Join us as we talk to Pradeep Sacitharan, a serial dropout turned award-winning scientist. Starting life as a war refugee and working in London bars, Pradeep's life took a radical turn following a near-death experience, propelling him into the world of drug development. He navigates us through his fascinating journey in the biotech world, recounting his trials and triumphs in the field.
Ever considered that academia might be flawed? Pradeep exposes the cracks in the academic system, expressing the need to revamp the current structure and invest more in budding talent. He shares his unique approach to experimentation, emphasising the power of learning from rejections. As he delves into his own experiences, he offers valuable insights to help young researchers navigate the often daunting world of academia.
But Pradeep's insights don't stop at academia. He explores the relevance of practical learning, neurodiversity, and talent identification. Plus, he sheds light on the fascinating and often complex world of biotech funding, helping us understand the important details often overlooked. Pradeep's story is not just about his own journey, but it also serves as a guide for anyone looking to carve their own path in the world of science and beyond. Tune in and learn from his unique perspective on the changing landscape of biotech, academia, and talent management.
Guest:
Pradeep Sacitharan
________
Reach out to Sam Parnell and Ivanna Rosendal
Join the conversation on our LinkedIn page
Join us as we talk to Pradeep Sacitharan, a serial dropout turned award-winning scientist. Starting life as a war refugee and working in London bars, Pradeep's life took a radical turn following a near-death experience, propelling him into the world of drug development. He navigates us through his fascinating journey in the biotech world, recounting his trials and triumphs in the field.
Ever considered that academia might be flawed? Pradeep exposes the cracks in the academic system, expressing the need to revamp the current structure and invest more in budding talent. He shares his unique approach to experimentation, emphasising the power of learning from rejections. As he delves into his own experiences, he offers valuable insights to help young researchers navigate the often daunting world of academia.
But Pradeep's insights don't stop at academia. He explores the relevance of practical learning, neurodiversity, and talent identification. Plus, he sheds light on the fascinating and often complex world of biotech funding, helping us understand the important details often overlooked. Pradeep's story is not just about his own journey, but it also serves as a guide for anyone looking to carve their own path in the world of science and beyond. Tune in and learn from his unique perspective on the changing landscape of biotech, academia, and talent management.
Guest:
Pradeep Sacitharan
________
Reach out to Sam Parnell and Ivanna Rosendal
Join the conversation on our LinkedIn page
You're listening to Transformation in Trials. Welcome to Transformation in Trials. This is a podcast exploring all things transformational in clinical trials. Everything is off limits on the show and we will have guests from the whole spectrum of the clinical trials community, and we're your hosts, ivana and Sam.
Speaker 2:Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Transformation in Trials podcast, and today we're delighted to be joined by Pradeep Stasadharan, who describes himself as a serial dropout. Hi, pradeep, great to have you on the show.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much. Pleasure to be here. I'm super excited.
Speaker 2:We're really excited to have you as well, and I think serial dropout is going to hopefully pique the interest of our listeners. Now, normally on the Transformation in Trials podcast, we like to structure a theme, the episode around specific topic. Today's topic is actually going to be more around you, because you have such an interesting story and a lot of that is interwoven into clinical trials, but there's a lot more to it as well. So today's theme is from high school dropout to drug development in China, and we're going to learn all about your journey and some of the things that have happened along the way. So let's get started and, I think, to kick us off, tell us about you and your journey, pradeep.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thank you for having me. I'm very aware that some of you are listening as scientists or we're getting to the clinical development and drug discovery. But yeah, I started my life. My mom swung on me from Sri Lanka as a war refugee into London, into the UK, grew up in a very rough social housing project in Northwest London. You know what you know and you go around the environment. So no one had a career, no one knew what science was. So high school wasn't the thing for me or all my friends. So I left school with very poor grades. We call it probably one GCSE in C. Some call it a dropout. You know, I have a saying I hate to study but I love to learn.
Speaker 3:So from 16, I was in sales. I worked in local shops, bars, clubs and so forth. I learned sales but life was teaching me how to deal with people and talent and that was very important into the managerial step later on in my life. So I was disciplined. I loved weightlifting. Luckily, one of my uncles came from Sri Lanka and he goes hey kid, you're either going to be in jail or you're going to die if you go on this way. So here's some weights. I loved weightlifting. I was a semi pro weightlifter. So I got into the biology. So I went to libraries and started learning about biology and muscles and fitness, aerobic and anaerobic exercise and so forth, and I was just learning. There was no structured curriculum for me.
