Bahija Jallal, Immunocore 🇬🇧 | Commercial, Diversity, and AI | E14

We’re super privileged to chat online with Bahija Jallal, the CEO of Immunocore. Immunocore is the largest biotech in the UK and the 5th largest in Europe with a market cap of just over 3 billion dollars. We talk about how Immunocore has helped thousands of cancer patients and has become a commercial biotech. We also talk about why she thinks gender and race diversity are a business case and how AI is changing protein and biologics engineering.

I’ve “known” Bahija for over 10 years, after reading her profile in a student pharma magazine when I was studying bioengineering in France. At that time, she was head of MedImmune and SVP R&D at AstraZeneca. Now as the CEO of Immunocore, with their pioneering T cell receptor platform, she has helped to bring incredible treatments for cancer patients to market.

🔗 LINKS MENTIONED

Bahija on the Breakthrough Labs podcast

Immatics builds on its PRAME Success (and competes with Immunocore)


Transcript

Bahija Jallal: We had one patient. She was the first patient, I think, to take Chemtrac. Now, seven years later, she is a CEO. She’s done so many things. She has so many birthdays. That’s really why I come to work every day. The company had a lot of rich history. Not always an easy one because it was the ups and downs.

Philip Hemme: Innovation is the sheen biotech stuff. It’s never a walk in the park. 

Bahija Jallal: I’m so excited to be in this era. Still, you know, be part of these, because we’re going to see a huge transformation with AI in the drug development process. 

[00:00:34] Welcome

Philip Hemme: I’m your host Philippe, and welcome to a new episode of the Flood Bioshow, where I interview the best Europeans in biotech to help you grow.

Immunocore is the largest biotech in the UK and the fifth largest in Europe with a market cap of just over 3 billion. And since early 2019, Bahija is the CEO, and we finally managed to connect I’ve actually known Daidja since over 10 years. I mean, known as I first read a profile of her in a pharma blog for students.

And when I was studying bioengineering in France, and at that time she was head of Medimune and the SVP R& D of Medimune. AstraZeneca and she just has a remarkable trichococcus. So in our conversation, we talked about how immunocore changed the life of thousands of cancer patients and how it became a commercial biotech.

We also talked about why biEJF things Gender and race diversity is mostly a business case and how AI is changing protein and biologics engineering. So, here’s my conversation with Bai Yichang and please like, follow if you enjoyed. Welcome to the show Bahija Jallal 

Bahija Jallal: good morning. Thank you for having me.

[00:01:46] Immunocore’s life-changing cancer drug

Philip Hemme: Yeah, it’s great, it’s great to have you. I, I want to start with with Immunocore. I, I find the company is really fascinating in, in many many ways, and I’ve followed it actually since, at least since 2015, since the massive Series A and one way that I find it fascinating is that, I mean, you really have changed the life of thousands of, of patients with a rare, basically, eye eye cancer thanks to an innovative drug, I mean, named Chemtrak, which is a T cell receptor, TCR, by specific fusion protein.

And what’s also fascinating that you managed to do that while owning basically the commercial rights, no farmer partner, at least sharing with a farmer partner. And you just reported revenues of around 240 million for the whole year, 2023. And I think that’s the second year the drug is approved if I’m if I’m correct.

So I’m wondering, like, I mean, that’s an amazing achievement. Can you share with how you, how you actually feel about it? 

Bahija Jallal: Okay. Yeah. No, thank you. I feel great about it. And the most important thing is really a drug that almost died to bring it actually to patients. What was extraordinary about it is that these patients actually you know, once they’re diagnosed with metastatic, UV melanoma, they literally have 12 months to live.

That’s what they tell us more and more, that when they are diagnosed, the doctor basically says you have to get your, your you know, affairs in order. And to bring that hope for people. And we had one patient that came and talked to us. She was the first patient, I think, to take Chemtrac. And now seven years later.

She is a CEO. She’s done so many things. She has so many birthdays and, and you know, and that’s really why I come to work every day. So it is, it is amazing what it’s doing for patients. I 

Philip Hemme: saw actually you reported I think this three year data as well and there was a Compared to standard of care. What was it?

Was it 25 per around there? 25%? 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, it’s around 20, I think 27%. That’s what we saw. So we, we reported in New England Journal of Medicine, the three year survival, which is really amazing for a, a disease like this. And it’s still ongoing, but you can see the tail, what we call the tail, basically.

You know, at least 26 or 27 percent of patients still alive at 20 at three years, which was completely unheard of. I think what’s also extraordinary is the fact that in 40 years, that’s the first innovation in this space. And that is, really satisfying. 

Philip Hemme: Yeah. That’s like, it’s amazing. Actually, it, I was I listened to a podcast you gave on General Atlantic, I think it was in 2022.

And you mentioned actually also on, on the clinical trial that basically at the prime or the other intermittent readouts, the results were so positive that it was decided to basically stop the trial and go directly to the FDA for the approval, which actually, I’ve actually never heard any biotech companies have that actually.

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, you know, the, the end point was overall survival and usually that takes a while to mature. So, you know, to just put it in perspective, we were still in complete COVID time, if you will. We finished the trial randomizing patients in June and the first interim analysis was in October. And we basically internally said, you know, the probability that that’s going to hit in October is very, very low.

And we were extremely surprised that not only it hit, but the hazard ratio was 0. 51, which was really amazing. And we did two things that I’m really proud of. One is, of course, we went to the FDA to, to have you know, to agree on the BLA and, and, and, and so on. But the other thing is, because this is such a deadly disease, Even as a small company you know, we opened the, the, what we call the EAP, so an, Patient Assistance Program, because we could not wait until it’s approved by EMA and everything to make it available for patients.

So we started helping patients right away, which I’m very at no cost at that time. Which I’m very, very proud of. 

Philip Hemme: Did you, can you, just from a context as other biotech companies who had that recently of like stopping a trial, like having a trial going to markets after interim data analysis? 

Bahija Jallal: I, you know, I don’t, I, I don’t hear too many of that and sometimes the interim analysis is not really public you know, you don’t, you don’t tell the market when you’re having the interim analysis.

So usually people don’t talk too much about it, but it’s, it’s not a, it’s not a usual thing. So. It was a powerful drug on the overall survival, which I think is a, is a, is a really amazing. 

[00:07:40] Commercializing Immunocore

Philip Hemme: Yeah, that’s, that’s great. And now I think one of the main, your main priorities for this year is the commercial rollout of Chemtrail.

