Biotech Hangout

On this week’s episode, Graig Suvannavejh, Paul Matteis, Brian Skorney, Yaron Werber, and Jake Becraft opened with a look at the biotech market, with the XBI down roughly 700 basis points in two weeks but still up about 20% year to date. The IPO window remains open, though M&A has quieted. The co-hosts then discussed degrossing, overviewing a Goldman Sachs report that showed degrossing at the...

On this week's episode, Graig Suvannavejh, Sam Fazeli, Eric Schmidt, and Brian Skorney open with a look at the public markets, noting the XBI is up 27% year-to-date but down about 9% since its August high. The co-hosts then touched on Oura's pulled IPO, seeing little read-through for the broader biotech space. In deals, Sanofi and Regeneron extended their antibody collaboration for $1 bill...

On this week's episode, Sam Fazeli, Yaron Werber, Brian Skorney, and Matt Gline open with the IPO market, noting record average raise sizes even as XBI softens. The group turns to policy, unpacking newly FOIA-disclosed details of Pfizer's MFN agreement, including a revenue-share provision tied to price increases abroad. The co-hosts call the equalization concept constructive but warn cash-...

On this week's episode, Josh Schimmer, Eric Schmidt, Paul Matteis, and guest Adam Feuerstein open with the OpenAI/Hugging Face AI agent controversy, debating whether calls for AI regulation reflect genuine safety concern or capital rotating out of biotech into AI. Turning to markets, the group describes a choppy September for biotech, driven more by rate jitters and a quiet M&A backdrop th...

On this week's episode, Tess Cameron, Brian Skorney, Paul Matteis, and Yaron Werber open with a look at markets, noting the XBI slipped just over 3% amid concerns about energy prices, inflation, and long-term U.S. fiscal health weighing on the rate-sensitive sector. The conversation then turns to policy, discussing new FDA leadership appointments including Karim Mikhail as CBER director, with...

On this week's episode, Daphne Zohar, Eric Schmidt, Sam Fazeli, and Graig Suvannavejh open with a strong week for biotech, partially driven by M&A, noting it's already past 2025's full-year total. The group turns to Moderna, whose melanoma cancer vaccine data sent shares up nearly 200% and stirred some mixed feelings from investors. Contrastly, BioNTech's decision to halt its c...

On this week's episode, Chris Garabedian, Graig Suvannavejh, Paul Matteis, and Tess Cameron open with the biotech market. They describe 2026 as strong but discerning, with 19 Nasdaq IPOs this year and generalist investors still not fully back. The co-hosts also cover recent launches and raises, including Boulevard Bio's launch with Deerfield backing and Epicrispr's $90 million Series C...

On this week’s episode, Sam Fazeli, Brian Skorney, Yaron Werber, and Strand Therapeutics CEO Jake Becraft open with the wave of dealmaking and a solid Q2 earnings season, then turn to the reports of the potential AstraZeneca/Bristol Myers merger, which the group called “more smoke than fire.” Next, as the trend of reverse mergers continues, the co-hosts note they’re increasingly well-received as a...

On this week's episode, Graig Suvannavejh, Tim Opler, Yaron Werber, Paul Matteis, and Brian Skorney kicked off with a review of the market, noting pressure in the XBI despite a longer-term bounce-back from trough levels, though they see biotech fundamentals as largely intact. The group also discussed the trend of reverse mergers as an alternative to traditional IPOs, along with AI's expans...

On this week's episode, Josh Schimmer, Brian Skorney, Eric Schmidt, and Brad Loncar kick off with IPOs and raises, including Scribe's IPO, the first preclinical biotech IPO since the COVID era, which priced in a modest but upsized deal. The group also covers Mentari's additional $200 million raise ahead of its reverse merger with InMed, leading the co-hosts to question if reverse merge...

On today’s episode, Yaron Werber, John Maraganore, Sam Fazeli, and Matt Gline open with a discussion of biotech market volatility, with Matt noting that it often seems driven more by opaque factor dynamics than company-specific fundamentals. The group then turns to Eli Lilly’s continued “Amazonification” and reinventing the pharma business as it acquires a variety of different companies, including...

On this week's episode, Sam Fazeli, Josh Schimmer, Eric Schmidt, Paul Matteis, and special guest STAT's Matt Herper open on the market, noting that despite a wobbly day for biotech, the XBI holds strong gains year-to-date. The conversation turns to FDA transparency, where the co-hosts flag that CRLs haven't been released since April and that the agency may be walking back that practice...