Speaker 3:At 21, I went to a serious fight, went to the small coma, didn't see God, didn't see anything spiritual. I just woke up and said, hey, I need to change my life. And then I learned about failure and experimentation. Again, life was teaching me different pathways. I made three phone calls a lovely woman called Janet Hudson not the singer from America, but she gave me a access course in the UK. I put my head down, applied the biology I learned from the libraries. I finished a top of my class.
Speaker 3:Then I fell in love with drug discovery. So I done a biomedical degree and everyone was like, hey, you know what, you've got talent. But then I realized I need to go to certain places to learn drug discovery and really learn technology. So I set myself high goals. So I want to get to Oxford and one of my professors said, hey, you're very talented, we really like you. But how are you going to get to Oxford? So I said I'm going to take the train from Paddington. Great answer. And, as I tell the kids, if you're not exposed to a certain environment, you have to, and even professionals now. So that's what I did.
Speaker 3:In summer, I went to Oxford and I learned the environment. I said, hey, I can, I can survive here, I can do stuff here. So from my Polytech University, westminster, numbers came. I couldn't jump to Oxford, but I made 13 applications. I got a master's scholarship at Imperial College where I done drug discovery and experiment of physiology. I finished very well, top of my class, and throughout that journey I made 46 PhD applications. 47th was Oxford. So I got a scholarship Kennedy scholarship, but Oxford, we're done.
Speaker 3:Drug discovery in Ostia of Rites Love the Ostia of Rites done very well, I think. In 2017, I was the first to win the British, european and American scientist award. Then learned a lot about drug discovery, clinical trials, how to use even I was doing basic stuff, but I was obsessed with drug discovery how to use clinical tissues, samples, how to coordinate with orthopedics, doctors, surgeons and so forth, so really learning and how to network as well. And then I realized the system is flawed. Now you see, I went from dropout to Oxford and a PhD in five years. So I realized the system is flawed anyhow. So I was poking the system and the system was like we don't know what to do with you. So I told my professors, hey, I've got some very good gene expression at that time data. And I said, hey, I think I got three targets for Ostia of Rites. What can we do? And they said, well, it'll take 30 years. What you need to do is apply for this fellowship, get some money, go and do this combat and go way to do this. And that's right. And some of them, by the way, two of them were Nobel Prize winners are going to a room with.
Speaker 3:I said these guys are brighter than I, there's no ego here, but they don't get life, the bigger philosophy picture. I'm running out of time and I said, okay, I've been broke before, let's do something different. So I wrote from my own fellowships I dropped out now my second dropout from academia at the traditional postdoc route, instead of doing two or three postdocs. I said how can I accelerate this career and learn more clinical development? So I got a full, bright scholarship to Harvard Again, by the way, when I was Oxford they said how are you going to get to Harvard.
Speaker 3:I said I'll take a plane. So I did that, by the way, the summer before and exposed myself to Harvard network very hard and one of the professors said come along. So I learned one technique in microbiology at Harvard and I came back and I said this might work again. So I got what I call an EMBO fellowship at the Sabon University, worked with a very good clinical team there at the Sabon University Hospital, came back to the UK and then I went to Israel Daniel Turnberg Fellowship, learned proteomics from a professor. Came back. So I was actually very structured in my goals.
Speaker 3:I learned three world-class techniques from world-class labs, came back and said now can I have it? It doesn't work like that. Couldn't get any fellowships. And then again the reason is that because osteoarthritis or this orthopedics was as sexy as cancer, immunology, the fellowships and the money wasn't there, which is fine, I get from a point of view. So then I said okay, let's do something different. Something's always worth for me, which is experimentation numbers. So I made 272 applications and phone calls and someone picked up in China. They said come over. So I went to China.
Speaker 3:I think probably 18 months after my PhD I was an associate professor and those three drug targets. We published those papers in academia in 18 months, so that 30 years was now 18 months. We had the best clinical collaborators. Obviously I had a lot more money in terms of funds to do the experiments. I had a team of 12, I was 28, 29, I think, and I was an associate professor which was unheard of in the West two years after my PhD and I said okay, and then someone reached out to me and goes hey, do you want to do some business development, the clinical development, biotech kind of space. So I said, okay, let's learn this.