I’ve seen that from my understanding you are managing most of the commercialization yourself. As I mentioned, you don’t have a pharma partner. But you do have a partner for the commercialization of medicine, medicine, pharma for some geography, Central Eastern Europe, Israel, Canada. But then you manage basically the biggest market, I guess, is the U.

S. That you manage yourself. And then, so how do you, what’s your plan for the, like, for the coming, let’s say months for the commercial? 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah. So I think, you know, so we chose to commercialize ourself for two reasons. You know, one is. You know, we believe we, we can. We have a great team and it’s not, it’s a, it’s an orphan drug.

So usually I, I think from the capabilities point of view, we, it was the first time and we thought we, we can do it. The second thing is this is a new platform and I am a firm believer that we continue to learn. We continue to learn in the clinic and we continue to learn in the, in the market. We to bring that learning back into the early you know, as we bring more more products.

So the goal this year, like you said, we had a real, a nice growth, so, you know, quarter on quarter. So the, ChemTrack is the, the standards of care in first line, which is amazing in the U. S. and in Europe as well. And so going into, into the year in the US, we still have some growth in the US to happen.

So we are now going more, you know, you start in the academic academic, setting first and then you get into the community and you know, the US is very big, so the community is very spread. So we need to continue, in the community and then in Europe is, as you know, it’s country by country.

So we had a really great success in Germany and France Italy, and I, the, we just announced the approval or the reimbursement discussions with Spain. So we will be launching in Spain this year. So we will get more countries in, in Europe and we’ll continue that way. 

Philip Hemme: I’m curious on this topic. I mean, yeah, market access in Europe is definitely tricky for, for innovative drugs on the, on the podcast with Mark, the Gary Dell from, from Abivax and formerly from Epson.

And he mentioned that most of his market was in the U. S. just from a reimbursement point of view. I’m curious for, for, for you guys, I mean, especially Kim Choik. I don’t know the exact pricing, but I guess it’s, pretty high, I guess, in the six figures, I guess. So how do you, how is the discussion there in, let’s say, in Europe?

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, so I think it’s notorious that U. S. is still paying for innovation, you know, so I would say that you know, we probably skim track for the value it brings because, frankly overall survival is the gold standard. A lot of several drugs that in the, in Europe, they don’t get reimbursed if, if you don’t have the overall survival, for instance.

So we have absolutely the gold standards. We We had two scientific evaluations, one in, in Germany and one in in France. And we got one of the, you know, the high marks for the scientific. Basically everybody sees the value of of Chemtrack, but it is, you know, the U. S. is still paying for innovation.

Europe is country by country. I think we, we got a very good, you know, price in Germany. And, but we are still in negotiation, country by country, that’s the tedious part, I think, about Europe. You 

Philip Hemme: disclosed the price you get with Germany? Is it public? 

Bahija Jallal: Yes, I think it was disclosed. It was 10, 000. Okay.

Philip Hemme: And how does it compare to the U. S. then? I mean, the U. S. is a bit complicated with all the insurance. 

Bahija Jallal: So the, the U. S. is right now is, is around 20, 000. 

Philip Hemme: Okay. So that’s actually,

yeah, no, I’m, I’m, I’m curious because I also read in, especially in, in France, there was a I don’t remember exactly, but there was a, a group of, of professors and oncology professor, I think, especially around the professor in Lyon and Clos d’Arnault, what they were. They were quite, like, upset about the access to innovative oncology drugs for patients and that there were some, or at least in their opinion, some reports where the scientific, evaluation was basically lowered, or let’s say lowered to influence then the reimbursement or to justify not reimbursing some drugs and that would be then the patient could not access it or even, even on a special request in the hospital could not access it.

So I was curious how it compares with, with you when you have really outstanding data. Does it translate then to really positive? But it sounds like it’s the case. 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah. So in France where we are, we, like I said, we had the assistance program, which is the there is a pathway for that in, in France and they pay for, for the EAP, EAP right away.

It’s called AP1 or something like that. It’s a new system. But we are still negotiating the price now with the, with France, so we’re not, we’re not done. This negotiations just take a little bit longer. Yeah. 

Philip Hemme: As, as things can do in France.

[00:13:46] Explaining the TCR technology

Philip Hemme: All right. Let’s maybe a switch a bit to the topic, to, to technology, I think. I mean, it’s a TCR, basically TCR receptor, as a, as a that you fuse of a fusion protein to some T cell activating, activating, at least for a vacuum chuck. I’m curious, can you maybe explain a bit more, and especially how it will, how it differentiates from, let’s say, a bispecifics, typically?

Especially, one thing that puzzled me was on the targeting of antigens on the cell. I mean, how, why specifically couldn’t target GP100 of the same antigen that, yeah. Curious. 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, no, it’s a, it’s a very good question. So you know, the, the important thing in the, in the invention, if you will, is taking Really, what I would call always mimicking what happens in our body.

So we do have the T cell receptor and usually it’s really to differentiate between self and non self, you know, so. And we took that property the T cell receptor is membrane bound. So we made it soluble. Soluble, stable. Usually it’s also low affinity, so we increase the affinity a million times and with keeping the specificity.

And why this is important? Because the, well, the antigen is basically a peptides of nine to, or eight, nine, ten amino acids that’s presented by the HLA you know, so complex. So you have, that complex is pretty short to amino acids. And so you have to have. The specificity, and I’ll come to that because that’s where the differentiation comes from.

On the other side is the CD3 that basically will bring any T cell that’s you know, that has a CD3 receptor, any T cell will, will come. So we have in one hand, we are binding to the tumor cell. That’s basically our, our goal is to. Identify the, the tumor cell or, you know, make it visible. And on the other side is bringing the T-cells to kill the tumor cell.

So the differentiation, and to your point, why on GP 100 or OnPrem and things like that you can’t so, so far it’s not possible to, to, or there are, there are no monoclonal antibodies. Or antibodies specific to, to target. One of the attractiveness here is the fact that GP100 prime and all that are intracellular proteins.

And you know monoclonal antibodies have access to membrane bound or extracellular, you know, proteins. So the, these proteins, GP100 and, or PRAME or any other intracellular protein will be degraded and one, the peptides will be presented at the surface. So that’s how we have access to, to intracellular proteins.

Philip Hemme: So by specific, cannot, cannot like recognize it when it’s degraded and presented on the surface. 

Bahija Jallal: It’s so this is. It’s not specific enough. It’s not, so I’m not going to say never right? So at least to say TCR mimics, so we, we call them the TCR mimics, if they’re going to happen or not. But the difficulty, if you, if you will, the difference between monoclons, monoclons, basically they like, or they see antigens that are, non linear, right?