On this week’s episode, Josh Schimmer, Eric Schmidt, Tess Cameron, and Sam Fazeli open by noting the XBI’s continued rise, debating whether biotech is getting ahead of itself. The co-hosts call this a “new era” in which biotech can be profitable rather than sold off to pharma. The conversation shifts to deals, with AbbVie’s $10.9 billion acquisition of Apogee, which raised questions about China-so...

On this week’s episode, Graig Suvannavejh, Eric Schmidt, Paul Matteis and Financial Times’ Oliver Barnes kicked off with the biotech market, with the XBI in positive territory and 12 biotech IPOs completed so far this year. They expected the IPO window to remain open for high-quality private companies. The group also overviewed recent financings, including SonoThera’s $125 million Series B, City T...

On this week’s episode, Yaron Werber, Tess Cameron, SamFazeli, and Brian Skorney kick off with a look at markets, noting that while AI remains hot, biotech may be cooling amid anticipated tech IPOs. The co-hosts note that biotech saw a significant recovery over the past year driven by M&A and improving sentiment, highlighting that the XBI has remained remarkably stable. The discussion then tur...

On this week’s episode, Chris Garabedian, Brian Skorney, Graig Suvannavejh, and special guest Ginkgo Bioworks CEO, Jason Kelly, kick off with a market update, highlighting a continued positive sentiment, citing Endpoints’ recent Biopharma Sentiment Index survey results, which showed improvements in biopharma conditions. The co-hosts also note the continued IPO activity, including Kardigan’s recent...

On this week’s episode, Sam Fazeli, Josh Schimmer, Eric Schmidt, and Tess Cameron kickoff with deals, highlighting the up to $15.2B Hengrui–BMS partnership and the broader trend of outsourcing early-stage drug development to China. The discussion continues with the co-hosts noting China’s edge in speed, quality, and cost-efficiency, while underscoring that the strength of U.S. capital markets rema...

On this week’s episode, Josh Schimmer, Paul Matteis, Eric Schmidt, Yaron Werber, and special guest STAT’s Allison DeAngelis open with what they describe as “a bananas week for biotech,” highlighting strong substantial secondary offerings, including Cytokinetics and Avalo Therapeutics. The conversation then turns to M&A, with multiple new deals announced in Q1 and continued activity this week,...

On this week’s episode, Eric Schmidt, Matt Gline, Chris Garabedian, Sam Fazeli, and Graig Suvannavejh open with a discussion on biotech public‑market dynamics, noting solid year‑to‑date performance for the XBI. Next, the group highlights the reopening of the IPO window, with multiple upsized offerings and strong aftermarket performance, supported by renewed generalist investor interest. The conver...

On today’s episode, Chris Garabedian, Paul Matteis, Tess Cameron, and special guest Adam Feuerstein kick off with a discussion of the public markets, highlighting the XBI’s post‑pandemic highs, Kailera’s IPO pricing and more than $625 million raised, the opening of the IPO window with multiple filings, and increasing generalist interest in the biotech sector. The group also discusses Obsidian Ther...

On this week’s episode, Graig Suvannavejh, Josh Schimmer, Yaron Werber, Sam Fazeli, and special guest Financial Times journalist Oliver Barnes kick off by highlighting the strength of the biotech sector from a public markets perspective, noting the XBI has outperformed the S&P 500 so far this year. The group agrees biotech is in a solid position overall. In policy news, the co‑hosts discuss th...

On this week’s episode, Graig Suvannavejh, Mike Yee, and Eric Schmidt kick off with a look back at biotech deal activity through the first quarter, highlighting a solid, but not overheated, M&A environment. The group discusses recent transactions, including large, commercially focused deals designed to drive near‑term revenue growth rather than pipeline speculation, particularly Biogen’s $5.6...

On this week’s episode, Grace Colón, Josh Schimmer, Eric Schmidt, and Brian Skorney open with a look at the macro backdrop. With market volatility and interest rate uncertainty, the hosts agree the macro is still “driving the bus,” tempering what might otherwise be stronger bullish sentiment. Even so, biotech continues to demonstrate relative resilience – XBI holding up better than the broader mar...

On this week’s episode, Sam Fazeli, Josh Schimmer, Paul Matteis, and Graig Suvannavejh kick off with a discussion on the impact of current geopolitics on biotech investor sentiment, noting that biotech is fundamentally insulated from oil prices and emphasizing that the sector is becoming cash‑flow positive at a pace not previously seen. Shifting to regulatory news, the group discusses Vinay Prasad...

On this week’s episode, Mike Yee, Eric Schmidt, Matt Gline, and Yaron Werber kick off with a discussion on the sector's resilience amid market volatility, highlighting positive capital markets developments. The fourth quarter of 2025 saw approximately $10 billion in follow-on financing, with the first quarter of 2026 approaching about a $2.5 billion IPO run rate, which would be the highest sin...