Speaker 3:So my third dropout I dropped out academia, went into biotech, expanded business development. We actually brought up clinical trial units, particularly the preclinical space in Europe, and we took the contracts back to China. That exposed me to a lot of financial statements, the business side of things. I didn't know what profit and loss was. I didn't know what EBITDA was. I didn't know what acquisition was as a scientist. So you learn a lot more of the business stuff. And that's where I was and the pandemic hit and then I realized I'm going to do my own business. So that was my fourth dropout. But I think for this podcast we'll talk about the journey up to China and biotech, and where we are.
Speaker 1:I like how you narrowed down 30 years into a matter of a single years. That is really accelerating clinical trials and what this podcast is all about, absolutely.
Speaker 2:I agree. I owe a couple of observations from my standpoint. First of all, well done for getting out of sales before you were 21. I wish I'd done the same. I know you're still into sales. Everybody's in sales to a certain degree, regardless of what they do. Number two, that fight. That seems like an inflection point in your life, right From the description of what as to how you kind of put it out there in terms of your background and history. Everything up to that point was going down a path that would perhaps would not have shaped your future as it has done today if that, if that particular fight, hadn't happened. So, as much as it sounds horrific, in many respects it's probably kind of shaped your life to a certain extent, right? Or something happened at that point in time where you thought I've got to do something different.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think I was also fed up as well. So I believe in those trauma points and so forth, but I don't dwell on those. And particularly in the lab as well, when you do clinical development experiments and when you face with talent management. There's some hard issues there and you take some hits, but you don't dwell upon them. I'm also a big believer in that.
Speaker 3:When it comes to management as well, or even outlook, I think as a society we look too much on the, you know, or this guy is driven or that woman is driven because of their background. So I don't think it comes down to that. I think it just comes down to certain individuals, certain choices you make and you just get on with it. And that also shocked me at one stage of Oxford, because at Harvard I'm not saying, you know, you had a very diverse background at sometimes even, but the system shapes people. So, hey, I done it for 30 years this way. This is how the next generation should do it, or this is how clinical development should do it. And then something comes like the pandemic and it shifts people's minds. But you know, everyone's bright enough at this game to realize that you might have not. You don't need a serious trauma to actually do something different.
Speaker 1:I also I like your realization that the system is false. And that's once you've had that realization that you you cannot help but see other patterns and other ways of short cutting the system. I recognize that completely from having done things much faster in certain circumstances and then you realize, wow, well, if everyone kind of realized that this can also work, our industry would be completely different. But I would be curious to hear more about in which ways have you seen that maybe the academic process is lending itself to be short-cutted?
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, first of all, big picture thinking why kids in tech I'm not saying it's bad or in other spaces, at 21, 22, 23, raising hundreds of millions of pounds or dollars for their kind of ventures? And you know, kids or you know I call kids, but you know young adults have to be 27, 28, 30, maybe even 14 now, after two postdocs, to get a couple of million to execute a possible idea and drug discovery. It's crazy, because then what happens is you do put pressures on someone's social life or their work life balance to see where it goes Right. So I think as academia, biotech, as a Western system, we need to say how can we put more money in the hands of really talented people or driven people at a young age to actually make the mistakes? Because sometimes we think, oh, this science thing is so hard that we need so much experience. No, it's not. You really need to put more money in the hands of people who are younger stage. If we do it in other fields, we have to do it here in this field.
Speaker 3:And the problem is, you know we had very prestigious fellowship saying, oh, we do that, but no, you don't. It's still within a structure of a fellowship or a mentor. You go off here, you do, it's still in a postdoc structure or a biotech catalyst structure, so forth. How do we disrupt that system and say, hey, go raise a venture fund, like you know the tech industry, like the AI industry, and make some mistakes and do something innovative and maybe do it pre-PhD or doing your PhD? Can a PhD scholarship now that has a biotech and academia kind of module, which they do? Say, hey, instead of giving us a scholarship, can you give us a 10 million grant so we run it like a small biotech in drug discovery and then get mentors around them, Maybe teams, so you give teams of people PhDs. You know what can we do different? Because I truly believe you've got to put more money in the younger people's hands in academia quicker, because the old thoughts are not doing it any quicker.
Speaker 2:And what's the reaction being from people when you've suggested this different approach, Pradeep?
