cabo:

Oh, well, it's hard to answer in a short period of time. Jeremy is, you know, one of the most charismatic, authentic leaders you'll ever find. And that's immediately when I saw him speak at um FT conference, I saw that. And I was like, I want to work for him. Um so I handed him and um he hired me. Uh and and he's he is one of those people who generally truly wakes up every single day thinking about how am I gonna get patients these medicines to patients. It's not um, it's not fluff, it's real. And um he is business savvy, he understands the markets, he understands drug development, and he cares about his people. He cares about the comp people at the company that he that working for him, he cares about the patient community. Patients text him or call him or email him directly, and he takes whatever they ask of him very seriously. And um, you know, there have been cases where, you know, we've had to, you know, obvious had to move away from um advancing an asset in a certain indication, whether that's because the study didn't turn out the way it was expected or for other reasons. But the commitment to the his commitment to the community didn't end just because the company's priorities changed, right? So for example, Ovid was one of the first companies that like gave the data from the trials back to the patient community for them to be able to use that and advance their knowledge and understanding of the disease and help them to continue developing their assets. So um he's he's as authentic, patient-centered as he comes off to be, and also just a brilliant deal maker. Uh just comes up, just has a very creative deals, um help the company um grow to where it is and evolve and pivot over time, and um find assets that others just overlooked and find opportunities for those assets um to like address unmet needs.

Ben Comer:

That's excellent. Um, I want to ask you about the Miami Biotech Collective. Um, what sparked it? And you know, what um you know, what what do you hope to do with it? You know, what what are you um what I guess what drove you to pursue it? What what sparked the idea, what drove you to set it up?

Raquel Cabo:

So I grew up in Miami and I left Miami, and I never thought I would be able to come back to Miami because at the time I thought there was no biotech in Miami. So it'd be a graveyard for my career. COVID happened, we spent some extended time here, and and we really, really wanted to come back. And um, you know, thanks to hybrid working, we made the decision to come back and you know, kind of figure out how it impact our careers. And and when I came down here, I realized that there's actually a lot of biotech activity happening. It's just not as tangible and accessible as it is when you go when you're in a city like Boston, right? Where like you step outside and like everybody around you works at some biotech company. So I would, you know, I was traveling to a conference, I would speak to someone, I would meet someone, and they're like, oh yeah, I live in South Florida, or oh yeah, Ultragenics has this Latin American headquarters, and you know, the person lives like five minutes from me. So it was a lot of those conversations, and I and I started to feel like, well, there's a lot of people down here, there's a lot of operators down here. Um, but they're not um, we're not connected. And um there is there there's an initiative that was started by um an individual named Doran Junger, who works at a head hedge fund, I believe, who started a WhatsApp group. And anybody who moved to Miami who worked in the biotech space or medtech um would get added to this WhatsApp group. And that group over the couple of years had grown to I think now like 150 members. So the people were there. And even and even outside of that group, I was still meeting people who were not plugged in to this. And and um I I'm just naturally a community builder, and I wanted to just bring together some operators, so other like peers. So I initially started, you know, talking to a couple of folks like to like have a dinner. I'd been to a conference in Boston. There's a and actually this is where I met Rich, like a dinner with a bunch of other biotech execs, and um, you know, it was an intimate gathering, and you get to meet a few people. So I thought, let me see if I can pull together 15 people and have a dinner. And um through word of mouth, I ended up having about a hundred people. I'll say that they're interested and in getting together. And so I realized at that point that this is much bigger than I had initially thought, and that there's uh interest, there's people, and and then I found out that there's people who are putting willing to put money towards building a community. Um, so so I founded the Miami Biotech Collective with the idea of providing a forum to connect operators who are in South Florida, so Jupiter down to Miami, um, and help folks deepen and broaden their network, right? So in Miami, you will know a few people, like you live in Coconut Grove, you'll know a couple people in Coconut Grove, you live in Aventura, you'll know a few people in Aventura, you're in Boca, you know the folks at Boca, but you're not connecting across those little pockets. Um and so that's what Miami Biotech is doing. It's bringing people come down from Boca from Del Rey to events, and they're meeting individuals that they normally would not be crossing paths with. Um, there's also a strong interest in um advancing the region as a next biotech hub. I think we had seen over the last five years an influx of people coming down here. Like me, I came down here, I liked it, I wanted it to stay. A lot of people did the same thing. Um, an influx of capital, a lot of investors are coming down here. There's uh a lot of alternative types of investors, so like family offices that you don't see in other regions. There's been an incredible amount of investment in the health systems infrastructure. Um and and with all of those, and then you also have Miami Airport, which is like an incredible, like the number one um logistics um airport in the nation, um, and does a tremendous volume of distribution of pharmaceutical products. Um so you have a lot of these factors coming together. Um, and there are individuals who are want to raise the visibility of the region and also want to start creating relationships and partnerships with other organizations. But there wasn't really like a formalized way to do it. So we're also facilitating that. Um and and it's just been a tremendous few months where just an idea to have a dinner turned into a Miami Biotech Collective, and now I have a lot of relationships and partnerships. One partnership with the Beacon Council, I have a partnership with JP Morgan, and we have a lot of exciting things coming down the pipeline for the over the next few months.

