Founder Stories: Bringing back industrial biotech with Pratish of Ardra Bio

What happened to the biotech industrial revolution? Not long ago we thought synthetic biology would completely change industrial biotech, only to see a string of failed companies unable to bring innovation from the lab to market. Pratish Gawand, CEO of Ardra Bio, is tackling this challenge and focused on bringing natural products to market with novel synthetic pathways that can make the promise of synthetic biology a reality.

A: Tell me about your background, how did you get interested in the biotech space?

P: I’ve always been interested in biology and chemistry, and wanted to do something that would combine those worlds which is where biotech came in. I used to work in fermentation, food and bioprocessing back in India. Though I was really interested in Molecular Biology, I did not get a chance to work on that in India, so I moved to Canada to go to the University of Toronto to get a PhD in Metabolic Engineering.

Entrepreneurship came in when I started thinking about the bigger impact I wanted to have. It came down to taking ideas from the lab into the real world, rather than just publishing papers.

A: How does that tie into the origins of Ardra?

P: In 2011 I went to Bio World Congress in Toronto that which really took my interest in entrepreneurship to the next level. I think this was actually the turning point to inspire my leaving academia to go into industry. I was seeing a lot of companies get started and raise money, which made me want to go down that path. I started thinking about what impact I could be making and got support from my advisor, so I came up with a novel pathway for an important molecule that would meet an unmet need.

A: So what’s that unmet need and problem you’re working to solve with Ardra?

P: We’re focusing on making bio-based chemicals for sectors of industry that want natural ingredients, and we’re going after flavors, fragrances, and cosmetics because we think it’s underserved. There’s a big problem with how to make and extract ingredients from plants which I think biology can solve. Rather than make commodity chemicals, which it turned out biotech couldn’t really do yet at profit, we’re staying focused on specialty chemicals.

A: You mentioned problems with using plant biology for these chemicals, how does your approach differ?

P: Plants are limited by constraints of yield and scale. Industry has created solutions based on these same plant pathways, just in yeast. Naturally, the constraints don’t change since pathways are all the same. We’re taking a totally different approach by engineering totally new designer pathways that are engineered to be more efficient, give higher yields, are more suitable for scale up, and can make multiple products.

A: This seems like a pretty difficult sector, what makes the natural chemicals you’re targeting worth going after?

P: We see a big consumer-driven trend towards natural ingredients and industry is listening and moving that way too. Big companies are pouring money into really difficult projects with a low likelihood of success so this is a big signal that they really care. If we can crack this problem we see a huge market and a lot of partners we can work with to scale and get to consumers fast.

Seeing all the challenges small startups have, I’ve realized we need to be open with our product and tech in order to engage potential partners early. This industry is struggling and filled with dead companies that tried to do everything on their own. We understand how difficult the technology is and that one startup can’t go from the lab to commercial scale alone. Collaboration is so important. We’re trying to initiate communication to build trust and collaboration early. In some ways it’s changing the culture of this industry. A lot of the next generation of biotechs are leaning towards a more open approach, which is something we really embrace in order to optimize pathways, scale up, and get to market.

A: How do you think success can change your industry?

P: So I mentioned how much this industry is struggling so we think success can have industry-wide implications, rather than just impacting flavors, fragrances and cosmetics. A lot of people see this as a dead industry. We, and other startups in the space, are trying to restore faith in industrial biotech’s ability to make a difference. If we succeed we’ll show that industrial biotech can solve real world problems.

A: How is your team able to tackle this? What’s the expertise?

P: Jonas, the CSO of Ardra, and I understand this challenge really well. We have over two decades combined of experience in metabolic engineering and bioprocessing. We’re both scientists at the core, and can support each other even though we have a clear demarcation of roles. We function really well as a team since we’ve always been well-aligned on goals and can push the science and business sides together smoothly.

A: Is there any signal that would validate all the work you two are doing?

P: It’s really just seeing people buy the product, which shows that we’re solving this problem. I’ve seen a lot of companies raise money in this space without actually delivering anything. Raising money is not a real validation of a successful business, customer interest is. We really want to make something that people want and having corporate partners interested in what we’re making was big validation and showed we’re creating products that give tangible value.

A: What are the big goals and milestones you’re looking to hit in the short term? Long term?

P: Short term, we’re trying to scale up into large production facilities. We want to go into demonstration scale facilities of 20,000–30,000 liter fermenters which would bring us revenue and to market. Long term, we want to change the flavors and fragrances industry. Industrial biotech can bring natural ingredients to market, and we want to see natural ingredients dominate this sector, which is now petroleum based.

You can reach Pratish at pratish.gawand@ardrabio.com

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Tune into our livestream to see Pratish pitch at Demo Day on July 14th