Speaker 3:I get shut doors and so forth. Hence I've given up in terms of changing the system. You can only influence what you can do, right. And so my approach was hey, let me start my own business, build verticals, get cash flow and then start maybe acquiring into biotech in five years time and then change the space where I can, if I can. So that's been my approach. I've never forgotten the science and my passion for it. But how can I do it different and come back to it? Yeah, it's very hard in a space when you learn certain things and you're expert. I used to say to my lesser manager team that don't high experts, high expertise two different things Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Go ahead, Zana I wanted to go back to the experimentation and numbers game point, because I have myself successfully applied that method. Whenever something seemed impossible or there are many doors that were shut, then you just send out lots of messages or lots of applications and then someone always bites. It may be number 47, it may be number 200, but just keeping at it. But I feel like a lot of the way that we teach our young adults or larger children is that they need to be very narrow in what they select and what they pick. They need to focus, focus, focus. So when you have applied, this numbers game approach.
Speaker 1:What kind of reactions did you see?
Speaker 3:A lot of failures and rejections. Each number was a learning point. I always say rejection is a very important thing. But rejection is a misconceived conception or perception. Someone's perceived you or your application the wrong way around. How do you fix that and go back so you learn that as well? And that was in the lab every day, where you felt experiment. That was in clinical trials. Even when you write to orthopedics or elsewhere and say, hey, can I have some samples to make that clinical trial better? Can we go to phase one, phase two? This way you get rejections as a team, as a corporation as well. So how do you go back and fix that and what is the feedback? Eventually, something will go right if you keep going. But then you go to narrow, narrow, narrow sometimes. But you've got to see the broader picture. If it's not working, you just have to go with the flow and make some slight changes to the path.
Speaker 2:I have a comment about how you describe China. So you've moved to China, you're working in academia in China. Based on your description of that, it sounded like things moved quicker. Or perhaps the system is set up differently in China versus some of the challenges you just described in terms of our current system. Could you elaborate a little bit more on that, pradeep, please? Yeah, sure.
Speaker 3:So let me talk about a big picture thinking and then going to nitty gritty. I think, as scientists or workers or whatever we do the politics different from where we are. I was obsessed with getting my drugs to market or publishing the data and the ideas I had. Most people in this species are in the same driven way in terms of science. They want to do some good stuff for their own species, discover drugs and so forth. Let the politician and the big game pictures play their games. I'm sure that game is necessary in some aspects as well, right? So when I landed in China, I saw hungry individuals and nation or local governments who were like us and our governments in the West, maybe 50, 60, 100 years ago developing academia, developing R&D, developing the society and so forth and getting more patent, getting more IP, and that's their place in history. So I took my talent there to accelerate my talent and also accelerate drug discovery. So you've got to understand the scope of history and where countries are at and their hunger for R&Ds appetites not higher. So they'll spend more money to attract the talent and also, everyone is more willing to collaborate quicker.
Speaker 3:This notion of there's no red tape and it's cutting corners, it's nonsense. There's a lot of red tape and there's a lot of formalities, by the way, in China, and they do very rigorous testing and so forth but what I see is the ability to do the paperwork and admin quicker, because there's a lot more stuff dedicated to those places. A lot more people understand hey, this is my role, this is my position, this is where I turn up and get this done. And also there is hierarchical structure where you say, hey, if you need samples or if you need clinical trials, you shifted to those areas and do those areas. So maybe a hospital in Chengdu or Nanjing specialized in this, they're already set up to get samples and people into the system and they're already. So it's like you don't need paperwork or time to do certain things. You submit and it's time to go straight away.
Speaker 3:So I think that's there. It's almost having a pre-ordained or set up already there to go. I think that's very healthy. In different spaces, by the way, we just did in the Australopoietic, we've done cancer, we've done immunology and so forth. So that's very important, I felt. And then the actual funds to move funds was quicker. You didn't have to wait, the money's released. It's like a business now If I have a loan for my business or a startup. I need the funds quicker. It's really quicker, the reagents and the notions are really quicker and it's always there. So those little things make a huge difference. I think it comes down to appetite and the ability to move and get things done.
Speaker 1:I would be curious to hear your thoughts on. You can say the whole ecosystem of how we conduct science, because it seems like you're suggesting that there's too little info of money in the early stages where we have younger researchers trying things. But does this also translate to you can say the whole model for how we expect to develop new drugs?
