We’re in Hamburg with Sean Marett, who has been instrumental to the success of BioNTech for 12 years
We talked about the secrets behind BioNTech’s success. We also talked about the art of dealmaking and working with China.
⭐️ ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Sean joined BioNTech in 2012 as part of the Management Board. He was instrumental in the growth of the company and global expansion through business development and product commercialization. Prior to BioNTech Sean worked in top companies such as GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, Evotec, and Lorantis.
I first met Sean in 2015 in Berlin, when BioNTech had no website, but was already the largest private biotech in Europe. Now Sean has retired from BioNTech after 12 years but still aids the company as a specialist consultant.
🔗 LINKS MENTIONED
- BioNTech Announces Planned Retirement of Sean Marett: https://investors.biontech.de/news-releases/news-release-details/biontech-announces-planned-retirement-sean-marett
- BioNTech pays $800M to take control of potential Keytruda killer: https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/biontech-pays-800m-take-control-potential-keytruda-killer
- Sean Marett, COO at BioNTech, on the Future of mRNA Therapies – 2015: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zrDKRvsAEU
Transcript
[00:00:00] Intro
Sean Marett: In 2011, Dirk invited me to Mainz and suggested I go and talk to Ugo. I went to see him and he presented individualized cancer therapy. His vision, I thought, that’s the future of cancer treatment.
Philip Hemme: Was it MRNA already?
Sean Marett: It was.
Philip Hemme: It was
Sean Marett: then? It was. When you negotiate a deal, you really need to understand all of the elements.
Otherwise, how can you be effective? at negotiating. The reason why BioNTech didn’t license those programs was good science. China does have good biotechnology companies, really outstanding. It’s a global business and we saw assets there that we wanted to license.
Philip Hemme: Welcome to a new episode. I’m your host Philippe and on this show I’m interviewing the best Europeans in biotech to help you grow. BioNTech has helped defeat the COVID pandemic. One of the person’s instrumental behind biotech success is its CVO and CCO Sean Merritt. I first met Sean in 2015 in Berlin when BioNTech didn’t have a website but was already the largest private biotech in Europe.
Now Sean has retired after 12 years at BioNTech so I went to Hamburg to catch up with him. We talked about the secrets of BioNTech. success. We also talked about the art of deal making and working with China. So here’s my conversation with Sean and please hit the like follow button if you’re enjoying it.
Welcome to the show Sean. Thank you very much.
Philip Hemme: Lovely. Yeah. Sunny day. Sunny day. Lovely place. Great day worked out. I’m super excited to do that conversation. That’s great.
[00:01:45] Sean Marett stepping down as CBO of BioNTech
Philip Hemme: I want to, and I want to start with You are, let’s say, post BioNTech days, you just retired, was 12 years as CBO, Chief Commercial Officer.
And you told me, there is no dog walking. No, that’s right. How is it, how is it working? How is it going?
Sean Marett: Yeah, it’s been quite busy, actually, the last few months. The nice thing is I can, I can work on things I really, really want to work on, really like working on which reminds me a bit of Beyond Tech, actually, because that, in the early days, that was very much how we played.
The company focusing on what we, we liked and, and what we were good at.
Philip Hemme: That’s good. And so I saw you, you’re already on the board of ias. That’s right. Also, I guess looking for maybe also board memberships or some consulting
Sean Marett: that That’s right. I mean, I, I I’ve been on board of IAS for since 2021. And I’ve done a number of board positions over the years.
I mean, this, I curious, is my third one. And yeah, I, I’m interested in, in, in doing more board positions. That’s good. There’s
Philip Hemme: some, some investors or some, some people listening can reach out to you. What I, what I loved is how you transitioned out. I, I really love, I mean, I saw the press release was very positive.
I saw the, like the whole, like there was, The post, everything, the tone was like, it was like a very nice, positive, planned, transitional. I think I’m correct about this now, like, can you?
Sean Marett: That’s right. Yeah. I mean, we’ve been planning this for two years, Grant. It’s important. I mean, one of the things you learn is every so often you need to, you need to refresh and refresh a board, and I’m of the firm belief that there are people who can do what I did.
Better than I can. Therefore, I thought this would be my last few years. And agreed that with the supervisory board, agreed that with the management board, and so we, we, we we put a plan in place to To, to replace me must
Philip Hemme: have been a very tough decision, like also emotional decision. It
Sean Marett: is, it is.
But you know, um, one thing I’ve learned, you look at politicians, you look at footballers and sometimes they stay too long and they become less productive. I know. Yeah. And I didn’t, I didn’t want to, I didn’t want to get into that position where you get too comfortable because success for me was always, you always have to be slightly unsure about the future and slightly nervous the whole time.
And I’d lost that a little bit, I felt, and I, I wanted to get that. And I think the company benefits from, from when you. When you really are a little bit nervous about things.
Philip Hemme: That sounds, sounds very good.
[00:05:10] From Pfizer to BioNTech
Philip Hemme: Maybe to, to jump to a bit. I’m curious to hear the really the beginnings, maybe BioNTech, maybe even before, like what I read in your post was that you actually started at Pfizer, the first, the first job.
Sean Marett: Yeah. I left the lab and went, went into selling for Pfizer. I went to see physicians.
Philip Hemme: And then you ended up basically partnering with Pfizer and solving the pandemic together, which
is crazy. Yeah. Yeah. It was full circle. It really was. It was so cool. Yeah. And look.
Sean Marett: What was interesting for me about that was the commercial processes that I learned when I started at Pfizer.
I haven’t changed that much since since my very first job. And so I really, really liked the commercial element of working with Pfizer and the commercial team. It was just like the old days, actually. Very old
Philip Hemme: days. It’s amazing. And I guess When at BioNTech, it helped a lot. Also, I mean, it must be very difficult in this time pressure at that scale, also to negotiate and to get the commercial rights, which I think BioNTech did very well must have helped a lot, I guess.