There’s a confirmation, and that’s how you have the binding of the monoclonal antibody. Here, we’re talking about very linear. You know, eight to nine amino acids linked to the HLA. And what we know is the T cell receptor needs to bind to both at the same time to recognize so the HLA and, and it’s very, very linear, very, you know it’s not a conformational change or anything like the monoclonal antibodies.

So, at least so far, the T cell receptor is made to, to recognize HLA complex. Antibodies less so, but it, I’m not going to say it’s impossible. 

Philip Hemme: Okay. This makes sense. And now I also understand, because I saw the, basically the slide or the figure of that you can target, let’s say 90 percent or the 90 percent of the antigens that.

by specific or T cells cannot target on the, the, because you can access basically all these kind of small antigens in different conformation. That’s okay. That makes sense. I have two questions or two, two things that comes to mind is one is what about basically alternative scaffolds or to have proteins or nanobodies.

I mean, we had, we had the CEO of XC of Abilene was just a previous guest. So I guess with the nanobodies, maybe you can target different conformations. And you can also do, basically, by specifics, I mean, 

Bahija Jallal: That’s why I said it’s not impossible. I think the best thing right now is the T cell receptor, right?

Because we understand it really well and everything. I think there is another feature that I, I, for differentiation that I didn’t talk about is the fact that we can target down to five to ten copies per cell. Monoclonal antibodies as we know them right now, you need a thousand, you need a much more higher expression, right?

And that’s really crucial. Like I said, it’s not impossible to have a TCR mimic. I, I really don’t believe that’s you know, I just, I just think the technology is not ripe enough, but it’s going to be possible. I, I just think it’s, it’s always possible, but it’s not as straightforward and you need a much higher expression of the target.

Philip Hemme: Cause that’s, that’s the second, I saw that for, I mean, also as a transition to PRAME that’s one of the biggest, let’s say, competitors or someone by the company exploring is, is Ematix also, also European company, German based, and they are, they are using by specifics, no? Correct. Okay. But they are, they are earlier than you, I believe, in the trial or still in, in phase one exploration?

Okay, so we’ll see in the results how, how well it works, I guess, and how specific they are as well. Exactly. 

[00:20:40] Targeting tumors with PRAME

Philip Hemme: And maybe maybe as also transition to PREEM, can you, like, talk a bit more about it? I mean, it’s basically the rest of your pipeline. And from my understanding, it’s a much I mean, it’s basically targeting solid tumors as a much larger patient group as well.

Yeah. Can you maybe talk 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, no. So GP100 is very much a melanoma protein. It’s expressed only in melanoma. And we have now what we talked about, the whole data in uveal melanoma, but we have a trial ongoing in cutaneous melanoma. So there, it’s very much a melanoma specific protein. PRAME is really exciting targets for multiple reasons.

You know, one, it’s more broadly expressed. And in larger tumor types it’s also, not expressing normal tissues, which makes it very attractive, but only in tumor tissues. It’s also what we call a negative prognostic marker. So that means, you know, I, the way I look at it is tumors don’t want to get rid of it, basically.

And whenever it’s expressed, it’s more homogeneously expressed, which, you know, it’s a, it’s an advantage, basically. So yeah, so for all these attributes, I think PRAME is, is very attractive. We also showed, last year at ESMO, we showed that it’s it’s active it’s active in melanoma, uveal, and cutaneous, and also we showed activity in ovarian.

And we’re testing it in other tumors as well.

Philip Hemme: And you’re also in colorectal cancers, correct? 

Bahija Jallal: No, colorectal is on P Well. That’s another target. And it’s the third target coming to the clinic. 

Philip Hemme: Can you, yeah, I, I mean, I have a, I mean, a bit personal, but my, basically my mom, my mom had colorectal cancer, so it’s a bit also touching. And all the discussion we have is, is, I mean, Yeah, it’s amazing that, you know, I can relate to it and that you’re working on other patients and with, like, heavy, heavy cancer and you can have a transformative impact.

But yeah, so, but I hope to, I mean, I hope the rest of the trial goes well as well. I saw that you’re working on, on infectious disease as well, but I think, I mean, and looking also for functional cure, which, and HIV, which I think is also amazing. 

[00:23:26] Immunocore now and then

Philip Hemme: But maybe we can, we can switch a bit more to, maybe more to the team from looking at, I mean, obviously you’re coming with a MedImmune background, I was, what was it?

Almost, was it 10, almost 10 years, I guess I’ve had, 13 years, well, I’ve had a head of basically head of MedImmune and just from AstraZeneca. What I’ve seen is that quite a lot of, people in your team also joined you, or ex medium. Can you, can you share a bit about this? Like, was it, was it planned or was it,

Bahija Jallal: No, it’s never planned, of course.

Yeah, I think the, the, you know, to just close on, on what we talked about and the infectious disease and everything that, what attracted me to the company is The technology is novel. It’s a real pioneer in this area and also more transformative. You know, our goal is not to be just incremental, but to do something, you know, it’s, it’s high risk, high reward as I call it.

That’s why we’re going into infectious disease into. Not just controlling the viral load, but looking at, you know, can we actually get the functional cure? So every time you’ll see us in something, it’s really how can we, you know, can we be transformational, not just incremental? And so I would, I would absolutely believe that that’s part of what attracted several people from you know, from MedImmune or from AstraZeneca.

And you know, and it, it does help if you work with people before so they know, they know what to expect, right? 

Philip Hemme: I guess it’s, I mean, it’s, I guess they love working with you as well, and. 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, and I love working with them as well. Yeah. 

Philip Hemme: Love is usually with Super, I mean, with Supercroft. That’s nice. I mean, I find it always a a great sign, for when, I mean, as, as a founder or CEO or manager, when, when your team wants to continue to work with you.

Even for me in the team now, Flood Bioteam, actually most of the people that joined me from the, from my previous startup, which I founded, which is also great. And they want to work with, I think it’s a great sense of, Oh, very nice. And maybe one word about also on your, on the chairman of Immunocore, I mean, John, John Bell, but what, what, what was.

What was pretty striking to me was that he is basically, he co founded the company, which dates back to like 1999 in some ways, as I think was Avidex at the moment, and he’s still chairman basically now, which I think is a pretty like remarkable duration of being chairman. I don’t know that that many chairman who last that long in companies who stay that long.

How, like, how, how is it to, to work with them and, and how is it, how, how make, make, I mean, that you co founded and it was chairman all the way along, how, how does it like play out? 