Speaker 3:Yes, yes, so drug discovery there's a high failure rate, as we all know, and there'll be a lot of iterations going forward in terms of how AI and other things play technology in reducing that failure rate. But in the end of the game it comes down to a bigger numbers game. But how do we empower it's accept failure. But how do we make it quicker? In the Western world? I also think because we have so much talent, because we might have compared to if there's five PhDs now we have 2000 PhDs going. Now how do we tell people, hey, 1,995, you might belong in a different field, but the five talent we give them all much enough money to go and explore and go and do some failures at a higher rate. I think that because sometimes I think we're producing too many PhDs, but hey, give them a PhD, but give them options to go somewhere else as well.
Speaker 3:I think that also is a failure on our rate as well. I think there's no nitty-gritty technological advance or there's no ability to do the science on the bench. That we need to change. But I think it's a whole system approach in the West. We need to change to accelerate that and truly really I keep banging on this point get the money to younger people at the cooking stage and let them fail and let them drop out. Hey saying hey, I failed, I dropped out, I'm going in. Businesses like that, right Tech, goes through a lot of burn out rate, but then they go and do something else as well because they're learning. By the way, there's some data suggesting that a lot of early business entrepreneur failures actually go on to have successful careers later on, so I think that's also important as well.
Speaker 1:How was the acceptance of failure in China? Because that is something we struggle with in the West. Failure is still stigmatized, especially in academia.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think there is a very safe-face culture in China, but it's a good kind of dialogue as well, where failure on the lower level is okay, it's fine. Failure at large scale is still looked upon like hey, where can we go wrong? But in the sciences I didn't see much of that going on. I felt like, yeah, you can fail, you can do certain things, as long as you report it and come back, and also, if it's failing, it's fine, you should publish it. By the way, negative data is good data, because then you're telling other people not to go there, and that's another problem. We don't publish enough negative data out there. There's drawers and drawers and tables full of negative data. I'm sure that's not being published.
Speaker 1:I would also like to dive into the thing you mentioned before About learning versus studying, that you enjoy learning but you don't like studying. Can you elaborate on the difference between the two?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, look, we all need to study for our degrees and master's degrees and so forth, if we only got the specialized area right. But then when you do a PhD, there's no actual regular studying. It's actually failure and learning in the lab. It's fascinating how we have to study so much to get to a point at the PhD level where we have to learn and fail and business now is like that, life is like that. So I don't think we equip enough people to learn how to fail and the difference between learning and failing.
Speaker 3:I'm learning from my failures, but studying allows you to study and answer certain questions in the right manner to get the right grades. I think that's wrong as well. How do we empower practical learning and how do we empower practical studying? I think that's very important. Can we get, you know, can we get first or second year degree students just to do a first or second year kind of PhD where they set up their own experiments and go on fail? You know people say it's resource problem and so forth. But well, if you think you have a system where you can identify talent at 18 and 19 due to A levels and GCSEs and everything, well then, collect those and give them money, and give them resources and a PhD instructor very early and let them fail if you have so much trust in your system.
Speaker 1:I love that concept Identifying talent by letting people fail and learn from their mistakes early on. That would be revolutionary.
Speaker 3:Yeah, particularly with the fees they charge now across the UK and the US as well. And how do you get more neurodiversity as well, you know, and accept certain things and not kind of pre-ordain or judge someone because of their background, you know? I think that's very important as well.
Speaker 2:Pratik, you went to some pretty highly coveted establishments in terms of Harvard, oxford, imperial. Did you see any kind of? Do people look at your background and your educational background pre-going to those establishments and question, look, is this guy the right fit for what we're doing here?
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely, but I didn't give a monkeys.
Speaker 2:That still exists. That still exists today, right.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, absolutely. I don't you know the UK. Anywhere I go, I don't think racism is an issue as much as it used to be. They might they just suggest this institutionalized racism, but I think, as a biologist scientist, it's very hard to nullify that because we're creatures from the African plains and patent recognitions is ingrained in us. So if it's not our kind of kind or tribe, we have to recognize patents. That's how we survive. But how does education, exposure, experience nullify that patent expression? That's the key, right? And I think it comes down to what I feel is not racism but classism. And how do you defeat that? I think that's the now big question in the West. How do you defeat classism and so forth? Because sometimes you know, I walk in rooms, I can sense it, but I think I think your monkeys, because that's down to my probably confidence and self-esteem and I went around with my goals and say, hey, I don't have the same cards, but I know exactly my strengths and I'm going to play to those.