Sean Marett: Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I mean you need to under, when you negotiate a deal, you really need to understand all of the, all of the elements, otherwise, how can you, be effective at negotiating and if I didn’t understand something, I would certainly learn it. For me, the commercial part was easy in that I, I knew it.
I was advisor. I was a GSK in the United States in commercial roles. So I, I kind of, that wasn’t so difficult. And the manufacturing was also relatively straightforward for me because I had run plants before in my career. So I, I understood GMP. And clinical development also because my time at GSK in, in, in, in global marketing where you of course interact with the clinical, global clinical and global regulatory group.
And so you really have to understand all
Philip Hemme: of this. Oh, it’s amazing how every pieces fit together.
Sean Marett: They really is, you know, and. And you need to fit them together. It’s a jigsaw puzzle. And do you need to understand that when you, when you’re, when you’re negotiating, because you, there’s you and perhaps one or two colleagues, and then you have opposite you a whole organization with all of the specialization and that all asking for very specific things of their business development group.
So you have to be able to really argue if you want to be successful. It’s a biotech technology company.
Philip Hemme: I think I will, I will come back to that. I remember we, we had a discussion once said by Europe, I think about the Genentech deal, you just signed it. Oh gosh, yes. That was a lot. That was eight years ago.
But I remember still remember it. You mentioned something like eight or 10 hour calls straight or something, but I want to jump after that to that. And maybe before, where we stay on kind of career, I’m curious to hear. What had, how did you meet Ugor and how did it come to be, this work at, at Biontech?
Sean Marett: I met Ugor in 2003 when I was at Evotech, and he just together with Özlem had founded Ganymed, and there was also a COO there, Dirk Sebastian, and I remained in contact with Dirk and Özlem over the years.
And in 2011, I, dick invited me to mines and suggested I go and talk to Ko, who was in the university at the time. And I went to see him and he presented individualized cancer therapy to me, his vision. And I thought that’s the future of cancer treatment.
Philip Hemme: Was it mRNA already, you know? It was. It was, yeah?
Sean Marett: It was.
It was, it was, it was sequencing, uh, algorithmic selection of neoantigens and manufacturing with mRNA just in time, just for the patient. 2011.
Philip Hemme: But I can imagine 2011 also was not, you know, It’s still a pretty small organization for you, I guess. I mean, can you go through the decision making process of, was it really clear or was it easy?
Sean Marett: Only clear
for me. Okay.
Sean Marett: Completely clear. You need good science. You need a executionable plan and Google had it. He had it. And, and I just, I just like Hugo, right Tim?
Philip Hemme: It’s a personal self address. I think from the 20 plus episodes and like, it came up a lot that the personal fit is
Sean Marett: very crucial. It is really crucial because As everyone knows in the biotech, I mean, it’s, it is a brutal business.
It’s not, I mean, it’s, it’s tough and you go through ups and downs and you need to support each other. You as a board, you need to support each other in the difficult times and celebrating the good times. And therefore, fit is, is one of the critical success factors in my view. As well as, of course, just taking risk of being entrepreneurial.
Philip Hemme: It makes me think about Stefan Borsell from, from Modena. And he said, I met him in Boston once, but he said, biotech is for people, people, people. Like real estate is for location, location, location. And I think. That’s what you just it’s just, I think that was correct.
Sean Marett: I mean, you need good, you need good science as well.
You need really, really good science.
Philip Hemme: That’s it. And yeah, I mean, I don’t know if you remember when the first time we met, I think was in, was in Berlin at the mRNA conference. So it’s pretty nice, Kovac, Moderna, BioNTech. And I remember, because I had never heard of biotech at that time, I think it was 2015, 2016, something.
2015.
Philip Hemme: And then we met and he told, yeah, you know, it’s the largest private biotech in Europe. I’m like, okay, well, never heard of it. I think your website was not existing or like very, very minimal.
Sean Marett: Yeah, but it’s existed until 2014. For six years after we, we founded the company, after the company was founded.
Philip Hemme: Can you talk a bit about these, like, early days of you joined Zouguo to, to that moment? Like, what’s, yeah, why, why you didn’t have a website before? Why, like, what’s?
Sean Marett: Well, I think I think we felt that it was important to focus on building the platforms. And fortunately through Thomas and Andrea Strongman, we had the investment that allowed us to do that.
And it takes years to really develop platforms and, and so we were able to, to focus on doing that. And, you know, when we were getting closer to clinical stage, we, we, we felt that you know, if we want to be a global biotech, and we always said from the very, very beginning, that’s what we want. That’s what we want the company to be.
You need you need reach, and in order to get reach, you need The website. Well, no, you need Palmer, you need farmer partners. And so we switched on the website and started looking for partners. That’s
Philip Hemme: what we did. That’s amazing. And I’m wondering also from the, but even from HR for hiring, I mean, a website and whatever is pretty useful as well, right?
Sean Marett: Well one Business development person who the company will remain nameless said to me when I said over 240 people and based in minds and he said,
can’t be a serious biotech. You don’t have a website. Actually we had a lot of publications, scientific publications supporting what what the company was doing and the correct answer would probably be but I do recognize you have a lot of scientific papers.
Philip Hemme: It’s amazing. I think it’s over there.
It’s quite extreme sign of prioritization and focus, but I guess it worked out at the end. Like,
Sean Marett: I mean, we, when we decided upon because of the quality of the science we were able to do five. Deals in 18 months on different platforms,
Philip Hemme: including
Sean Marett: the Genentech.
Philip Hemme: Which was like, was it 300 million up front
Sean Marett: or something?
Yeah, 325. Yeah, so we raised, I mean we raised then just under 500 million dollars in financing from up front. Which, which was useful for us, plus of course, we got some partners, some good partners who, who had clinical operations globally, which of course is one of the things we were, we were searching for in order to funnel our inventions.
Yeah.
Philip Hemme: That’s
Sean Marett: meant.
[00:15:28] Building a biotech in Mainz
Philip Hemme: And one still on, on the similar topic, what, one thing that is amazing that you build the company in, in Mainz. Which is, there is a lot of pharma around, but it’s not the biggest biotech hub in Germany or in, or in Europe.