Bahija Jallal: So he’s, he’s very unique I would say because he is not only on the science and everything, but also really great entrepreneur, I would say, and great and understand You know the business really well.

I don’t think he was chairman all the time. I think the the The science started in his lab. He was, you know affiliated with the company but became a chairman I think just two years before I came or something like that. So j james nolan I think was the the chairman before but he is Absolutely a fantastic person and also extremely supportive and I I don’t think We have a great partnership and I absolutely, you know, the success of of Immunocore.

He absolutely should take a lot of, of, credit for it as well. 

Philip Hemme: Of course. Maybe on the, expanding a bit on the, on the history of let’s say on the history of immuno car, what was always also quite interesting is that. EZP was, there was like three different, basically it ended up being coming from three different companies with at least there was Medigene in, in Germany and, and Adaptimune also I think in, I mean, also in Oxford.

Bahija Jallal: Correct. They split at some point. 

Philip Hemme: And split it at some point, but basically it’s coming from the same lab, which is pretty, it’s pretty, pretty amazing. But at the same time, you know, I guess when fast surfing adapt immune is a bit, I mean, it was more in cell therapy and, and in solid tumors. Like, how, how, how is it today, the relationship with the different companies, like?

Bahija Jallal: So we don’t you know, we, after adaptamine and iminocor split, I think there’s, you know, after each one of the companies, one chose to go with cell therapy and we went with the soluble, you know, we don’t, we don’t have no, nothing special as a relationship, like, it’s completely independent. to independent companies right now.

So, as you said, the company had a lot of rich history. Not always, not always an easy one because it was the ups and downs, and I think that’s what happens in a new technology, when you’re pioneering something and it’s completely unprecedented, so there was, there’s a lot of time to be invested in, You know, bringing it to, to the level where it is right now, but in meanwhile, I think there was a lot of, ups and downs and, you know, for the, for the company, but hopefully right now it’s, it’s more stable.

Philip Hemme: mean, you know, innovation, especially in biotech. It’s tough. I mean, never a walk in the park, wash the 

Bahija Jallal: shares, and the patients. Yeah. 

Philip Hemme: And I, I also, because I, I read more on the financial side, I think, I mean, Medi Jean was basically main shareholder even of, of Unco, but at some point, I guess they were bought out.

So today they don’t have any share 

Bahija Jallal: connection or a minimum, I think. 

Philip Hemme: And then, I mean. I remember what, I mean, that’s one when I started really following it, when, what, you know, like kind of stood out on the map was in, in 2015 when they raised this like massive series a, I think was the biggest ever in, in Europe.

And even on us 10, that even today is still really big. If it was like 320 million, but at the same time, I heard you say on the podcast that it was a lot of money, but there was no strategy. Something like this and that it was. mismanaged. Can, can you expand a bit on this? I’m curious. 

Bahija Jallal: Well, I can, I can just say how I found the company, right?

So I think, you know and talking to investors when I took over, I, I think, you know, you raise money. It’s for me, the philosophy of raising money, you really need to have before you go to raise money, what you’re going to do with it. Right. And raising 350 in a series a where the company, you know, again, I, I would say it didn’t really have a plan and went through the 350, you know, more quicker than it should without the data.

And I think that’s the, that’s the issue. So when I came to the company, the, you know, there was no, the majority of the leadership team or the executive team has left. There was. Yeah, the company was just in, in not stable condition, I would say from the governance point of view, from the science, which direction it should go and, and so on.

But I really, the, the positive thing at why I came otherwise, you know, was the depth of, of the, or the innovation, the, the platform. I absolutely believed in the platform. And saw the potential in Kim Trac and, you know, I thought naively, you know, everything else I can fix. But it was hard, hard to fix.

It was not it was not easy. So thank goodness I was naïve, yes. 

Philip Hemme: Sometimes naivety is good, 

Bahija Jallal: it’s a blessing. 

Philip Hemme: Sometimes. Yeah, I, and also it’s yeah. I mean, I remember at that time also from, I mean, from the fundraising, I mean, I think what Ford was involved in, it had raised this like massive funds, almost private equity, also early stage, but massive fund.

And I remember talking with some investors, even some large French VCs, and they were all like super excited about the round and it’s one of the rare, but like basically everyone wanted to join in at some point. They were very excited also, I mean, from, also they were very excited by the platform as in, that it can be manufactured pretty easily, that has amazing data, this amazing potential, etc.

On paper, at least it could look very big, but I guess, yeah, it’s, need to, to deliver afterwards. Because, yeah, no, that’s, that’s what we needed. That’s great. I think, yeah. And maybe to, to wrap up on, on, oh, actually to, to, to, to wrap up on I immuno in the podcast you mentioned your dreamers to, to build, I think the largest or the largest fully integrated biopharma in the world.

I think it was a . 

Bahija Jallal: I think that start, I start with the, with the, with the Europe, and we’ll go from there, but yes. Why not? I think we have. You know, when I look at the, the platform, like the questions you ask, you know, how would you do that and why would you do that? Well, the first thing is we have, we have the science and we have the platform to do that, right?

So we have, we built everything from really strong research where we can bring more science and more targets. We have, the platform is modular so we can be in, cancer. Infectious disease, and then in the last earnings, we actually talked about the third, we’re at J. P. Morgan, the third possibility, which is in in autoimmune diseases.

You know, which is really an exciting area. So we have a big space to play in. We have a fantastic technology that’s, that’s not just, you know, the bi specific is the start, I would say. We can use, we used CD3, we can use any other effector. So when you have a vast you know, space to play in, if you will, then I think it’s, That has your ambition has to to match that as well.

So why not? I think we could why not? 

Philip Hemme: That’s great. I mean, yeah Guess you will try your try your best Absolutely. No, it’s good. 

[00:35:37] Why Bahija chose Immunocore

Philip Hemme: And maybe to go back on I mean that sounds super exciting also for you personally to join I’m curious on that decision said I mean As you, as you mentioned, you could have gone somewhere else.

I can imagine with your profile, you could have gone in many, many, many other places. Can you like, walk back a bit on the, on maybe the different options you had or the, how you came to that choice? Also, I mean, going for a European company versus US based companies or, or staying in Pharma, going maybe to a CEO position in Pharma.

I guess you had like many, many options. Yeah, 

Bahija Jallal: so I, I was, I was lucky that I had several options, including, you know, staying in MedImmune if I wanted to, but I felt like I had accomplished what I needed in MedImmune. We had a great vision there and we had, I had a fantastic time there. I, you know, the, I never, never had.