Speaker 3:But as a manager and as a recruiter and as a top-level executive, you can play neurodiversity, but you need to deal with the talents. That's there and the data suggests that successful talented people come from successful, talented backgrounds. It's not this Hollywood script where everyone gets a stressful life and then everyone becomes successful. It doesn't work like that. So you have to deal with the people and talent there. At the same time. You're going to promote neurodiversity. So it's a fine balance and you're going to work with both.
Speaker 1:Do you think that we could achieve more inclusion of neurodiversity if we had this more experimenting approach to science?
Speaker 3:Yes, empower younger people at the younger stage. You're always going to have pockets of deprivation and poverty, no matter where you go in the world, even in the West. But getting more people exchanged in science programs at a young age, exposing them, is very important Because you're going to have very driven, ambitious, select individuals who click and get razor focused obsession, saying hey, I might not come from the background, but I love this thing and I'm going to go all ahead. The whole point is not to hold people's hands. The whole point is to expose them to a possibility and let go. That's the whole point. That's why I do podcast, that's why I do outreaches and so forth.
Speaker 3:It's not to hold someone's another Asian kids hands or another working class English purpose. They say this is what I've done Expose and let go. I'm not even going to mentor your, consult yourself or expose them, and that comes down to clinical trials as well. If you can expose a young kid or young adult to the possibility and let go and give them the funds, then you let them do their own thing. Because, after what it comes down to the individuals drive and passion as well. And, by the way, this thing about passion only a very few people are very passionate because it takes a lot of emotional drive. I always say don't expect passion from everyone, expect them to expect to pay, because emotional drive is what drives passion and that's very rare. So if you expose the people, you're going to let them go with their own passion.
Speaker 2:I wonder, pradeep, if you've got any thoughts about why and you touched upon this earlier with when it comes to tech people are happy to sort of throw money at people at a younger level and, to your point, take more risks. Why is there that difference between tech and then the life sciences? Is it because tech come at this from not having all of these systems and the history in place that the life sciences has? Or is it something to do with the returns? I don't know. They're just wondering on why that is.
Speaker 3:And also your question is boasting system and returns. Okay, returns from a investors point of view, even a SaaS business that can be upscaled and exited for 10 or 12 times multiples is bigger, right. So the PE firms, vc firms, will take that gamble. And also then it comes on the systems where people like to see MDs and PhDs and MDs and PhDs in the back of names for them to invest in biotechs. But then they like to see experience, maybe preclinical data, maybe a pattern which takes ages preclinical data. How do you do that if you don't expertise? So you have all these boxes to tick and then you have to, you know, get favorable professors or favorable establishments and that, like you and I, can back your data. And all that takes time and effort. Compared to tech, where you can do a pitch deck with some data as well and maybe some few sales, you know some pre-revenue and that's it. You're good to go. And with drug discovery, it's a huge failure rate and there's no revenue to show until you do the latter stage. One thing to say is that what we can. I think what's important is that you can jump this hurdle If a professor or a biotech or someone believes or someone knows it's a group of individuals or talented individual. What you can say is, hey, we have some data here that we don't know what to do with. With this, we think you have the talent. Go and do a pitch and get some money to follow up.
Speaker 3:So there's a lot of avenues. People are not going. People say, oh, that's the PhD scholarship route, yeah, but can you bring more together to actually elevate and raise tens of millions of pounds? Because you need to fail a bit more, and that's very important. And there's another stage how do you get young people to have teams quicker? It's not even raising money as a PhD student, mostly you're.
Speaker 3:You buy the fourth year. You might be responsible for a bachelor's or master's student. You might be responsible for a bachelor's or master's degree, but how do you give PhD students a research assistant or certain teams so they're learning team management at a younger stage, right? So when I was in corporate pharma at the end of it I was in in China, about 600 people. I gave my PhD students and postdoc structure saying hey, one day I want you to lead a lab, be better than I here's people to work with. And I told the research assistant you don't answer to me answer to your students. I said I need that job, maybe get another job, but I need responsible people right talent to have teams at a young age. So they're learning team management at a young age. So it's a funding also talent management we're going to empower for better clinical trials and better outcomes in science and the biological sciences.