Sean Marett: Well, so people in mines tell me it’s, it’s quite biotech because there’s a lot of wine in part, it’s a, which is a biotech process.
Philip Hemme: Fermentation, yeah, that’s right. But how, how was it, I mean, can you talk a bit about it? How was it to build the business there? What are some of the challenges, maybe some opportunities as well, sometimes when you’re big fish in a small pond, it’s, it’s better.
Sean Marett: Oh, I think we, I think we had we had advantage that Ugal being a professor had good connections with the university and so we were able to hire scientists, but also partner with in particular TRON Translational Research Institute which is a Rheinland Pfalz owned, partly owned.
Institute and they did a lot. They did a lot with us together. And in that way, although we were 240 people at the time, we were much more than that because we were able to work with the Institute on And they provided a further 70 80 scientists. It
Philip Hemme: reminds me a bit of also I had a Harpreet from Ematics on the show and Ingmar from CureVac and also this very local tubing and connection with the university, was using the offices there.
Very, very Heavy support, but maybe you get less if you’re in a bigger biotech hub or like, and,
Sean Marett: and even with more competition for the, for the facilities. I mean mine’s in the early days when, when we were sequencing patients tumors, we were accessing Mines computing system, because it was one of the, the most powerful systems in Europe.
Yeah. And that’s, I mean, in the early days, of course, there’s a lot, it’s an awful lot of data to, to churn through and you need strong computing power, which didn’t really exist in Europe. Mines was an exception.
Philip Hemme: Wow. Okay. Hmm. But I guess this connected. backward, not forward, you didn’t, or it was not planned forward by Ugo or someone, like, how intentional
was
Philip Hemme: it, like?
What what do you mean for that?
Philip Hemme: No, I mean, like, did Ugo already kind of had that plan and knew that there was this infrastructure and access to it, or was it more that he was professor there? And then when you were going forward, you, you found the right opportunities and the right infrastructure and everything connected.
I think that both.
As it was, but both.
Philip Hemme: And maybe the last on the history as well, one thing that always like fascinated me was, was that you seem to add a very clear Delegation and clear set of responsibilities and focus within Biontech, where you were really in charge, at least, at least how I perceived it of the biotech business, you would take care of all the bio partnering conferences and the partnering in general, and I guess a big part of investor meetings as well, versus Ugo could then focus on the Western.
I’ve never seen Ugo, I think at the conference or something. And I found it always like, first of it’s surprising. Usually CEOs will attend some of these meetings as well. But in your case, like, seemed like, but it seemed to also work. And probably, yeah, I don’t know. Can you talk about, is it correct, my assumption or like,
Sean Marett: It’s correct.
Yeah. I mean, that’s how we worked. And I think in order for that to work, there has to be a, a good understanding of each other’s capabilities and and trust and, And it’s something,
we talked about fit at the beginning and, and I think it’s, in some, in some ways it’s a little bit unspoken you just go and do, do stuff because it needs being done. And that’s how we divided up the, the work. Igor was always focused on the science there, always. And it was important because well, People sometimes forget is that we’re never alone in the world and there’s always competition and you need to be quick.
You need to be quick in biotech.
Philip Hemme: Yeah, yeah, but and how was it when you negotiated deals and they didn’t see Ugo or something? Was it surprising to them or like, was it?
I got used to everyone, but I used to be. Investors got you to use it, right?
Sean Marett: Yeah. But at the end of the day everyone is interested in output and in this way we could focus on output.
I mean, we, when we went to do the IPO, we had a number of nature papers supporting the platforms. These help. If I see such as Ugal is spending time at Bio Europe, he can’t be writing those nature papers. And at the end of the day, it is, you know, we are selling science.
Philip Hemme: Huh. Science and the, I guess, commercialization of science and having a slim as all must help.
Sean Marett: Yes, again, later on, Shannon, that helped too, that, that, that, that that really helped too.
Philip Hemme: It’s pretty nice also how, I mean, how they, how the credit, yeah, I mean, how they shared the credit as well. Islam and Uighur. I mean, obviously. And
Sean Marett: Islam. Yeah, no, it’s correct. I
Philip Hemme: think it’s correct. I think it’s correct.
Like nice to see you know maybe one, one more controversy, I mean, more controversial question about buying tech and I don’t know how much you can, you can talk about this, but one thing that puzzles me a bit doing, I mean, from this dynamic first, I mean, it’s amazing. Like what you achieved is like, no question about it, this is insane.
But one thing that puzzled me a bit was the, the amount charge slash the margin. And I want to come, I mean, Modena did basically the same as you guys, I think at least. And then, but then when I saw AstraZeneca, they did more the approach, maybe they were forced by the university as well or by public money.
And they basically sold almost at cost of it was a pretty low margin. And when it’s kind of public needs I found it. I mean, I just was two different approaches, but I’m wondering, because I mean, I saw like everyone, we want to solve that. And even I remember Ugo was having like a deal with Moderna for like fair development or something.
And then, but then when you see the prices and now the profit, I mean, it’s amazing for Biointech and for Moderna to have so much cash to be developing. But I’m wondering from a public perception or from whatever, whatever thing, how, how the decision was made, how, like what was behind, I don’t know how much you can talk about this and how much it’s true.
Just, yeah. I don’t know.
Sean Marett: Well, I think, you know, if you’re a big pharma company that you’re, you’re in the different position than a biotech such as us who’d just done an IPO in terms of the capital you have and the risk you can take. With respect to beyond Tech, we took a risk, quite a, we took a large risk in that we focused the company four months after our IPO, which was a IPO focused on cancer, especially.
You
Philip Hemme: were a
cancer company, correct?
Sean Marett: On
covid
Sean Marett: and. We use the proceeds of of COVID for the original vision of the cancer research. So, the money flows back into, into further research. I think that had we been Unsuccessful it would not have been terminal for Biontech, but it would have been a difficult, more difficult time for sure. And you know, we just didn’t know.
