AI in Pharmaceutical R&D with Kim Branson

Kim Branson, PhD, SVP and Global Head of AI and Machine Learning for GSK, joins Vijay Pande, founding partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they talk about how AI has improved drug discovery and development, as Kim walks through all the ways AI can be deployed in the lab. They also get into detail about what an ideal partner looks like and what kind of solution is attractive to a big biopharma, making this a particularly relevant episode for builders in biotech AI.

Unleashing CAR T with Carl June

In this episode, Carl June, MD, pioneering immunologist and oncologist at the University of Pennsylvania, joins Jorge Conde, general partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they discuss Carl's work on CAR T, a remarkable story of the first use of CAR T in a pediatric patient, and Carl's take on where oncology treatments are headed next. Though this episode was originally published in September 2023, back when we were called Bio Eats World, we’re republishing it during this year’s ASGCT conferenc...

Longevity as a Health Asset with Tom Hale

Tom Hale, CEO of ŌURA, joins Vijay Pande, founding partner, and Daisy Wolf, investment partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they talk about the potential of wearables to change behavior, and how that can affect health. They also discuss how AI could maximize the usefulness of wearables and power the insights provided to wearers.

The Power of Drug Discovery with Philip Tagari

Philip Tagari, Chief Scientific Officer of insitro, joins Vijay Pande, founding general partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they discuss the transformative power of drugs in changing human health—and history. They also reflect on the evolution of the drug discovery process as it shifts from serendipitous discovery to AI-enabled engineering. Finally, they chat about where the industry is headed, and how AI might change the competition landscape.

AI-Enabled Continuity of Care with Ed and Todd Park

Vijay Pande, founding general partner of a16z Bio + Health, chats with the builders (and siblings) behind Devoted Health, Ed and Todd Park. The Park brothers, with decades of expertise in healthcare and policy, including as EVP and COO at athenahealth (Ed) and Chief Technology Officer of the United States (Todd), started Devoted with the idea of building a healthcare model from scratch. Together, their discussion underscores the sector's urgent need for technological innovation and the game-chan...

Grand Challenges in Healthcare AI with Vijay Pande and Julie Yoo

Vijay Pande, founding general partner, and Julie Yoo, general partner at a16z Bio + Health, come together to talk through the grand challenges facing healthcare AI today. The discussion covers the implications of AI integration in healthcare workflows, AI as a potential catalyst for value-based care, and the potential for innovation in clinical trials. They also talk about the AI startup they each wish would walk through the door.

Adapting Biopharma to AI with Greg Meyers

Greg Meyers, EVP and Chief Digital and Technology Officer at Bristol Myers Squibb (or BMS), joins a16z Bio + Health general partner Jorge Conde. Together, they talk about how AI could transform drug discovery and development at a large biopharma company—and how a company might have to adapt to harness AI; modalities they’re excited about; and Greg’s do’s and don’ts for startups looking to partner with a company like BMS.

Behind the Buy: Payors and Providers on AI Adoption

As any healthcare founder knows, it can be difficult to get into a room with the executives making purchase decisions for payors and providers—so we’re bringing the executives to you. This episode features interviews with payor and provider leaders about what they’re seeing and how they’re thinking about AI. Guided by Julie Yoo, general partner, and Jay Rughani, investment partner at a16z Bio + Health, you'll hear from the executives about how they're utilizing AI, the KPIs they use to gauge eff...

Biotech Revolution with Software Engineering Daily

"There is a revolution unfolding in biotech. The confluence of new biological methods like CRISPR, virtually unlimited computational capacity, and machine learning has fundamentally transformed our ability to engineer biology for wide-ranging applications." Vijay Pande, founding general partner at a16z Bio + Health, joins the Software Engineering Daily podcast to talk about innovation in biotech and healthcare, the biotech startup landscape, the impact of AI, and much more. You can see a transcr...

Dark Genome Hunting with Rosana Kapeller and Marty Taylor

Rosana Kapeller, CEO of Rome Therapeutics, and Marty Taylor, physician-scientist at Harvard Medical School, join Vineeta Agarwala, general partner, and Bryan Faust, investment partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they discuss Rosana and Marty's recent publication regarding a virus-like element in our genome known as LINE-1. LINE-1, part of our "dark genome," was ignored as junk DNA for years, but is increasingly recognized to contribute to the pathology of autoimmunity, cancer, neurodegenerat...