Ben Comer:

Yeah, well, the Miami Dade Beacon Council, I read on their website that there were a thousand life sciences companies uh in in in the area, which uh was amazing to me to to read that statistic. I think you have a member of the the Beacon Council on your um women's leadership council, which I want to ask you about in just a second. But uh and I'm also gonna ask you about some of the gaps that exist in the ecosystem. But before that, what do you think is the real pull? Like what are what are the what would you describe as the the chief attributes or the you know the biggest benefits to you know starting a company or or headquartering a company um in South Florida?

Raquel Cabo:

So South Florida has the obvious lifestyle benefits, right? Like we that's everyone knows that. That's like what everyone thinks that they come down here to retire. Yeah. You have the weather. So you have obvious the obvious lifestyle benefits. There's no income tax. So that's another um incentive for individuals who want to come down here. Um and then there's, as I mentioned, there's this new energy of the new folks who've come down here, which are creating a really ripe environment for collaboration and entrepreneurship, um, and a lot of interest in helping companies drive growth. And while some of the infrastructure is in the early stages, the aptitude and the interest to develop is there. Um so, for example, like the Beacon Council, they're prioritizing life sciences and um they're advancing they're you know helping companies come down here. So Galderma just moved its headquarters to Miami. Um, there's a couple other companies doing the same thing, whether that's from other parts of the United States or from other countries, Latin America, Spain. Um, and the and then the universities, they're really working closely. They're super eager and interested to work with um industry to advance common goals.

Ben Comer:

I was curious about that, you know, the relationship with the universities and tech transfer offices and how how active that scene was. It sounds like it's active.

Raquel Cabo:

Yeah, well, it it is active. So, first off, there's been huge investments. So, University of Miami just had a $50 million grant to the Sylvester Cancer Center to advance its research. Um, they're building Converge, which is going to be shared lab space. Baptist Health had another $50 million go to build a neuroscience and expand its neuroscience institute. They're recruiting top talent from different c areas of the country to like set up the to like help them build the infrastructure needed to run top-tier clinical trials and funding to give the researchers their their their staff to do research. Um and the individuals who work who are working at these hospitals are very eager to work with industry and figure out like how do we help you advance your your programs.

Ben Comer:

Right. Yeah. Um well let's let's talk about some gaps. I guess the thinking of a commercially successful biotech company, let's say, you know, the full life cycle from startup to successful approval to commercialization, um, what what gaps exist in the South Florida ecosystem? And uh do you have you know any thoughts about how to fill those?

Raquel Cabo:

So there are a lot of gaps because we're at the early stages. Um one gap is talent. So there is great talent coming out of the universities, but like other areas, they're experiencing the brain drain because there isn't a place for them to immediately go to that's local. Um the other the other type of gap is seasoned operators um because we haven't been home growing folks, right? That's great. Um and but that's something that like with Miami Biotech Collective, by like creating a community of seasoned biotech operators, we're helping allow give people the opportunities to find the job after the job, which will help bring more people down here. Because one of the challenges that established companies are facing when they're trying to recruit is people are worried that they're not going to find the job after the job. We all know that biotech is uncertain. And so by helping build out that community, create a better um system for job um trading, yeah, yeah, that will help with those. Um other gaps are wet lab space. So UM is building out this shared space, but there's still gaps around that. You don't have that same infrastructure that you have in other parts of the country. Um while there is an increase in capital down here, uh the volume, the numbers aren't as high as in other parts of the country. And a lot of the companies down here are early stage, either looking for seed funding, Series A, and so or that early stage capital through family offices, VCs, hedge funds, those those are um what will be driving the growth. And I and the volume of those transactions aren't as high as in other parts of the country, but it's it's it's growing.