We had, when we got the results as the clinical phase three, which was on a late on a Sunday night in November, we had two press releases ready. One worked, two, it did not work. And you just didn’t know and I think you have to recognize that all biotechs in this business and take risk. You do have to, you do have to cover that risk.
Yeah,
Philip Hemme: that’s always what’s, yeah, yeah, makes sense. But you think AstraZeneca took less risk?
Sean Marett: No, I don’t think so. I think they just had more cushion. I mean, it wasn’t, They have many, many programs, they have a cash flow positive. If it didn’t work, it wouldn’t have been kept as, difficult as for a company that generates no cash, burns cash, and has a limited supply of cash.
Philip Hemme: No, I mean, it’s fair. And I think at the end of the day, also, I think from a margin, you didn’t charge more than, let’s say, industry standards for a successful CIP, whatever a rare disease or what Argenix is charging or whatever. I think it’s, was in a similar ballpark.
Sean Marett: I think that I mean, the price is our market prices and that’s what we, that’s what we agreed.
And I think there, as with all negotiations, there are certain checks and balances including on the price. That’s good.
[00:29:02] The art of biotech dealmaking
Philip Hemme: So going to the what we discussed let’s say the art of deal making and what you, what we talked about Genentech, to go back to that, the deal we had with Genentech, I want to spend a bit more time on there and also, I mean, I think in Europe, I think you’re one of the best.
Dealmakers in Europe, at least for the biotech side, not for the pharma side. At least I cannot think about too many other that are at your level. So I want to spend a bit of time on there on like, what are some of the lessons, maybe for some people listening who are maybe a bit more junior or senior or more senior.
And I don’t know, I mean, we can start on many levels, but maybe the. I was impressed this, this, this, what you told about this, our Genentech that you were like, I don’t remember how much, like nine or 10 hours on a call and you had whatever, like 20 people in front in on the other side of the line with all the experts.
How did, I mean, how do you manage this kind of like
discussions? And like, you
Sean Marett: have to, you, you, you have to I think you have to be extremely well prepared. And I think for any. Any negotiation, anywhere, you, you need to prepare, you need to really consider all of the potential scenarios and the way negotiation can go beforehand.
You can’t predict it all, there’s no way, but being prepared gives you confidence. And the other thing I think You have to know the detail. You really have to know the detail.
Philip Hemme: How much of that is, is what you mentioned, experience of commercial, like different set of experience to get there? How much of it is in your control where you can, let’s say, put in more hours to be prepared?
Sean Marett: I mean, it really it really helps if you can understand the complete discovery through commercialization process because you can You can, you, you should just, and, and, and you know what, you, you understand a little bit about the, the market as well, um, I think that helps. I think too always, I’ve always regarded deal making as a fair balance between two parties.
I’ve seen deal making in companies, which, where people try and get as much as to their advantage as they can. I find that for, for, for me, I don’t. Do it like that, because I always regard these deals as the beginning of a long term relationship, and in any long term relationship, it’s always give and take.
And, at the end of the day, you’re trying to get through a fair and reasonable deal. And sometimes people forget that. And I try and remember that.
Philip Hemme: You have some examples maybe that you can talk about?
Sean Marett: Um, like I do have some examples like this, but I will not be talking about them.
Philip Hemme: Yeah, or maybe anonymous, I mean like, nothing else.
I mean, what, and is it, is it like this also for a fair deal? I think when you’re on the biotech side and you don’t have too much leverage.
But you got to create your leverage. Let’s talk about that after.
Sean Marett: Yeah, you can’t, yeah, yeah, yeah, you can’t, you can’t negotiate with two hands tied behind your back or, as Winston Churchill said, with your head.
In the mouth of a tiger,
Philip Hemme: you go on. How do you create your leverage? How did you do it? That by intake?
Good science. Yes.
Sean Marett: Good science. Knowing and being prepared to say no. And creating a competitive environment. There’s always more than one.
Yeah, in fact I negotiated with three parties in parallel before. And it’s useful to do that.
Philip Hemme: Yeah.
Sean Marett: Because that strengthens your Yeah.
Philip Hemme: It’s funny because in pharma and biotech, I always feel like competition is a bit, it’s not taboo, but it’s like, Oh no, we all like, let’s be competitive. Like also the VCs, we’re all friends.
We know each other. But at the end, when I hear about really how the deal works or the deal making works versus I mean, deal making or fundraising, so competition and the fear of missing out is very strong actually. Right. And I don’t know as strong as in other industries, but it’s very strong. I mean, I guess.
Sean Marett: It’s very strong, it’s strong depending on the science, of course. And some of it’s fashion, you know, there’s waves of, uh, waves of interest normally sparked by a publication in a renowned scientific journal, but yes.
Philip Hemme: But going back to your fair deal, I mean, I remember, I don’t remember the name of the company.
I think it was IL2 company in doing IL2 targeting IL2 and in Boston, and they were acquired by American Merck. And then when it was released, all the SEC statements, you saw that they made an offer for like three times less than the final offer just because two other pharma partners came in. And then the bid went back three X, which if you, I mean, if you count the value, then it’s I mean, the first offer was clearly not fair or clearly not recognizing the value.
And then the value of the competition is.
Sean Marett: Well, you’ve got to ask the first, whether the first offer, I don’t know the basis of the offers, but
clearly the price was somewhere higher than the initial offer.
It’s the fair price, the fair
Philip Hemme: price and how was the deal with Pfizer? I’m also curious. And I don’t know how much you can, I mean, not sure the specific, but must be also. And especially with that, like time pressure, I guess the time pressure was on both sides gave you leverage, but also removed leverage.
Sean Marett: Yeah, we, we did in five weeks from, from, from letter of intent. Yeah. So. We did the letter of intent and then we did the contract and it was all done in four or five weeks.
Philip Hemme: That’s pretty fast.
Sean Marett: Yeah, yeah, there was a lot of, yeah, there was a lot of late nights. You have to do it quickly. I mean, it doesn’t matter which deal you do, deal making, part of the success of deal making is speed.