DNA as Data Storage with Vijay Pande

Vijay Pande, founding partner of a16z Bio + Health, dives deep with a16z Podcast host Steph Smith into the potential of DNA as a data storage mechanism. This episode, a cross-post with the a16z Podcast, draws parallels between Moore's Law and the race for "Moore's Law for DNA." Vijay discusses the density, longevity, and ubiquity of DNA, and how this could be leveraged into a data storage solution. Vijay and Steph mix technical advancements with futuristic speculation as they talk about what the...

The Most Interesting Healthcare Companies You've Never Heard Of with Julie Klapstein

Julie Klapstein, founding CEO of Availity, long-time healthcare executive, and a16z Bio + Health's newest advisory partner, joins Julie Yoo, general partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they delve into Julie Klapstein's rich career journey, which has spanned several decades of progress in healthcare. They also discussed building Availity, her time at MultiPlan, and the network effects undergirding both businesses. Finally, they talk about how AI could impact healthcare—for payors, providers, ...

CRISPR by Design with Benjamin Oakes

Scribe Therapeutics cofounder and CEO Benjamin Oakes, PhD, joins a16z Bio + Health founding general partner Vijay Pande. In this episode, Benjamin traces his journey from PhD student to pioneering CEO in genome editing. Benjamin discusses his early exposure to CRISPR technologies, his hands-on experience of transforming these bacterial immune systems into "genome editing scalpels," and the founding of Scribe. The conversation sheds light on the challenges of engineering these molecules, as well ...

Metrics for a Complex Machine with Josh Clemente

Josh Clemente, cofounder and president of Levels, joins Vijay Pande, founding general partner, and Daisy Wolf, investment partner at a16z Bio + Health. In this episode, engineer-turned-entrepreneur Josh charts his journey from SpaceX and Hyperloop to cofounding metabolic health-focused company Levels. With a relentless drive for data-led health monitoring, Josh highlights the potential of wearable tech for tracking various biomarkers. Josh, Vijay, and Daisy also discuss how AI can simplify compl...

Transitioning From Gymnast to Investor with Aly Raisman

Former gymnast and current investor Aly Raisman joins general partner Julie Yoo and investment partner Daisy Wolf of a16z Bio + Health. In this episode, Aly Raisman shares her quest for healthier living—physically, mentally and financially—on her journey from gymnast to a business investor. Having herself transitioned from an intensely structured routine, Aly emphasizes the need for more open conversations about mental health and financial literacy. She speaks passionately about the gap in women...

Finding PMF in Healthcare (After Tasting it Elsewhere) with Eren Bali and Max Cohen

Max Cohen, cofounder and CEO of Sprinter Health, and Eren Bali, founder and CEO of Carbon Health, join Julie Yoo, general partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, they talk about becoming healthcare entrepreneurs despite non-healthcare backgrounds and what they had to learn along the way. They also discuss finding product-market fit, how they track PMF using KPIs, and the evolving investor landscape as the digital health space expands and matures. Additional reading: Digital Health Builder Diarie...

IRA, AI Regulation, and the Future with Joe Grogan

In this episode, Joe Grogan, a senior fellow at the Leonard D. Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics and a former senior government official, joins Vijay Pande, founding partner of a16z Bio + Health to discuss all things regulation. Together, they dive into Joe’s experience working in the early days of the Covid pandemic, how he thinks about the Inflation Reduction Act’s effect on pharmaceutical R&D, and the future of AI regulation. Additional reading: Check out Joe's latest op-ed her...

Drag & Drop Genome Editing

Today's episode features the CEO of Tome Biosciences, Rahul Kakkar, alongside John Finn, CSO of Tome. They are joined by Jorge Conde, general partner at a16z Bio + Health. Together, the three of them discuss the technology underlying Tome's work, known as PASTE, a genome editing technique. They also dive deep into how this technology could be applied to help patients, making cell therapy more accessible for more people. Editorial note: We mistakenly identified Rahul Kakkar and John Finn as the c...

Past, Present, and Future of AI with Vijay Pande

Bio Eats World is now Raising Health! Vijay Pande, founding partner of Bio + Health, is joined by Daphne Koller, Andrew Ng, Aviv Regev, and Jakob Uszkoreit. Vijay leads us on a reflective journey through the monumental achievements in AI from the 1980s to today, with a focus on the progress in healthcare and life sciences. This episode is drawn from the episodes we recorded in 2023 with Daphne Koller, Andrew Ng, Aviv Regev, and Jakob Uszkoreit, which are linked below. This blend of expert commen...

Fireside Chat with Sean Duffy

Bio Eats World is now Raising Health! On this first episode of Raising Health, Sean Duffy, cofounder and CEO of Omada Health, joins Vijay Pande, founding partner of Bio + Health. Sean and Vijay discuss the building and growth of Omada, from the early days to now. As the cofounder of one of the original digital health companies, Sean has unique insight into the growth of both the digital health field and the changing venture capital environment. They also talk about the future of AI, how Omada is...