A development plan, as they call it in, in companies, you know, what do you want to be, where do you want to be after, and so on, because I’m somebody, if I put a goal on myself, I will try to achieve it, and I didn’t want to do that, right, so I wanted to just, sometimes great opportunities come from the side, right, when you don’t plan them.

But one thing that was very important to me, you know, while I don’t plan, you know, you know, in two years I want to be CEO or, or CSO or something like that, one thing I always know is I follow my heart and it has to be whatever I do, the science has to be really interesting. You know, because that’s my first motivation.

If I don’t like the science or if I cannot be passionate about it, I cannot do that. So yeah, while I had a lot of different opportunities, I was lucky that way. This one where people really didn’t understand at the beginning why you would go to this company, it was because of the science. And so I thought the you know, seeing that that platform and what it could bring when a lot of people didn’t believe I think is what, what attracted me.

Was it high risk? He was really high risk at that time, but it paid off. Yeah. 

Philip Hemme: It’s always amazing when you look back at such a decision and it turns out to go well. I remember actually when I, I mean I remember I was following and I got forced to step down as CEO, and then the CFO stepped down, like, okay, and stepped down without any replacement, or like, I will support the board, something, I was like, okay.

But then when you joined, I was also surprised, but I think, yeah, it turned out amazingly. A 

Bahija Jallal: lot of people were surprised, but yeah, I’m happy I did. 

Philip Hemme: Ah, great. And I’m curious about the development plan. I like that I am typically, I would not have many either. But I’m curious, now you still, like, I mean, you don’t have a development plan or, or how, what’s your, let’s say, or where do you see yourself in the next, I don’t know, 5, 5, 10 years?

Bahija Jallal: Well, you know, we have a lot to do at Ubuntu Core. I think we have a great platform. I think, you know, when I think about the next few years is you know, hopefully bringing, you know, still, ChemTrac to more patients. I think, you know, if we do the cutaneous melanoma, we have one, one thing that’s I’m really passionate about is, you know, how can we get earlier and earlier and earlier in cancer and, and help people.

So we have an adjuvant trial with the European organization that’s ongoing for ChemTrac. That, if we can, you know, bring these to patients even earlier, I would be, you know, really thrilled. You know, PRAME, if we can bring PRAME, you know, autoimmune infectious disease. So that’s all I’m thinking about.

And I think there’s, there’s a lot to think about, a lot of unfinished business. 

Philip Hemme: Yeah, it can keep you busy for a while. I guess maybe, 

[00:40:22] Top lessons from Bahija Jallal

Philip Hemme: No, that sounds good. If we can switch a bit to a topic. Curious on you, I mean, this podcast is also quite focused on, I mean, on European leaders in biotech, or at least He does have a pretty strong European connection.

I think you, I mean as you basically did your, your, like your, university studies and PhD in France. You grew up in Morocco, then, then PhD in France, postdoc in Germany. You moved to US for quite a while, but then coming, coming now with a UK company. Can you like, I don’t know how, what were some of your lessons there or how it, yeah, how it helped you, or it’s helping you now?

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, no, I, I am, I was extremely lucky, you know, to have done all my schooling in, in, actually in, in France and my PhD in France. It really, you know, France for me was not only on the academic side, but growing as a person, you know, the cultural side, everything, which was great. Then going to Germany was, I would say it was my first time seeing, it was a test for me, you know, can you take what you did in PhD?

And actually be an independent, somehow more independent researcher. And there I really fell in love with the whole cancer research I think was, was in Germany. And and then, you know, the US very much you know, I had the really this very strong idea that, you know, pharma companies or biotech or whatever, we didn’t know that at the time, they don’t do science.

If you go there, it’s, you know, because it was more chemical companies. And so, U. S. really showed me that you can, you don’t have to choose between the two. You can do science, great science to bring great drugs to to the market. I think I learned a lot about biotech and being entrepreneurial. Definitely that entrepreneurial spirit more in the U.

S. and that Especially in 

Philip Hemme: California, 

Bahija Jallal: I guess, where it’s strong. Yeah, completely at the hub of of all biotech. And, and not being afraid to take risks, you know, people do encourage you to do that, you know. And now full circle back, you know, I see it again, I think in, in the UK, is, you know, bringing this learning, all that I was exposed to, if you will, bringing it into, into the company.

And what I see as the learning, I think, for European companies and, and everything is that Europe, and I see it now in, in the UK have fantastic science, like absolutely fantastic science. I think you see in Germany started, few few decades ago or a few years ago. And then in the UK, you have the startup.

Arena is, is very strong, right? And you have more money to get a startup company. But then I think where it becomes less or more problematic is to mature these companies into a full fledged, you know, industrial, you know, company. And that’s because, you know, the, Yeah, the appetite for risk is really less than in the U.

S. Hopefully it’s changing. Hopefully with the success of BioNTech in Germany and, you know, hopefully with Iberocorp, you know, in, in the UK and things like that, that will encourage people to invest. Because then it’s, it’s like a vicious circle. If you don’t have that, capital to, to grow the company, then you have less you know, talents on the clinical side and so on that’s exist in the U.

S. So, I think that’s the learning and the comparison between the two, that 

Philip Hemme: I bring. Ah, that’s, that’s that’s great. And talking about, I mean, what you mentioned in, in Europe also now you have, I mean, luck, I mean, not luckily, but I mean, luckily, but it was not only luck, but now a few commercial biopharmas or biotechs, I mean, you know, obviously, but you mentioned BioNTech, GenMab, Argenyx, CryDoing which are still, like, Independence for the product on the market and the product on the market that makes good, like what makes an impact.

And in this case of whatever, hundreds of millions of revenues in the billions of revenues, which I think also brings, I guess, what’s your, I mean, other people who have that experience that you just mentioned, and the bring them to, to the rest of the industry. And I think it’s, it’s great to see. And it, it happened actually pretty.

Obviously with the delay compared to the U. S., compared to the Gen Zines and the Gen Techs, but still, yeah, great to see. 

[00:45:48] How is risk appetite connected to innovation?

Philip Hemme: And also maybe just connected to the discussion we had previously, I’m always curious also, I mean, risk appetite for sure, capital appetite. I’m also always curious on how much is it connected that the market in Europe for innovative drugs, as in reimbursement, is so less good than in the U.

S. How much is that, like, how much is that connected, basically? 

Bahija Jallal: Well, it has to be connected, right? So if you look at the U. S., we always argue that that pays for the innovation because, you know, we don’t have, in this business, The cycle for innovation or the cycle for R& D is much longer than the tech, you know, in the tech the R& D is much shorter and here you invested when I think about ImmunoCore, and we talked about the Series A and everything, that’s been 20 years in the making, you know, so how do you 

Philip Hemme: And in the billion, over, probably over a billion dollars 

Bahija Jallal: invested for?