Philip Hemme: Speed and momentum, I guess.
Sean Marett: Speed and momentum and you really, you know, the longer a deal takes, the less likely it’ll occur, in
Philip Hemme: my view. 100 percent all the time. And
Sean Marett: it’s the less likely, I mean, you may get there in the end, but certainly the conditions will be different.
Philip Hemme: Yeah, I like that. I think also my experience with fundraising, I think it’s similar to fundraising as well, where your momentum matters.
It
Sean Marett: does. It does.
Philip Hemme: It’s
Sean Marett: the same. It’s the same thing. And it’s competition. Yeah. Also in, in financing. I
Philip Hemme: like that. I think what’s, what’s tricky is when you as we discussed a bit also before starting the recording, like when you’re a biotech that is not that well financed or that doesn’t have that strong science or you have less, less optionality.
And how do you like to create this momentum and create, have this leverage, I think, and I think quite a few biotechs in Europe are in that position, especially right now, where the cash is thought to be to dry up. Dries harder. Yeah,
Sean Marett: I guess there’s no magic trick. And
Philip Hemme: he says bringing you in as a consultant, maybe.
Yeah, there’s
Sean Marett: It depends, I mean
I think it depends on the individual, individual cases and I don’t think you can. Necessarily draw any conclusions because some, some may, some may need some, some marketing, others may need to do additional studies and then they’re there, you know, it depends.
Philip Hemme: Same as with fundraising, I guess it’s, yeah, society depends a lot on, on the stage and everything.
Do you have maybe not talking this much? Is there a deal outside BioNTech that you, that you particularly enjoy or particularly liked how it was done or how?
Sean Marett: Well, I did, I did supply deals for the COVID and I kind of liked that. Yeah. Cause that was different. I was dealing with governments and they’re, they’re different.
Philip Hemme: Also,
Sean Marett: So governments, um, governments, no, they tend to, they tend to have, of course, pharma has too many, many stakeholders. The government has politicians who may not really fully understand some of the technical aspects of what they’re buying, whereas a CEO of a pharma company does. And I think that managing that and explaining that to politicians does, does take time.
And You do have to, you do have to communicate a lot, and because again, it’s not always their particular area, and you, you, you need to educate them.
Philip Hemme: And how, you said, it takes time, but when you didn’t have the time?
Sean Marett: Well, you just make it at the later night. Okay. It’s where have we been with the German government?
I mean, we were on the phone late at night, quite, quite regularly.
Philip Hemme: Yeah.
Sean Marett: Oh, that’s crazy.
Philip Hemme: We met Reminds me, I think I saw one interview from and maybe she was together with, we were saying 12 months basically from starting the, the vaccine, I guess, whatever, January, was it? January
Sean Marett: on February of the pandemic.
End of January. Yeah. Yeah. We were in the clinic in April
Philip Hemme: to, and then to injecting the first part, make market access, market approval, and injecting first patient was a, she said was a crazy ride from like. a series of sprints of sprints. And I think she said, like, she couldn’t believe they would be able to do it even from a human capacity.
Like and that was like, and sounds like exactly what I mean. That’s like a crazy ride. Yeah,
Sean Marett: it was. Yeah, it was. And of course you don’t really you don’t really realize at the time because you’re so, you know, You’re so focused on execution.
Philip Hemme: I was thinking about a deal, maybe also a deal that you haven’t done necessarily, a deal that you, you’ve seen in the industry, observed, maybe if there’s one that particularly stood out, especially you from a, with a European angle, I don’t know, European pharma or European biotech.
Sean Marett: That’s a curd, you mean, a deal that’s a curd?
Philip Hemme: Yeah.
Sean Marett: I can’t think of any, all deals are unique. They’re all, that’s the nice thing about biotech, they’re all, they’re all different. I think with being on tech, if I think about all of the deals that I’ve done, I found them all fascinating, every single one of them, whether it’s fundraising or CRSA, CRSB, and doing the, the IPO, whether
Philip Hemme: it’s, well, that was
Sean Marett: a lifelong ambition for me.
Philip Hemme: You
look
Sean Marett: very
happy on the
picture. I was. There was a, it was, I wanted, I told Google that day. I said that, I’ve achieved my lifetime ambition. And let you stick mostly. No, yeah. No. Doing IP on the NASDAQ. I always wanted to do it. It was it was really, it was really cool. Whether it’s that or even, you know, the, the, This, the COVID supply agreements and the government or doing the, we did a deal when I was at Biontech with the UK with the health system there, which was also unique or, or just the deals we did with pharma.
They’re, they’re all they all have their challenges. They’re all absolutely intellectually fascinating. And so I, I don’t think you can. I don’t think you can ever say, oh, I wish I’d done that deal. I think, I think I think yes. I think they’re, they’re just very individual.
Philip Hemme: It sounds like you really enjoy deal making it all like,
Sean Marett: Hey, I do.
Philip Hemme: I think that’s a crucial, I mean, you didn’t mention this, but I think it’s also a crucial,
Sean Marett: of course, you have to look, you have to love what you do. You have to love what you do. And it’s, it’s, it’s, you know, over the, over the course of Beyond Tech I don’t think with the commitments that we all made, you could commit like that if you didn’t love it, you can’t do it.
I mean, I, I, I was working Christmas, New Year didn’t really take a holiday for many years. Because we were, there was always something, always.
[00:45:29] Mistakes in dealmaking
Philip Hemme: Maybe we talked about what, what was important to have, or what’s the positive, but can you talk a bit about mistakes you see people doing in, in deal making, or the common, let’s say, common mistakes. Underpricing. Underpricing.
Sean Marett: I think I learned that from my time living in the United States. You have to value good science, and I think that’s one thing.
But then, on the other hand, if the science isn’t Good then that statement is of course not correct, and again, it’s very, depends on, on the particular situation and I think realism.