Ben Comer:

Yeah.

Raquel Cabo:

Um and and I think that um, you know, once we have those ingredients coming together, we'll be positioned to really take off. Once we get considering that we have infrastructure, we are have the universities, we have companies that are already establishing and moving here, um, we have the logistics, there's um increase in manufacturing, folks are building up manufacturing facilities down here. Um and and the region is wide, so we're going from Jupiter down to Miami. And and the attractiveness of the region is demonstrated by this huge growth and number of conferences that we're seeing. So I'm calling it Miami Biotech Week in March. There's multiple biotech investment conferences. LSX had their conference here last year for the first time, had 300 people attend. Um UC EMERGE adding a biotech component to their to their conference. Bio International is coming down in March. So people are seeing the opportunities down here and the energy. And I think all of the pieces that will come together.

Ben Comer:

Um the Miami Biotech Collective has an advisory board, uh, but also has a women's leadership council. And I was I wanted to ask you what the thinking behind the women's leadership council was, and you know what that group brings, you know, to the larger collective.

Raquel Cabo:

That that group can't was formed out of me seeing a problem. Yeah. At my first event, we had over 50 people attend. And of those 50, there's probably five, six women in in in attendance. And it was it was really shocking. And not only that, but in the invite list, it was a majority men. And when I would talk to other men, I'm like, we need to invite more women, we need to include more women. Folks couldn't identify other women to bring in. So so we already we all know that there's an underrepresentation of women broadly in biotech, but here it feels a lot more acute, the the issue. And um I thought the best way to solve that is to bring women together who can help one, bring in more women, but also find ways to support women in biotech. And um the women's leadership council is made up of women um in industry, um a recruiter who's the CEO of her own company, and there's uh we have um Nydia from the Beacon Council, and then um she's not up there yet, but Cecilia Gonzalez, she's an investor. So she's um also joining the advisory of the women's leadership council. And the idea is for us to problem solve together how we can increase representation and create the support system for other women who are in whatever stage of career they're in to reach their achieve their goals.

Ben Comer:

Great. Awesome. Um we've talked, uh, I feel like a lot about this uh already. You know what? I'm gonna skip it because we've already covered it. I was gonna ask you your best pitch to entrepreneurs and founders who might be looking around for uh a place to set up company headquarters. I think we have the answer already based on our conversation. But I um getting back to the collective, uh, how would you characterize your current membership? Um, you know, what what it's comprised of, the types of companies and maybe the types of uh people or or companies you'd like to bring in in the future.

Raquel Cabo:

Great. Yeah. So um I have about 185 people since June who've expressed interest in being part of Miami Biotech Collective. So, and that number has almost doubled since my last event in um September.

Ben Comer:

Wow.

Raquel Cabo:

And the the representation is mixed, but more than half, so about 60% are individuals from biotechs. And we do cat we are categorizing um biotechs by early stage, late stage, commercial, public, um, and just a mix across the board. We have um investors, so about um I'm doing mental math, like 20% are investors. Okay, and we have academics. Um, we have a relatively smaller proportion of service providers, and that's deliberate. Like service providers are hugely important to the ecosystem, but what we want to do is have like meaningful relationships with service providers, where the events and the gatherings are opportunities for operators, academics, investors to be meeting and identifying opportunities, but and not being pitched by service providers, but service providers who are participating are ones who are contributing to the growth of the ecosystem. Um, so it's very strategic and selective about how we engage with with service providers. Um and um we and yeah, I can't, I think yeah, sorry, I think that's no, that's that's great.

Ben Comer:

Um I I was, you know, you mentioned you're a community builder uh earlier in our conversation. Um, and I was curious about, you know, if you're actually facilitating between members, you know, qu somebody has a question about maybe it's about a service provider, or maybe they're, you know, looking for a specific uh type of talent. Um is that part of the Miami Biotech Collective's mission to kind of connect people across the region, answer questions for people, help people source various things, or is it more of kind of a networking and just community-building uh type of organization right now?

