Biotech Activities & Organizations at Stanford
Kevin Ho, MBA student at the GSB and our board member, has put together this guide to biotech resources at Stanford. In part two of this two-part guide, Kevin shares biotech activities and student organisations you can engage with at Stanford. An updated version of this guide is always available on our website resources tab.
Kevin Ho, MBA Student, Stanford Graduate School of Business
Getting actively involved in biotech-related organizations will help you apply the things you learn in class. Several student groups have formed as outlets for the ~17,000 students across campus. The university is also wonderfully (sometimes frustratingly) decentralized - this has led to a number of university-administered entities that are useful to know about.
Student-run Organizations
Stanford Biotechnology Group (SBG)
A group of PhD and MBA students who work to connect students at Stanford with the biotech industry. Among other things, SBG runs INDE 209 and organizes speaker events and networking happy hours on/near campus.
A surprisingly professionally run long only public equities hedge fund with ~$80K (yes, that’s right - thousands, not millions) under management. A natural extension of INDE 209. Analyst teams research and pitch individual equities, after which the management team decides whether or not to invest a pool of partner capital.
Nucleate connects student scientists, clinicians, and businesspeople to form small teams for the purpose of commercializing lab-based discoveries. It acts as an incubator by connecting these teams with advisors (e.g., professors, investors, operators). Nucleate operates across the Bay Area (UCSF and Berkeley are involved, too), as well as in other metro areas across the US.
The HCC helps students get internships and jobs in healthcare. It hosts recruiting and informational events with industry leaders, organizes an annual conference, and sends out a nifty weekly newsletter. Its scope is wide - healthcare is a big industry - so biotech only comes up every once in a while.
University-run Organizations
These vary in terms of the ability of students to “join” or otherwise get involved. Some are essentially centers of excellence / ways for faculty to collaborate. Others exist for the purpose of helping students. In any case, worth knowing that these exist.
Run out of the CSB department, SPARK guides researchers (PhD students, postdocs, faculty) as they conduct translational research and eventually commercialize their discoveries. Provides support from faculty and industry advisors. Meetings occur weekly on Wednesdays and either involve an interesting guest speaker or reviews of SPARK projects. Students and postdocs who are interested in doing drug R&D but do not have their own ideas have the ability to join existing project teams (so long as they need/want additional manpower).
Adjacent to biotech, Biodesign supports innovation in healthcare technology, ranging from medical devices (this is where it started) to digital health. The program runs a number of classes across topics, offers fellowships to faculty and students, and serves as a home and center of excellence for design in healthcare technology innovation.
A career center and community for med campus students interested in careers in the life sciences. Especially helpful for non-MBAs (who have their own career services) looking for internships and jobs in industry.
Chemistry, Engineering, and Medicine for Human Health (ChEM-H)
ChEM-H is both a collection of faculty and students, as well as an actual physical building (it’s beautiful). It brings together a wide array of scientific disciplines and administrative support with the goal of generating useful ideas, translating those ideas into products, and removing as many barriers as possible along the way.
Innovative Medicines Accelerator (IMA)
A collaboration between ChEM-H and Stanford Medicine, the IMA brings Stanford scientists into closer contact with key drug development capabilities (e.g., medicinal chemistry). It is brand new (founded in 2019), and does not have much of a track record to date.
Another extremely new program, Stanford Medicine Catalyst was established in 2020. It is a joint effort among the School of Medicine, Stanford Health Care, and Stanford Children’s Health, and covers four verticals: digital health, medical technology, diagnostics, and therapeutics. The program supports project teams with an early prototype and/or validating data with up to $1 million in funding and operational support over 9 months.
Center for Definitive and Curative Medicine (CDCM)
The CDCM helps Stanford scientists take cell and gene therapies from concept through clinical development. Potentially a really interesting center of excellence to learn about a groundbreaking area of therapeutic development, as well as how clinical development works.
Office of Technology Licensing (OTL)
The OTL helps Stanford scientists patent their technology, then works with businesses (sometimes startups founded by those same scientists) to license this IP. Historically, the OTL has been instrumental in enabling the commercialization of life sciences - the Cohen-Boyer recombinant DNA patent gave rise to Genentech and demonstrated that science could be both beneficial for society and lucrative. The OTL hires interns to help out with their patenting and business development activities.
A 4-week (full time) or 8-week (part time) program to learn business basics at the GSB without having to do the program (and without the $200K price tag). Apparently quite good for scientists and clinicians.
A space at the GSB that comes with mentors, advisors, alumni, and peers. Enrollment is year-round and not selective (open to any Stanford graduate student). Not oriented toward biotech startups, but the resources provided (e.g., discounted AWS compute) can be useful for projects in computational biotech. Mentorship is also broadly applicable.
Resources
Some additional light reading and listening. May seem like gibberish at first (at least, it did to me) but eventually your brain will start making connections and figuring it out.
My go-to industry news source for biotech. They send out a daily newsletter on new deals, financings, policy, and scientific discoveries, and cover the industry incredibly well.
Slightly longer form articles than Endpoints. STAT covers big issues and happenings in biotech and healthcare more broadly. They also host events and have a great podcast, the Readout Loud. Paywall, but you can bypass it by logging in with a Stanford email address.
Articles written by Luke Timmerman and his network of contributors. Luke is an industry insider and seemingly knows everyone and everything that’s going on. His podcast, The Long Run, is awesome and free.
Two Scientists Walk Into a Bar
30-40-minute podcasts hosted by Genentech. Accessible and fun.
Spotlights biotech founders. Each episode runs through a founder’s background and his/her company’s science, then discusses the potential impact of his/her work.
We’re venturing beyond Stanford to another university here. This podcast, hosted at Johns Hopkins, explores careers in biopharma. It covers consulting, finance, small biotech, and bigger pharma companies, and is meant to help students understand pathways best suited for their interests and skills.
This is a website, and (free) subscription email list that highlights latest small- and large-molecule approvals. The emails are a pleasure to read for both their content and concise descriptions of mechanisms and target. For example, you’ll get a “Molecule of the Month” email. They also highlight fun stories of discovery/developmental campaigns and have a number of other resources on their website - but I’ve learned a lot just by reading their emails. - Sai
Notes
Biotechnology is an extremely broad term that, technically, encompasses any technology involving biology. The scope of this document is much narrower than that. It is primarily focused on therapeutics, with some bleeding over into diagnostics and medical devices. Unfortunately, it does not cover synthetic biology, plant biology, or other forms of biotechnology.
Feel free to reach out (kevin.ho45@gmail.com or kevho@stanford.edu) with comments or questions.
Contributors
Joel Bateman (MBA 2023)
Sai Gourisankar (PhD 2023)
Kevin Ho (MBA 2021)
Bri McIntosh (PhD Student)
Anica Oesterle (MBA 2022)
Egan Peltan (PhD Student)
About the author
Kevin Ho
Kevin is a second-year MBA student at the GSB. Prior to Stanford, he studied Ethics, Politics, and Economics at Yale University, where he also completed an MPH degree in Health Policy. Kevin previously worked in management consulting at Bain & Co., where he focused on technology, private equity, and healthcare clients. Most recently, he spent several years working in global health, first in vaccine access with the Clinton Health Access Initiative, and later in maternal and child health policy at Gates Ventures.