I think you have to be practical. Sometimes you have to sometimes you have to do things in the short term for the long, long term. And I, the IPO was a good example of that. The, um, we iPod when the NBI, the NASDAQ Biotech Index was, as I say, falling off a cliff. It was just. Declining. I think returns for the year at the point we went on the roadshow were 0.
5%. And then in October when we IPO’d, fund managers were losing money. And, and it was a, it was a tough IPO. One year. It
Philip Hemme: was not, I mean, it was, it was done, but it was, yeah, not the most successful.
Sean Marett: And, and actually, when we were debating it I remember the advice of one of the bankers who didn’t say very much, but he said one thing that I shall never forget.
It’s just remember, you know, this is, this will set your company up for the long term. And that’s how you have to look at it. That’s correct. Absolutely correct. Absolutely correct. And, you know, that. Very simple statement, real clarity, and yes, we, we did it not as we wanted it, but we still, it was still a good result.
Philip Hemme: Going back to underpricing, undervaluing, how do you, Let’s see if you’ve got science. How do you, I mean, how do you find the, the right balance?
Because I guess that’s, well, you know, I mean, yeah, I mean, it’s
Especially as a European, you always, we always say we under, undersell ourselves. Versus American tend to, Maybe oversell themselves as a, like, very general cultural traits.
Sean Marett: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think Europeans do. I think I think generally we, we, we, we do. It’s a global market. I think that’s what you have to remember. And, you know, the, the, then if you, if you, if you recognize that, then you, you, you do look at global comms I mean, everyone looks at, so there’s three ways of doing that.
There’s an, a net present value calculation on the assets there’s the comparable deals, which are only as good as what has been done before. Use that a bit, but I don’t think I would have done some of the deals had I, you know, Always done that. And then there’s feel, just pure feel. And I think it’s a combination of analytics and feel you have to, you have to feel the market.
And and sometimes that’s not that’s not so easy, but it does come to you because it, it’s it’s it’s a consequence of ensuring that as a deal maker. You are talking constantly at, to a lot of companies at some of these powering events and then you get a feel.
Philip Hemme: Mm hmm. Yeah. Makes, makes sense.
I like that. I think it’s, I guess, I mean, that’s the art of dealmaking as well. It’s, there’s so much, that’s why, I mean, that’s why it can be called kind of an art because there’s so much feeling and
Sean Marett: It’s intangible. The thing is, it’s early. It’s early, so there’s a lot, in a lot of directions it can go in and I think you have to You have to look at the science that you are doing a deal on, and thinking about, always, at least I always do, when it goes to the market, because if you understand that and the opportunity offers, you can get a good sense of value.
Sometimes net present value will tell you that, but net present value on preclinical assets, if it’s preclinical, it’s quite hard. But it’s useful to, I still did it. I did do NPVs in my early days to, I did them myself to, just to, just to give you another data point. It’s data points at the end of the day.
Philip Hemme: And how, how do you, if, I mean, some people is listening is. Because, I mean, that’s also the hard part about BD, you, you want to be strong in science, whatever, PhD or whatever, like science understanding, you want to have experience in deal making, you want to have a commercial background, like, that’s a lot of, like, skills.
And I guess it’s hard to also have all of them. I guess most people in BD will have one aspect where they’re stronger, or I think a lot of BD, especially in biotech, they don’t necessarily have a commercial. experience. So how, what would you, I mean advice is a bit of a word, but what’s, what would be your thoughts there I can, and like have.
I guess the ideal profile. I don’t
Sean Marett: I think it’s what I said earlier. You need to talk to people. You need you need to gather information and you can do that nowadays, even if even if you haven’t done, let’s say, a commercial job, you can, you can still get a sense for the market. You can still, you can still read what is the standard of care for a particular program.
And you think about how your medicine. If that’s what you have in a clinical development, might change that standard of care. You don’t need to be, don’t need to have commercial experience to do that. And I come back to probably the most important element of any deal making, which is preparation. I used to write my own term sheets, I still, I still do.
But term sheets. Very detailed term sheets. Because by writing your own term sheets, you
Philip Hemme: understand the details.
Sean Marett: You understand the details, but you also get an understanding of much more than that of the, of the whole strategic negotiations approach. And it helps you, it helps you in your negotiation strategy.
Some people ask lawyers to do it. I, I, I don’t understand why, because. It’s a Heads of Terms, non binding Heads of Terms, and but that’s just me. So
Philip Hemme: the lawyer is helping you, I guess, to make sure it’s
Sean Marett: I know,
Philip Hemme: not
Sean Marett: with the term sheet. Contract, yes. Contract. But not, not term sheet. Why? Unless it’s a binding term sheet, and of course you need a lawyer, but if it’s non binding, it’s just a list of terms you’re going to discuss.
It’s more
Philip Hemme: But you agree on them.
Sean Marett: Yeah, but you need to For the audience,
Philip Hemme: maybe someone not too familiar with term sheets, but it’s basically a, whatever, one, two pager, with what has a name. Agreements for losing or for deal making, at least from what I can talk for my fundraising was one pager of like, okay, that’s probably like the equity of kind of equity is evaluation of the company.
Like the big the big pictures is basically drawn. And then as a second step, you go to Contracting. Once everyone is signed, then you go to contract just to people are not too familiar, but that’s okay. So the term sheet, you would do it yourself.
Sean Marett: Yeah. I think, I think it’s essential in order to be able to negotiate
it.
Philip Hemme: I’m curious on some of the big ideas you made. How long was the term sheet or how,
Sean Marett: So, so, so some, normally I’m trying to keep term sheet three pages, but one went to one went to seven or eight. And you got to be a bit careful because you’re not negotiating a contract, you’re negotiating a set of key terms, which is how much, how much does this cost and what do I get for it?
It’s as simple as that.
Philip Hemme: And what does the other person get like that? Well, no, well, yeah, for both parties.
Sean Marett: Yeah. I mean, it’s, you got, you know, you have to consider it from both the seller and the buyer end of view.
Philip Hemme: I liked, I liked that. I like the advice on the commercial aspect as well. Like, I think it’s something I’ve seen my, my wife has more works in, in biopharma as well and has more commercial back on the market access.