It’s completely 20 years to, to come up with something that’s completely novel. So yeah, it takes, it takes much longer and you have to recoup that at, at some point, right? 

Philip Hemme: Yeah, but I, I, yeah, definitely, I mean, but, but really compare, I mean, because I, I’ve seen, even from inside some European biotechs and, I mean, going to the U.

S. is basically mandatory, but it’s still a big challenge and big friction and you have to hire a different team, different company culture, et cetera, et cetera. And that’s, I think, really not easy for, for European biotech. I mean, it’s always hard to quantify these things, but, 

Bahija Jallal: I agree. It’s not, it’s not easy.

And I would say you cannot do it from Europe. Like it’s the same things, like if you get it commercialized, you have to have a presence in the U. K., in the, in U. S. You know, if you are dealing with more investors here, that was my, my thing with ImmunoCore. We needed to have a presence in the U. S. because, you know, I, as I call it, out of sight, out of mind, you really need to be, have access to talent as well.

So we have, you know, and a lot, most of the clinical is here, most of the commercial, we have a team in, in Europe. So, I think we, We had to have the presence in Europe and in, in the U. S. to accomplish what we needed to accomplish.

Philip Hemme: No, but it’s, yeah, I remember we talked a bit with, with, with Mark Duggeridoo about, about this and about access when I mentioned him before. And then, and he was also a bit on the political comment and saying, okay, I mean, it’s, you should also not be surprised too much as a, let’s say, as a government or the governments or the union.

If you don’t finance innovation, there’s no market for it. That you don’t have companies developing it and trying to develop it or that you have champions in the space It’s you cannot have both Like it’s harder to have both. So yeah 

[00:49:10] Diversity in biotech

Philip Hemme: Maybe on another personal topic as well, on, it’s on diversity. I heard you talk on the, on the podcasts and I found it actually pretty striking that you’re very open about it and very direct, like putting the words, like switch, switch.

I found, I found really like, not a bit surprising, but also it really resonated, like it really resonates. I really liked it. Maybe you said something. Especially for gender diversity, it’s not only fair, but there’s a just, there’s a business case which I find it’s like, I mean, for a business, I like that, but you didn’t really expand on it.

Could you, could you expand on, on the business case and especially, are you measure, measure? 

Bahija Jallal: Sure. Yeah, no, I feel, I feel really strongly about this because I think when we talk about diversity, we usually talk about, it’s not fair, we have to, you know, We have to be fair, we have to do these kind of things and, and my view is for everything we bring a business case, why this is good for business, right?

So instead of bringing it to the business as a guilt, you know, and making people feel guilty because they’re not, we are actually not doing ourselves a service by not explaining why it is important. 

Philip Hemme: Because you bring it as an opportunity. 

Bahija Jallal: And to say why, why, why it is important for, for your business to have the, the diversity of thought in general when I look at where we are, we have, it’s in the business of innovation, right?

And to be innovative, it’s not having 10 Moroccans working with me that are women are all the same that went to France and stuff like that. We all have the same, you know, the same reference, the same cultural reference and everything. But if you bring people from different, if you look for that you know, diversity of thought, you automatically going to have, you know, a diverse, slate or diverse, employees.

My thing is, you know, You know, there were studies actually in nature showing that labs with more diverse you know postdocs and, and and and PhD students produced more, more articles and more research than, you know, measured by the number of articles published than non, you know, diverse lab.

And I don’t think we do enough of those kind of studies. So whenever you see me in talking to academics, it’s like, you know, actually bring data. Because if you bring data, you’re going to influence the change a lot more than if we just, you know, make people feel, You know, it’s about fairness or guilt or something like that.

It’s really about why this is good for business and I absolutely believe it is good for business. It’s not easy. It doesn’t mean it’s easy, but it’s good for business.

Philip Hemme: Yeah, I, I, I, I like that I, where, where I am also, where I would not, not challenge you, but where I would like, where, where I’m also like, what’s a bit hard is, is really making that case and having evidence to back that case, that business case. I mean, you mentioned the study, but how do you translate, I mean, academic output to, let’s say a company like Immunocore.

It’s got a different setting and also from a personal experience, I really believe in this. I mean, I applied pretty much the same to my first startup and having with diverse hiring. And I mean, more from a feeling and seeing that this brings us better products and we could live a better product for, for our users and, and, and that leads us to grow as a company.

But it’s, it’s very hard to like quantify and like put into, you know, like into really precise or more precise, like let’s say bullet points or whatever of, and, and then especially in the hiring because you rapidly become and like being having to favor. certain diversity in the hiring process to, to get this diversity.

And I found that also not that easy to, to have a, like, let’s say, more quantifiable approach there, or having some a bit more specific things. How do you, like, How do you go more granular? 

Bahija Jallal: I think there is more, I think there is more to it. I think you, you point your finger to something that’s important is we don’t do enough of the studies because I think it’s really possible to actually quantify that, quantify everything.

I think for me is in, and we did that in, in my previous you know, life. Is we said, okay, we get it. I want to have a really diverse because it’s so important for, for our business of the innovation that we can be more productive, that we can be actually more bring more, you know, drugs to the market.

And the first thing was not to be counting how many or not, but to focus on the environment. Right? Because if you want to attract different people and everything, they have to be in an environment where they can feel themselves, because that’s really the difference. You know, can you be, you know, in an, in an very diverse, setting.

Most of the important thing is what we call the, the inclusion. Right? So to have a diverse is to have everybody can be themselves. And you cannot tell me when we don’t feel ourself that we are productive, right? When we have to be somebody else and, or try to not be ourself, you know, it’s stressful. It’s not, it’s not great.

But if you are in an environment where you can be yourself, you’re going to produce your best work, right? How to quantify it? I think that’s, that’s my, my always you know. Work for or appeal to, to the academics, you know, we need to focus on that. Instead we’re focusing on numbers, you know, how can we quantify that, that innovation?

I, I’m pretty sure, you know, I quantify it here. I quantified it in my, in my previous life. How did you quantify it at the Renault Kwong? Is how, is how productive we are and how, you know, the, the quality of the people we’re attracting. Which is really important, you know, if I can tell you, you know, some of it’s the diversity here is, is fantastic and we started from the board on to my leadership team.

