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Start-up companies can fill the gaps left by big pharmaceutical firms, according to Jeffrey Aronin, president and COO of Ovation Pharmaceuticals. Aronin started Ovation to meet this need. “We were profitable from day one,” he said.
But among the speakers at a conference hosted by the student-led Healthcare Group, Aronin was alone in his immediate profitability. Tom Fitzpatrick, managing director of 2200 Ventures, expressed a more common experience. “It’s complicated and tough to do things in the health care field,” he said. Still, he added, the work is “a lot of fun.”
Experts on several panels offered advice during the day-long conference at Chicago’s Hyatt Regency hotel on November 5. At the discussion on entrepreneurship and venture capital, Fitzpatrick was among speakers who outlined requisites for getting started.
The first step is to secure funding. Aronin raised $150 million from a private equity fund; others sought money from venture capitalists. Rajni Aneja, ’92, cofounder and vice president for corporate development at zuChem, recommended looking to corporate support even at the early stage. Despite the resources, “raising money is hard,” Aronin said. “People want to see one clear path to the return.”
Speakers agreed that certain areas of the field show promise for entrepreneurs, particularly oncology, the central nervous system, pharmaceuticals and diagnostics, and genomics.
“There’s space for smaller companies to blossom in identifying smaller target drugs,” said Rifat Pamukcu, President, CEO, and Chairman of Midway Pharmaceuticals. “Big pharma wants to develop the blockbusters, but pharmacal genomics can be good for start-ups.”
—Carmen Marti