Speaker 1:There's also be an aspect of being in a team in general, not just team management, but because PhD students tend to be pretty isolated and do research on their own, and that's not how science happens in pharmaceutical companies. You're always a research team that share results and you get that exposure from different angles. How can we get PhD students to work with like-minded peers earlier?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean that's one of the key aspects I think I succeeded at Oxford than others is that I worked hard in the lab, but I gave myself four to six hours at night to network or even go out, because I realized that even in a place so competitive, there were actually differences because some groups had so much money there were 30 people Some groups in the lab and academia already had four or five biotechs giving them money and I realized that I need to network with this group or this lab or this pharma group that has 30, 40 people, because I saw that in those groups, those students and post-docs and young adults excelled more. So what you need to do is try to get innovation happening from smaller groups and bigger groups and to connect them and to actually speak out. The problem also is that at that stage people don't understand the value of networking or at that stage they're so focused on their thesis or project they don't understand the bigger picture. And you need to understand and tell them hey, here's a PhD structure, but here's also a module for business or module for team management or even days of how to get this across.
Speaker 3:So what you do is do your PhD and eventually some of you will jump into business development. Some of you will do post-docs and be a senior scientist. Then maybe you realize I like sales, business development, but you've got to expose them to certain modules, I believe at a younger stage, and say, hey, you know, you're doing business in biotech, this is how you do merchant acquisitions, this is how you might actually do something. And that comes down to if we give them more money, you can give them more responsibility of just not the science, but the management, finance side and other aspects as well, and also team management, and say you've got to work with these people across the world to get these results because the goals are bigger, because there's more funding.
Speaker 2:I want to take it back to China because I think you gave us a good insight about the academic side of things, but if I recall from your journey, you then went into biotech right in China. Perhaps talk to us a bit about the landscape from the Chinese perspective of working and operating in China as a biotech.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean I had I put my head down, so I had a lot of responsibilities from a young age. What I thought was the facilities are world class. Again, it comes out to hunger and appetite to glow globally. So we did a lot of merchant acquisitions. So I think the emphasis is how do we increase R&D, how do we increase patents, how do we get unique drugs, how do we tackle targets that are diseases that are local to us and also then develop something internationally as well? There's certain capacities that any other country has low capacities and high capacities and areas where we can do and they try to work on those strengths and also address those weaknesses.
Speaker 2:So with Chinese biotechs. To your point, their priority was getting approval in the Chinese market versus looking at it more internationally. Was that a secondary type objective?
Speaker 3:Yes, because that's yes. It's a question, and also it comes down to will the international community actually accept these drugs? Because there's a bias there sometimes. Right, let's be very honest. So that's also another thing. Hey, it happened to me. Where can I go quicker to expose my talent, to get my results? And then if you want to pay attention to my drug or my publication, you do so, because I guarantee if you have a cure for cancer and people are jumping up and down after they're in the hospital, people will take notice in the West or elsewhere and deploy that drug. So where do you get your results quicker and then let others talk about them?
Speaker 2:Okay, as we start to wrap up the podcast for D, we normally ask our guests the same question, and that question is if there was one thing that you could change about our industry, what would that be and why?
Speaker 3:Pre-conceived notions from the establishment. Get money into younger people's hands, give them more responsibility in terms of funds and also talent management, and expose them to business and entrepreneurship, but also make sure that it's in line with the rigorous academia and laboratory and clinical data experiences, and that comes to PhDs and also MDs as well.
Speaker 2:I love asking that question because we get a completely different response from every single audience member and I think whatever the response we get is going to touch different parts of our listener group. So really appreciate that and this has been a fantastic conversation. Pradeep, I know that our listeners are going to want to reach out to you and learn a bit more about you, what you're up to now, and possibly network and connect for future opportunities. So where's the best place for them to connect with you?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so yeah, I'm here to help and serve. So PK Sasi Darin is my Twitter, instagram, facebook handles and my full name Pradeep Kumar Sasi Darin on LinkedIn. I actually try to get back to everyone that emails me or inbox me. I'm sorry if I'm a bit slow, but, yeah, please do reach out If you have any ideas to collaborate or if you need any help.
Speaker 2:Brilliant Thanks, pradeep, really appreciate it.
Speaker 3:Thank you very much, guys. So super exciting, Very unique podcast. Thank you All the best Thank you.
Speaker 1:You're listening to Transformation in Trials. If you have a suggestion for a guest for our show, reach out to Sam Parnell or Ivana Rosendale on LinkedIn. You can find more episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or in any other player. Remember to subscribe and get the episodes hot off the editor.