You know, as you have to lead there by example, but I can tell you, I quantify it by the quality of discussions we have, the challenges we have, each other, you know, the the innovation that I see every, every day, right? But you have, it’s not easy. I’m not saying it’s easy, but you have to, to produce an environment where people can be themselves.

And then. And then it’s a vicious circle, like when people are feeling, you know, it’s a great place to be, then they attract others and, and so on. And that’s, I’m not saying we have all the metrics and how to, to measure it, but I can see the end product. You know, can we be productive in what we do? In what we do, can we be better in what we do?

And I’m still appealing to academics to, to focus on that versus the numbers. 

Philip Hemme: Yeah. But even, I mean, even when you can, you, it’s hard, you cannot, basically A, B test, you cannot really compare. A less diverse immunocore, what would you have delivered? I mean, I’m just challenging and playing the devil’s advocate here, but 

Bahija Jallal: No, no, no, it’s good, but that’s the kind of discussion we need to have, right?

That’s the kind of discussion that we need to have. It’s not See, the discussion would have stopped very quickly if I would just say it’s not fair not having women, you know, 50 percent of the, of this and that and whatever. But that’s the discussion we need to have. 

Philip Hemme: I find it actually personally it’s pretty difficult with a discussion, at least me as a, let’s say, white male, is that, like, I would have no legitimacy in, in, in bringing this topic of discussion, you know.

At least I’m perceived as having no legitimacy and it’s, I find it, but yeah, it’s, 

Bahija Jallal: but see, I don’t see it this way. So this is where I feel like. We are all part of it, right? So part of how, why we believe diversity is good, right? And not it’s, it’s for you white male to solve this problem. No, it’s all of us, right?

So I don’t think I, I, I want, I don’t want the, the haves and have nots, you know, the have that feels guilty and the other ones is not. If we believe and we focus on that diversity of thought. That is important. It’s your, it’s your goal should everyone is responsible as all of us to make it possible because if we believe that that’s the best for society in, in general, frankly, and, and for the work in, in particular.

Philip Hemme: I like that a lot. I mean, and very, I liked that a lot and I can see him on. US also, I mean, more US mindset than US, and what you’re saying there. And it’s something that I experienced. I mean, I finished my studies in Boston and that’s where I really could feel this like meritocracy. We don’t care really where you’re coming from, what’s your color, whatever, what’s your accent is about really more about your mindset and being aligned with everything and what you deliver.

Which, yeah, I found really good and, and I, I remember in the, in the interview you said when you came to France, you discovered how people were judged on the color of their skin and that was pretty shocking. That’s, 

Bahija Jallal: yeah, because I, I come from a country where we’re all very different actually. You know, if you think about Morocco, you have people who came from Andalusia, they were chased from Andalusia.

You have the Nolats in the South, you have the They all look differently and they’re all very different. So that was completely normal. Yeah. And in Paris it was very, it’s, yeah, it was very shocking actually that people were labeled with, the color of the skin, you know, what I learned in Midwell.

Philip Hemme: Yeah. I think it’s yeah. It’s, I guess it’s changing in France, but it could yeah, there’s, there’s a lot of work to do in general in Europe. 

[01:00:59] Biological innovation

Philip Hemme: Maybe to, to finish on the, on the last, on the last topic, a bit more on the, let’s say, looking at the, at the industry and overall. And you, you mentioned when you came to us, you restrict how, how you could do more biological innovation, not just chemical also at pharma.

I remember you were saying in, I think in one interview you said that when Astra bought Medimune, I think there was 5 percent of the pipeline was biological, in 2014 I believe it was 50%, I don’t know what’s the percentage now, I guess. 80 percent plus,

like, but at the same time lately, at least in the last one, two years, but was also what, curious to me was that quite a lot of small molecules brought amazing results. Also a lot of yields. I find like, I mean, if I, if I looked at it, it was a kind of small maker was kind of. going down and replaced by biologics and now there’s a, I mean, still biologics, how do you feel about it on, on all that topic?

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, no, I think, you know, so you, you start with the small molecules, the, the degraders and other things. So the innovation, you know, started there as well. So I, I think, you know, the, I still, I’m still passionate about biologics. I think there is still, you know, we’re just mimicking what’s happening in our body.

And I think there’s still a lot more to discover there. I think, you know, you’ve seen the antibody direct conjugate, for instance, 

Philip Hemme: Say, no, it’s merging. 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, I think what I, what I like and that’s what we do in ImmunoCore now is really, you know, my message to everyone is we need to start from a biological problem and have the tools to solve that problem.

Right? We should not be, you know, we, our technology is the start, but how can we take all the learnings and stuff to solve a biological problem? And I think what’s fascinating in this era and fascinating in this in where we, where we are right now as an industry is that there is a really a huge toolbox.

of technology and to, to solve biological problem. And I think we are in an amazing era, frankly. So yeah, I’m, I’m still passionate about it. 

Philip Hemme: Does it mean also that you are not closing to getting other technology to move? If it never, yeah, never, 

Bahija Jallal: never. I think, you know, we, But you always, you know, go where, where your expertise is and, and collaborate and things like that.

But we are really trying to tackle some, some difficult problems and, and hopefully have the tools to, to solve them. 

Philip Hemme: That’s, I think, I mean, well, one, what comes to my mind as a, at least as a person, company that applies that pretty well is, is is BioNTech actually which always surprised me that they didn’t start with mRNA at all and, and now they have, I mean, I think they’ve even a prime, a prime by specific if I’m not mistaking, and then they have ADCs.

I think they have pretty much every biological technology in the pipeline possible, which is, especially as early biotech is pretty surprising. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah. Yeah, I’m not, I’m not advocating to be in everywhere, because I think, you know, there is a saying in in, in the U. S. at least, which says, how do they call it, master, you know, Jack of all trades and master of none you know, you have to develop some expertise and depth in, in the areas that you can you can master basically but you have to be open.

And I think to look at how to solve again, biological questions, I think that’s the most important thing. 

Philip Hemme: That’s I think that’s it, sir. It’s where’s the balance and how to prioritize it. That’s the half. That’s the half. I guess, I mean, not to defend BioNTech, but I guess they’re not trying to be everywhere to be everywhere.

But it’s probably opportunity based. And I mean, on mRNA, they were super good in mRNA. 

Bahija Jallal: I’m super tense. Yeah, no, I’m not making any judgment upon them. I think they also have they, they were successful and had a lot of money, you know, so they can afford these kind of things with the COVID. So, and we’re all very grateful that they’ve done that, right?

Philip Hemme: Yes, absolutely. 