Introducing: Raising Health

Generalist Medical AI with Pranav Rajpurkar

Pranav Rajpurkar, PhD, joins Vijay Pande, founding partner of a16z Bio + Health. In this episode, Pranav and Vijay discuss a future with generalist medical AI. This is the idea of a medical AI that isn’t narrowly tailored to one specific task. As Pranav notes in the episode, the research and development process in medical AI development so far has been siloed by specialty, but generalist medical AI exists outside those siloes. If generalist medical AI is successful, it could act as a dynamic sup...

Gate Unveiling with Jordi Mata-Fink

Jordi Mata-Fink, PhD, cofounder of Gate Bioscience, joins Vineeta Agarwala and Ben Portney of a16z Bio + Health. In this episode, Jordi discusses how he and his cofounders are working to commercialize a novel class of therapeutics, termed 'molecular gates.' His company, Gate, is working to exploit a previously uncharted avenue in cell biology—the secretory translocon—for therapeutic intervention. This approach has the potential to combat diseases otherwise resistant to existing therapeutics. Jor...

How to Build an AI-Native Health Plan with Mario Schlosser

Mario Schlosser, cofounder, former CEO, and current President of Technology at Oscar Health, joins Julie Yoo of Bio + Health. The conversation explores how AI advancements can revolutionize traditional healthcare models by enhancing efficiency, personalizing care journeys, and integrating real-time data insights. Mario also discusses "benefit-less" benefit designs, where healthcare plans learn from and adapt to individual consumer patterns, at least theoretically leading to the holy grail of bet...

Bridging AI, Ethics, and Consumer Trust with Miriam Vogel

Miriam Vogel, President and CEO of EqualAI, cohost of the podcast In AI We Trust?, and Chair of the National AI Advisory Committee, joins Vijay Pande of Bio + Health. Miriam offers pragmatic insights for founders on ethical integration of AI. She also outlines concrete steps to build trustworthy AI. Finally, she discusses the regulatory landscape and the state of politics around AI today.

Clinical Copilots: Augmenting Human Care with Suchi Saria

AI trailblazer Suchi Saria, in conversation with Vijay Pande, sheds light on the winding path that led her to launch Bayesian Health, a bold effort to infuse intelligence into clinical workflows. With infectious optimism, Suchi describes her vision to create "clinical copilots" that augment human capabilities and unburden care teams. Yet she acknowledges the delicate balancing act required to implement AI ethically, emphasizing the need for continuous monitoring and oversight to build trust. For...

The Worlds She Sees with Fei-Fei Li

Fei-Fei Li, PhD, Professor in the Computer Science Department at Stanford University, and Co-Director of Stanford’s Human-Centered AI Institute, joins Bio + Health founding partner Vijay Pande. In this candid conversation, Li unfolds her transformation from a young immigrant to an influential figure in AI. The conversation explores the birth of ImageNet, a pivotal step that bridged the gap between visual intelligence and accessible AI technology. They delve into the notion of a 'Dignity Economy,...

Supercharging Discovery with Evan Feinberg

Evan Feinberg, PhD, founder and CEO at Genesis Therapeutics, joins Vijay Pande of Bio + Health. Together, they talk about how Evan’s work in the lab (ironically, Vijay's lab at Stanford!) translated to the creation of Genesis, which is tackling the problem of drug discovery through AI. They also discuss how the Genesis team is building specifically to carry on work at the intersection of ML, biotech, and chemistry.

Evolving Biotechnologies with Olga Troyanskaya

Olga Troyanskaya, a professor in the department of computer science at Princeton and Deputy Director for Genomics at the Flatiron Institute's Center for Computational Biology, joins Vijay Pande, founding partner of a16z Bio + Health. Together, they talked about Olga's background and how she got involved in genomics, as well as how evolving biotechnologies have improved scientists’ ability to see different views of the cell. They also discussed social determinants of health, and how, in the futur...

CMO vs. CPO with Peter Shalek and Reena Pande

Peter Shalek, a Chief Product Officer, currently at Stellar Health and formerly at AbleTo, and Reena Pande, currently a strategic advisor and formerly the Chief Medical Officer of AbleTo, join Julie Yoo and Justin Larkin of a16z Bio + Health. As Julie mentions during the episode, there’s international relations, and then there’s CMO/CPO relations. Peter and Reena talked about working together to improve their relationship and the outcomes of their teams, and they get granular about what worked a...