Sean Marett: Oh yeah.
Philip Hemme: And It’s super interesting for me to see all that angle. It helps me to understand biotech also way more. And now I start reading what the agency is saying about the products to really know, okay, what’s the standard of care and what’s the added value at least perceived from a reimbursement point of view.
And that’s, It’s quite key as well and that’s something I wouldn’t necessarily do or do less before. And at the same time, I do also more on the science, but I think for even for people listening, even if you don’t have a PhD or, I mean, if you have enough understanding. of the science to allow you to deep.
I mean, you don’t have PhD. No, I don’t, no. You dig deeper and you can do your work on your own and dig deeper. You can learn a lot, but you have to spend the time and focus and prioritize it. I guess that’s also what if you’re kind of, it goes into what you said. Preparation means also focus, I mean, focusing and prioritizing doing the work and doing the research and exploring what’s, what’s needed.
Sean Marett: That’s correct.
Philip Hemme: I liked it.
[00:57:45] Biotech dealmaking in China
Philip Hemme: Maybe the last spot on the, on the deal making as well. One thing that was quite surprising in recently from, from BioNTech is that you in licensed a lot of assets from China comparatively, I would say, I mean, for BioNTech, you were one of the only ones really doing that, but for you from a big pharma, I think you did more than, let’s say, than the average.
Can you talk about, yeah, what was let’s say the rationales behind, and then the second time we can talk more about what’s your experience was, let’s say, negotiating with a Chinese culture, which. My wife being also Chinese, I’m curious, personally curious about that as well. And I know the country is very different.
The business country is very different as well, but maybe first, like business rationale of licensing there versus Europe or the U. S. I
Sean Marett: think the
reason I’d be able to get licensed those programs, which I was of course, deeply involved with, was good science. And China does have. good biotechnology companies, really outstanding biotech it’s a global business. And we saw assets there that we wanted to license. So I think that’s, that’s, that’s why as to negotiating with Chinese partners it depends again if they have worked in Europe or the U.
S. That, that, that helps, but clearly there’s a cultural difference in, in negotiation. I recognize that, I think you have to, I, I was quite worried about that and so I made sure that, um, at least with me, wherever I could, I would have people at Beyond Tech who were Chinese who could help me translate.
Philip Hemme: Just the language, the,
Sean Marett: yeah, yeah, not just the language and, and China, of course, China is is really fascinating. And the one thing I really love about China is it’s it’s still a very, very, very strong relationship business like everything. And and And that’s fun, building relationships.
It’s, it’s,
Philip Hemme: it’s, it’s great. I like the aspect you said of, I think a lot of Chinese biotechs have some history, at least, if I think about Beijing or about what was it, what was acquired by Genmab. something ADC biotech, they were Seattle and Chinese based. And it’s like quite a lot of China. I mean, there’s a huge Chinese or Chinese origin population in the U.
S. working in biotech or pharma. And a lot of them went back and started with companies in China as well. So I think I can imagine this helps like it does. Yeah, it does. I think that’s, that’s great about deal making. I’m curious. One, one thing that also industry wise was the, I don’t know how much you can really talk about this or comment, but the whole, the whole IP situation on mRNA, I found it like a bit saddening.
Oh, I don’t know if it’s not like a bit sad, but it went to that point, especially knowing again, when we first met the conference where you were. It was always surprising your competitors, but quite friendly competition, organizing conferences together, helping each other out. Like, I don’t know, what do you, yeah, what do you think about it?
Like,
Sean Marett: I think it’s it’s an unfortunate side effect of
making money
and in certain jurisdictions, it’s ordinary course of business. I, you know, you get, you get used to it. I remember years ago, I met European who I knew quite well. On a flight, and I hadn’t seen him for a while, he’s a non, he was a non executive director of a U. S. company, and the first thing he said to me was, I’m being sued again.
This is a non executive director
of this public company. He said, and the second sentence is you get used to it. And it is, it’s just it’s just
part of the, part of the, part of the business. As a European, I don’t like it. But I don’t like it at all as as a business person, I have to recognize that, you know, in certain jurisdictions, this is just the way it is and you just have to deal with it.
Philip Hemme: I guess, especially in the U. S. It’s very legal for, I mean, there’s the law is very, I don’t know the law, but the lawsuits are much more, there’s much more lawsuits than in
Sean Marett: ordinary course of business.
Philip Hemme: It’s ordinary. Yeah. It’s crazy. Even you change job you sue your, your, your employer and stuff like, I’m like, what a friend of mine was just, Oh, I don’t think it’s that bad, but you know, basically changing job, a lawsuit, a lawsuit with his neighbor, I was like, So it’s not normal, okay I guess, yeah, I mean, makes sense also for you as a, from a business point of view, I think it’s, you said it’s a global business and you have to adapt.
Sean Marett: You have
to adapt.
Sean Marett: You have to adapt. But one thing that I think, um, it’s important is, you know, and this is where you, you, you For me, when all of this happened, I mean, you’ve really got to believe in your own science and your own patents, and if you do that, you’ll, you’ll react accordingly.
Philip Hemme: Let’s, let’s see how it how it plays out, I didn’t think.
[01:04:25] Managing energy
Philip Hemme: The maybe last last topic on last topic? And also from the, from the discussion we had is on, you are traveling so much and how you manage, I don’t know, fatigue and effort. You mentioned passion, that helps, but I think, yeah, what, what else was there, like, that you, that helped you a lot?
Like, it’s, it didn’t burn out or whatever. I mean, 12 years of this rhythm is pretty,
Sean Marett: I mean, it goes back to what we discussed earlier. I mean, why do you do this, this job? And it’s a love of the job. And I think that that, that brings you a long, a long way together with the feeling that you’re part of a small family and biotechs are small families yeah, they may, most of them are, and And of course, you know, and, and, and belief, I really, I really strongly believe that as you’ve called it passion, passion, of course the belief cause as I said, when I started fundraising, I always tell this story, but it just, I, I never forget it.