[01:05:49] AI in protein engineering optimization

Philip Hemme: And one, I mean, one hot topic, but I guess we, we, we kind of not have to talk at it, but a bit about AI. And I heard you talking about AI already two years ago. And one thing you were focused on was really on the protein engineering Optimization. I’m I’m curious how, how do you translate it to, as, at, at Immunocore if it’s specific examples and what’s the scale of that example thing?

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, no, I, you know it’s a really I’m so excited to be in this era still, you know, be part of that. of these because we’re going to see a huge transformation with AI in the drug development process, right? So you see it today with monoclonal antibodies that a lot of the, a lot of the monoclonal antibodies starts in the computer, basically, because we understand a lot more about monoclonal antibodies.

We are in a very lucky situation where, you know, I told you, we’ve been at it for 20 years. So we know what works and what doesn’t work, and we have tons of data. And you know, when we did the when we developed the, to look for specificity and how it works, We did everything with co crystal structures.

So we have a resolution of maybe, we have resolved maybe 500, something like that, 500 co crystal structures. So you can imagine the, the richness of that data. To actually start looking at predicting, you know, what kind of TCR you need to have before even doing experiments in the, in the, in the lab.

That’s what we’re focused on. And I think that’s going to cut a lot of time. To, to bring you know, that, that’s one part where we can actually have, make a difference there. 

Philip Hemme: And how, how are you doing it then? Are you like training some models yourself? Are you partnering with some? 

Bahija Jallal: So we have one collaboration, so we’re partnering with the, with the one company and then we have internal efforts as well.

Because we’re sitting on that data, if you imagine not only the data that I, I talked about for the crystal structure and everything, but we also now, treated 2000 patients or something like that from clinical trials and everything. So there’s a lot of information there as well. So I think we are just at the beginning, but I’m really, really excited about that.

Philip Hemme: That’s good. Cause I, I think, I mean, the, And the potential is, is huge and can be really transformative. I think, Bernhard Lantau, that was a pre CEO of Eurotech on, on the show, and he mentioned that the gains, if you look at the industries, drug development would cut by 30 to 50 percent the costs. That was the whole process.

And I mean, what, as we discussed, and you think in billions and in years, time and money, it’s huge. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. But what I’m, I mean, that’s huge on one hand, but I’m also always like curious is what you just mentioned, having like some concrete, let’s say, examples of now, how can it help, especially biotech companies, like as of today or in the, in the shorter term and how they like integrated or work with it or profit from it.

That’s always, I find that. less easy to necessarily see, or not, not this easy to, to translate, and that’s what also curious, like, was very interesting to see. 

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, there is something really concrete now, like if you look at some companies going after monoclonal antibodies, nobody does, or at least these companies are not going to to immunize llamas, or immunize mice, or immunize whatever.

Look at, you know, or have a big phase display library and things like that, you know in small molecules, it started the same thing, you know, to do the design before. But in monoclonal, it’s really I think is showing the way there that basically you do all that modeling in silico, basically. And that’s AI, that’s basically, you know, based on the information we have about monoclonal antibodies.

Yeah. That’s what we’re trying to do on the TCR, because if you can cut all that empirical way of finding, you know, doing the testing and finding and all this, these are months. When you, when you cut, you know, a year or something of the drug development, that’s a lot of money already to start with. And that’s just the beginning.

I think once you get, the more you do of this modeling, the more you, you know, educate the system, the better it is and, and so on. And then you start, I think there is a company doing that in monoclonal antibodies in a, in a finding a different way of by specific, just all with AI. That’s completely fascinating.

So I think we just at the beginning, you know, 

Philip Hemme: the, the company, 

Bahija Jallal: what’s, what’s the name of the. You know, biologic, I will say, but they’re doing that. Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. 

Philip Hemme: And maybe do you have other names?

Bahija Jallal: I think Abcelera, I think, as well. Abcelera. 

Philip Hemme: Yeah. Do you have other, other, use cases, at Immunocore where you use AI?

Bahija Jallal: Yeah, we just, we just basically the, the, the area where we are focused on first is taking all that learning on how we can, before going experimental, find the right TCR. You know, just through that modeling and knowing. Because it’s not just finding the TCR. If you find the TCR, does it bind correctly?

Does it do and all this stuff? You can, you can do all that now in Silicon. Like I said, this is the beginning, but we are really working hard on that. Ah, sure. 

Philip Hemme: Well, one thing, I’m curious, also one thing mentioned Thomas Clausell on, from Oaken was on the show and he, I asked him actually, okay, what, what should a biotech platform how should a biotech platform use AI today?

Because obviously it’s very, I mean, tricky what we just discussed, too. Should you partner, should you do your own things, where to apply it? One thing he said, he also is on, on really on, on the clinical trials, on certification of patients or finding the right patients where you have massive potential gains as well.

Because do you, like, are you also using AI on, let’s say, on optimizing clinical trials? No, 

Bahija Jallal: not, not to the same extent, you know, but I think there is potential there. Good work. You know, is where to get the, the data. Like I said, we have 2, 000 patients or something, those, so we know a lot more and we are trying to use the data to to inform us.

But you know, I think where hopefully it will make more of a difference is basically, you know, clinical trials take a long time, finding the right patients take a long time. If we can cut from that time. You know, and bring the right patients to, to the trials and, and so on. You know, it’s, it’s not an easy thing and if we’re gonna do it properly, we’re gonna have to really collaborate in that space.

Philip Hemme: You’re not collaborating at the moment, you’re, you’re looking at it, you’re looking at it, I guess, collaborating. Right. Nice. That’s, amazing discussion. I could continue for a while, but I know we, we are, we are, we have a, we have a time limit. Like, yeah. I think, I think it’s a great wrapping up.

I think we can finish here. Thanks a lot for joining. 

Bahija Jallal: It’s my pleasure. Thank you very much. 

Philip Hemme: And please continue amazing work and like keep my fingers crossed that everything works out well and on the day 

Bahija Jallal: it comes out. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. All right. Thanks. Bye. Bye. 

[01:14:42] Thanks for listening

Philip Hemme: Thanks for listening to the end.

I have to say it was one of my favorite episodes so far. I’m impressed by what Baija has been building at Iminacore and how she is doing it with focus on the science, on care about the patients, following her heart, while at the same time she’s super down to earth. And, and having fun. I hope you enjoyed as well.

If you did, please hit the like, follow, review button. Any of these actions would, would help us a lot. And I would also be curious to hear what you think. So please, leave a comment below or send me an email to philip at flot. io Alright, see you in the next episode.

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