Raquel Cabo:

The the Miami Biotech's mission stems from the community's needs. And I've categorized them into three, I put them into three pillars, and and I've developed those from speaking to folks who are part of the group. Now, an individual who's later in their career may have a different need than someone who's earlier in their career or someone who's you know starting a biotech and raising money versus someone who you know ha is capitalized. So the needs are different, but what I did is through speaking with a lot of folks, doing a survey, I found that most people's interests fell into three different groups. So one is engagement, so meeting folks, connecting, identifying ways to like to collaborate, create opportunities, expand their career, share best practices. That's one pillar. The second pillar is um sharing resource sharing or access to resources. And so that's where um the connection between the investors and the operators really thrives. Uh the number one interest for most people is access to capital. And from an investor perspective, What they're interested in is identifying companies that maybe were not on their radar. Yeah. Um, so through our events and through conversations, we bring those two together. So, for example, at the September event, I had a panel of stealth of companies that are in stealth mode presenting. I think one of the companies said that after that presentation, an investor came in and, you know, made a expressed interest in investing like $15 million, right? So that's what I'm saying.

Ben Comer:

Wow, that I mean that's hugely valuable for those companies. Yeah.

Raquel Cabo:

Exactly. Um, and and then the third is influence. So there's a lot of people who feel really strongly. There are a subset of folks who feel strongly about building out the ecosystem and finding ways to best collaborate with the academics, with the beacon council, you know, and other um development uh center committees. Um and and those are one that, and so we're doing things to help them. So, for example, with the Beacon Council, we're gonna be doing a series of roundtables. The next round table is gonna hit the first round table is gonna hit the topic of why Miami. So a lot of the questions that you're asking, um, but the idea is to like crowdsource the answers. So what's going, what do we have that's going for Miami? What are the challenges and how can we solve them? And from there, identify ways that we can actively bring groups together to generate those solutions. So if the challenge is, oh, there isn't a pipeline of um scientists and we're losing them all to Boston, well, maybe because we have the University of Miami and Baptist sitting in the same room as you know, some other pharma company, we can find a way to create an internship channel, right? So finding those, identifying the problems and finding tangible solutions to those problems. Um and so those are the three areas engagement, influence, and resources.

Ben Comer:

Um, you're focused on Jupiter South. Uh, you mentioned earlier in our conversation that there were different pockets even within Miami where people were sort of isolated, not connected to each other. I'm curious if the collective is interested in, you know, working with Central Florida eventually or the panhandle. I mean, is it your intent to kind of scale up in the state of Florida or just make you know South Florida really strong?

Raquel Cabo:

We want to stick to South Florida. Bioflorida covers the whole state of Florida.

Ben Comer:

Yeah, true.

Raquel Cabo:

And Mark Glickman, who's the new CEO, or he's been the CEO for the last 18 months, has been doing a tremendous job of connecting and engaging with the different regions and really building up the whole state to support biotech, to support medtech, engaging at a state level for advocacy and dent and incentives. Um so Mark's got the Florida covered. And for us, we're really trying to like help grow and this this region in collaboration with Bio Florida and supporting their efforts as well. Um, but even though South Florida's our favorite, Bio Florida can't have favorites.

Ben Comer:

Yeah, right. Exactly. Um uh I've really enjoyed uh talking with you, Raquel. I I have one uh final question for you, and it's a hypothetical, and I'm gonna ask everyone while I'm down here. I'm I live in Central Florida, uh, so I could ask myself that this question too, but um hypothetical question. It's been a very quiet hurricane season so far this year, but let's assume you find yourself in the predicted path of a category four, category five hurricane. Do you board everything up and hunker down, or do you pack up the car and get out of Dodge? Stay or go?

Raquel Cabo:

I think for us it's gonna be stay.

Ben Comer:

Yeah. Yeah. Stay, all right.

Raquel Cabo:

Put in some new impact windows. I feel really good about our really good about that. And um I think we can weather, weather the storm.

Ben Comer:

Uh for listeners, one more thing I did want to ask you before we wrap up. Um, for listeners who who might be in Florida or might be you know thinking about moving to Florida, what's the best way to get in touch with the Miami Biotech Collective? Um, you know, how can they how can they talk to you?

Raquel Cabo:

Well, on my website at the bottom, it says get in touch with Raquel, and you can send me a WhatsApp message. So there's no more direct way than that.

Ben Comer:

Simple enough and direct. All right. Uh we've been speaking with Raquel Cabo, founder of the Miami Biotech Collective. I'm Ben Comer, and you've just listened to the Business of Biotech. Find us and subscribe anywhere you listen to podcasts, and be sure to check out new weekly video casts of these conversations every Monday under the Business of Biotech tab at lifescienceleader.com. We'll see you next week, and thanks as always for listening.

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