I, I went to New York And it was December, and it was one of the banks had a banking conference there. And you know, when you go to these banking conferences, you, you get appointments with investors. I had one appointment and, yeah, and that was with the IR agency who wanted to sell their services and I, I met at the lunchtime, I met One of the big pharma heads of research and development who I’d got to know really well.
And he’s, he, he said, and he, he built companies before and he said to me, you guys be fine. I’ll never forget that. And I thought, oh, okay. And then the next four days I spent in New York actually going around from fund to fund. I’d made some appointments
Philip Hemme: with the, was it gross funds, I guess for those,
Sean Marett: some of the big bigger funds.
Big funds, yeah, the big funds. And, you know, it was very much, I like to introduce BioNTech, a German immunotherapy cancer company. And there’s a who in that? What is.
That was always just every single meeting, every single one. Oh, but then, you know,
Philip Hemme: we did second time, then we thought, well.
Sean Marett: Well, I mean, you know when I think about it 12 months later, we did the sixth largest series A ever.
In biotech at the time we raised 270 million. So I think it’s it’s belief because it keeps going and perseverance.
Philip Hemme: Hmm. Perseverance. Yeah. I think, yeah, you can hear that from a lot of entrepreneurs, not just in biotech and perseverance is a key.
Sean Marett: Yeah. You have to. Yeah.
Philip Hemme: That’s good.
[01:08:17] Quickfire
Philip Hemme: To finish, I know I finished with a quick fire, quick questions where you can just answer yes, no, or one sentence and so what, what’s on the top of your mind at the moment?
My holiday. That’s a
Philip Hemme: good one. What’s your favorite biotech book?
Sean Marett: Oh the building of Genentech. Hmm.
Philip Hemme: The Beginnings of Gen.
Sean Marett: Yeah, yeah, yeah. With the, with the Recombinant protein.
That’s amazing. Yeah. I just reread it. Yeah. Skype two weeks ago. Yeah. It’s fantastic, bro. Love it.
Philip Hemme: What’s the, what’s the drug on the market that impresses you the most at the moment, except biotech drugs?
Sean Marett: I think Hemera was one that really impressed me because that came from behind and became a market leader with, um, in excess of 20 billion of annual revenues. That’s delusional. Yeah, I mean, it’s remarkable. It’s really good. And the other one was Kay Truder, and that was equally impressive.
Philip Hemme: Yeah. How much do you sleep per night?
Sean Marett: I sleep seven hours and I cannot function without good sleep. That’s good.
Philip Hemme: What’s the best biotech hub in Europe?
Sean Marett: Oh, I don’t know. I think, yeah, I can’t, I begin to say, no, I think
each have their specialities.
Philip Hemme: Yeah. I think Europe as a hub is also good. Not, not fighting different hubs, but it’s actually compared to Boston, which it’s clearly concentrated in Europe. It’s more spread out.
Sean Marett: It’s more spread out.
Philip Hemme: Even, I mean, we didn’t mention, but you, I never, I didn’t realize that you were.
not based in Mainz. You stayed in Hamburg for 12 years and you’re commuting, which is also an example of how, when you think about the hub, you think Mainz, but actually in Germany, and I interviewed a few others, and it’s very common where people commute a lot. I mean, my wife goes to work to Munich from Berlin and goes there once a month and it works perfectly fine.
And you can even do more and especially Germany, it’s so like like spread out as also federal and you have cities a bit everywhere and it’s pretty well connected by train. The train don’t run always on time, but it’s today they did. But you, I mean, people move quite a lot and it’s not so well.
Sean Marett: I think the infrastructure in Germany,
Philip Hemme: yeah.
Sean Marett: allows you to do that.
Philip Hemme: Like if you live in whatever, Philadelphia and you go to Boston, it’s a bit further, a bit more complicated.
Sean Marett: Yeah, it’s more, it’s more, it’s, it’s, it’s more difficult. I mean, when I was in Philly working for GSK, I used to go to Carolina every, every week and North Carolina. And it is, yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s more painful.
So,
Philip Hemme: One mistake you made in the past 12 months.
Sean Marett: One mistake that I have to think about, I’ll come back to you on that one. I, I, honestly, I have to think about that, you can skip this one. I don’t know. I make a lot, I make a lot of mistakes, so I, and, and, and, but I can’t think of one in the last 12 months other than not being quick enough to buy a car. Because
we don’t have a car at
Philip Hemme: the moment.
What’s one of your favorite European biotechs, again, except biointelligence?
Sean Marett: Oh, I don’t have one. I mean, I think, I think they’re all Not favorite, but one that you
Philip Hemme: particularly like, or maybe one that was remarkable in the last five months that impressed you.
Sean Marett: Again, I don’t really, I don’t really have them.
And a particular preference or favorite.
Philip Hemme: One of your European biotech heroes will be the last question. One of the what? European biotech heroes of yours.
Sean Marett: Heroes? It has to be. I mean. It Not European, but it would have to be Art Lemonson who who built Genentech. Because, I mean, he, he was faced with similar challenges with the technology that Biontech faced at the beginning with MRNA.
Philip Hemme: Yeah. And in the book, and for those who haven’t read the book, I think it’s, yeah, I highly recommend it. And they talk about Levinson as well. And it’s oh, there’s a lot of talks about him as well. A lot of public talks he gave. It’s amazing resource.
[01:13:57] Thanks for listening
Philip Hemme: Amazing. Thanks a lot.
Amazing discussion. Thank you for that.
Yeah. Yeah. Thank you too. Thanks for coming all this way. You’re welcome. Ah, really. With the weather and everything. It’s amazing. Yeah. It’s ugly weather. Lovely autumn day.
I’m impressed by what Sean and the Biontech team were able to achieve and how they achieved it. I’m also impressed by Sean’s experience in dealmaking and how he remains calm while having this British hero. If you’ve also enjoyed this episode, please hit the like, follow, review button. Any of these actions will help a lot to give more people access to the show.
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