Episode Description
🧬 The Biotech Startups Podcast is powered by Excedr—helping life science startups accelerate R&D and commercialization with founder-friendly equipment leasing. Skip the upfront costs, stay lean, and focus on breakthrough science.
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"I think comfort with failure, or at least exposure to it, is really important and is just an everyday part of laboratory work. I think that serves you tremendously well outside of the lab."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, we follow CEO and co-founder of Pheast Therapeutics, Roy Maute’s graduate school journey in Riccardo Dalla-Favera’s demanding Columbia lab, where he dives into genetic rearrangements in B-cell lymphoma and chooses intensity over comfort to accelerate his growth alongside clinician-scientists. He shares how brutal weekly Friday lab meetings, where imperfect work was publicly dissected, built his resilience and rigor, and what it was like to live through the shift from Sanger to high-throughput sequencing that reshaped cancer research. Roy also reflects on why he never wanted to become a professor and how a mentor’s advice led him to Irving Weissman’s famously hands-off Stanford lab—a stark contrast to his PhD environment, but equally formative for his scientific career.
Key topics covered:
Subscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-biotech-startups-podcast/id1679591994Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PSL162R2s0zOwU5913Zv4Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thebiotechstartupspodcast Website: https://www.thebiotechstartupspodcast.com/
Find our guest, Roy Maute at these links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/roy-maute-2b31b975/Website: https://www.pheast.com/ Find our host, Jon Chee, at these links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonchee
Learn more about Excedr:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/excedr/ Website: https://www.excedr.com
Intro & Outro Songs Created by OkKyojin, Owned by Excedr:Website: https://flow.page/kyojin
Resources & Articles:B-cell Lymphoma Genetic Rearrangements: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41408-024-01146-zMicroRNAs in Cancer Biology: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-07657-1CD47 Macrophage Immunotherapy for Cancer: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12573215/Cancer Stem Cell Biology and Therapeutic Targeting: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9256444/High-Throughput DNA Sequencing Technology: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-26947-8
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Columbia University: https://www.columbia.eduStanford University: https://www.stanford.eduUniversity of California, Berkeley: https://berkeley.edu
Riccardo Dalla-Favera, MD: https://www.genetics.cuimc.columbia.edu/profile/riccardo-dalla-favera-mdKatia Basso, PhD: https://www.pathology.columbia.edu/profile/katia-basso-phdIrving Weissman, MD: https://med.stanford.edu/profiles/irving-weissman
Timestamps: 00:00 Intro01:36 Choosing Cancer Research and Academic vs. Industry Paths05:34 Finding the Right Lab Fit and Demanding Training Environments06:18 Key Scientific Lessons: Genetics, DNA, and Cancer Biology11:02 Comfort with Failure and Scientific Training Value14:32 Storytelling and Communicating Science to Non-Scientists16:07 Pursuing Postdoc Training and Working with Irv Weissman22:09 Berkeley vs. Stanford: Academic Culture and Collaboration24:23 Stanford's Translation-Focused Approach and Industry Engagement26:58 Co-founding Ab Initio Biotherapeutics During Postdoc29:14 OutroThe Biotech Startups Podcast gives you a front-row seat to the business and science of building a biotech. Hosted by Jon Chee, CEO of Excedr, the show features honest conversations with founders, execs, and investors about their work, their companies, and how they got there. From scientific breakthroughs to startup lessons, each episode explores what it really takes to grow a life science company—from pre-seed to IPO.
As a TBSP listener, you can get exclusive perks through Excedr’s partner network—special savings, promotions, and more. Explore these offers today: https://www.excedr.com/partners.
"I think comfort with failure, or at least exposure to it, is really important and is just an everyday part of laboratory work. I think that serves you tremendously well outside of the lab."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, we follow CEO and co-founder of Pheast Therapeutics, Roy Maute’s graduate school journey in Riccardo Dalla-Favera’s demanding Columbia lab, where he dives into genetic rearrangements in B-cell lymphoma and chooses intensity over comfort to accelerate his growth alongside clinician-scientists. He shares how brutal weekly Friday lab meetings, where imperfect work was publicly dissected, built his resilience and rigor, and what it was like to live through the shift from Sanger to high-throughput sequencing that reshaped cancer research. Roy also reflects on why he never wanted to become a professor and how a mentor’s advice led him to Irving Weissman’s famously hands-off Stanford lab—a stark contrast to his PhD environment, but equally formative for his scientific career.
Key topics covered:
- The Power of Mentorship: Choosing demanding training over comfortable environments for maximum growth
- Embracing Failure: Weekly presentations of imperfect work building resilience and faster iteration
- Technological Revolution: Living through the Sanger-to-NGS transition that transformed cancer research
- Stanford vs. Berkeley Culture: Industry-friendly attitudes and translation focus at Stanford's stem cell institute
- Early Company Formation: Co-founding Ab Initio Biotherapeutics as a junior postdoc with structural biology collaborators
Subscribe to the Podcast:Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-biotech-startups-podcast/id1679591994Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PSL162R2s0zOwU5913Zv4Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thebiotechstartupspodcast Website: https://www.thebiotechstartupspodcast.com/
Find our guest, Roy Maute at these links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/roy-maute-2b31b975/Website: https://www.pheast.com/ Find our host, Jon Chee, at these links: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonchee
Learn more about Excedr:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/excedr/ Website: https://www.excedr.com
Intro & Outro Songs Created by OkKyojin, Owned by Excedr:Website: https://flow.page/kyojin
Resources & Articles:B-cell Lymphoma Genetic Rearrangements: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41408-024-01146-zMicroRNAs in Cancer Biology: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-07657-1CD47 Macrophage Immunotherapy for Cancer: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12573215/Cancer Stem Cell Biology and Therapeutic Targeting: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9256444/High-Throughput DNA Sequencing Technology: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-26947-8
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:Columbia University: https://www.columbia.eduStanford University: https://www.stanford.eduUniversity of California, Berkeley: https://berkeley.edu
Riccardo Dalla-Favera, MD: https://www.genetics.cuimc.columbia.edu/profile/riccardo-dalla-favera-mdKatia Basso, PhD: https://www.pathology.columbia.edu/profile/katia-basso-phdIrving Weissman, MD: https://med.stanford.edu/profiles/irving-weissman
Timestamps: 00:00 Intro01:36 Choosing Cancer Research and Academic vs. Industry Paths05:34 Finding the Right Lab Fit and Demanding Training Environments06:18 Key Scientific Lessons: Genetics, DNA, and Cancer Biology11:02 Comfort with Failure and Scientific Training Value14:32 Storytelling and Communicating Science to Non-Scientists16:07 Pursuing Postdoc Training and Working with Irv Weissman22:09 Berkeley vs. Stanford: Academic Culture and Collaboration24:23 Stanford's Translation-Focused Approach and Industry Engagement26:58 Co-founding Ab Initio Biotherapeutics During Postdoc29:14 OutroThe Biotech Startups Podcast gives you a front-row seat to the business and science of building a biotech. Hosted by Jon Chee, CEO of Excedr, the show features honest conversations with founders, execs, and investors about their work, their companies, and how they got there. From scientific breakthroughs to startup lessons, each episode explores what it really takes to grow a life science company—from pre-seed to IPO.