Geoff Meyerson, CEO & Co-Founder of Locust Walk, on Building a Global Biotech Advisory Firm

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Geoff Meyerson, CEO & Co-Founder at Locust Walk

In this episode, we sat down with Geoff Meyerson — CEO & Co-Founder at Locust Walk. We discuss Geoff’s extensive life science career, which includes stints in investment banking, venture capital, and business development. We also dive into the founding story and journey of Locust Walk, a global investment bank that integrates corporate development strategy and execution with ​capital raising for innovative life science companies, and hear Geoff’s outlook on the year ahead for biotech.

In our conversation, Geoff and I discussed:

• How “zigging when everyone else zagged” has paid off in his career, especially when co-founding Locust Walk in 2008
• Locust Walk’s growth over its nearly 15-year history, especially around its recent NewCo creation efforts
• The continuous evolution of the biotech industry and his outlook on the biotech markets in 2023 and beyond
• His guidance for current and emerging leaders in biotech

Start to 6:15: Understanding All Sides of the Biotech Deal Table

• On growing up around medicine: Geoff was born and raised in Florida and is the son of a doctor. Growing up around medicine, Geoff was always interested in building a career in life science, though not as a physician.
• On his early career: Geoff started his career in healthcare investment banking at UBS before pursuing his MBA and Masters in Biotechnology at Wharton and U Penn, respectively. Throughout graduate school, Geoff worked in BD at MedImmune (now a subsidiary of AstraZeneca) and VC at SR One, where he worked on eight deals.
• On “zigging when everyone else zagged:” Upon graduation, Geoff decided to join a small biotech, Zelos Therapeutics, instead of returning to a VC role at SR One. Although Zelos ended up folding, Geoff cherished the opportunity to work hard and learn fast.

“Going where everyone else isn’t, I’ve found, has been a successful option. Going to a small biotech company, I learned more in 15 months than most people learn … in a very long time … At that age, I invested in my career over maximizing my compensation.”

6:15 to 8:00: Biotech’s Tremendous Evolution in the Past Decade

• On biotech in the early 2000’s: Back then, the biotech industry wasn’t nearly as developed as it is today. Going public was more restrictive, less institutional capital was available, and technology was much less advanced. Further, the 2008–09 financial crisis taught a tough lesson to those who lived through it: growth can’t be taken for granted.

8:00 to 12:00: Locust Walk’s Founding Story

• On entrepreneurship during the financial crisis: Geoff and Jay (Geoff’s former boss at Zelos) decided to start Locust Walk on the day that Lehman Brothers fell. The original premise was to leverage their operating experience to build an investment bank that also provided consulting services.
• On redefining “risk:” Many within the industry thought they were crazy but looking back, the risk profile wasn’t as skewed as people thought. Geoff recognized that the opportunity cost to him was low given the eventual fate of Zelos and the state of the markets at the time. It ended up being an incredible time to be a life science entrepreneur!

12:00 to 16:00: Locust Walk’s Evolution Into a Global Advisory Firm

• On business development & licensing (BD&L): Geoff explains BD&L as transactions — often between small biotechs and large pharmas — that provide non-dilutive funding to the licensee to fund development. BD&L transactions come in a variety of flavors that enables dealmakers to be creative when structuring transactions.
• On Locust Walk’s expansion of scope: Beyond BD&L transaction advisory, Locust Walk also provided strategic advice on BD strategy and capital raising. The vision for Locust Walk was to be a “merchant bank” that advises, invests in, and even starts companies. Each of these capabilities is unique, but Locust Walk has expanded into each with an added regional focus with offices in the U.S., U.K., and Japan.
• On the unifying theme within Locust Walk: While Locust Walk offers many capabilities and operates across therapeutic areas, the unifying theme is next-gen, “leap forward in medicine,” and non-incremental companies.

“There’s a lot of different flavors and structures [of BD&L transactions]. That’s what makes it fun, there are no rules … because it’s a customized contract. You can do almost anything you want for exchanging value and rights.”

16:00 to 25:00: A New Approach to NewCo Creation

• On formalizing Locust Walk’s NewCo creation effort: Locust Walk helped launch its first NewCo, Garuda Therapeutics, in Fall 2021. This effort, while new to Locust Walk, incorporated elements of its core competencies: strategic advisory, storytelling, and partnering / fundraising prowess. Since then, Locust Walk has launched two additional NewCos where they’ve raised Seed rounds for high science, next-generation breakthrough companies.
• On identifying opportunity areas: Locust Walk has identified two key themes: stem cell biology and next-gen RNA medicine. Their goal is to meet all of the key principal investigators (PI) who have innovations that can be spun into companies and develop deep domain expertise.
• On “go-no go” decisions: Locust Walk has a formula (that they teach in a course!) that emphasizes animal model validation and pathway to IND (i.e., no more than two years away from entering the clinic) leading to a ~$5M Seed round. The subsequent Series A financing would then finance the company to enable the lead candidate to enter the clinic.

“Doing the killer experiment preclinically or early in the clinic is absolutely essential to building value and taking off the biggest risks one at a time.”

25:00 to 31:30: 2023 is a Year of Optimism … Cautious Optimism

• On Geoff’s 2023 outlook: Geoff was pessimistic on the biotech markets last year but holds a sense of cautious optimism for 2023. While there’ll likely be more pain this year, it’ll be specific to those who don’t have clinical data or meaningful milestones in the near-term. Further, Geoff believes that the private markets will slow while the public markets gain momentum; in fact, several IPOs have already priced in January 2023. Despite the present-day difficulties, the markets are more developed than ever before and there’re enough companies and capital to absorb the impact in the long-term.
• On guidance to management teams of emerging biotechs: To weather the current environment, Geoff advises management teams to pursue dual- or even multiple-track processes. In other words, companies should consider potential BD&L activity (e.g., partnerships), IPO opportunity, institutional financing opportunities, and more options in parallel. The more options teams consider, the more likely they are to succeed!

31:30 to End: Advice to the Next-Generation of Leaders in Life Science

• On diversifying knowledge and risk: As mentioned, Geoff encourages emerging leaders to be unafraid to “zig when everyone zags.” Further, Geoff believes that as biotech continues to evolve, it’ll become crucial for emerging leaders to understand orthogonal areas such as technology and the many other areas within the healthcare ecosystem (e.g., payers, providers, policymakers).

“I learned so much more by being open-minded and not doing what everyone else is doing … Think about who you can get mentorship from, who you can mentor, and pay it forward!”