August 4, 2025 • 52 mins
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On this week's episode, Oury Chetboun, co-founder and CEO of Seekyo, a French biotech, talks about the range of experiences that prepared him to lead a company focused on developing innovative solid tumor treatments that target functional proteins in the tumor micro-environment. Chetboun talks about raising money for preclinical research and navigating the valley of death between research and clinical development, accessing French innovation funding and angel networks, how click chemistry can produce therapies at a lower cost compared to antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), and the potential use of drug combinations and umbrella trials for testing multiple cancer indications.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Ben Comer (00:07):
Welcome back to the Business of Biotech.
I'm your host, Ben Comer, ChiefEditor at Life Science Leader,
and today I'm speaking with OuryChetboun, co-founder and CEO at
Seekyo, a French biotechdeveloping treatments for solid
tumors that target functionalproteins in the tumor
microenvironment.
Ori began his career in lifesciences with a pair of training
(00:30):
programs at Medtronic andSharing before joining BTG, now
a part of Boston Scientific.
He worked in businessdevelopment at Genzyme and
corporate development atEurapharma and consulting at
Alira Health, and was head of BDand licensing at Basilea before
co-founding Seekyo, which isnow on the cusp of entering
(00:51):
first in human clinical trialswith its lead candidate, SKY01.
I'm grateful to Oury forjoining the podcast today to
talk about his experiences as afirst time CEO, what he's
learned so far, what makesSeekyo distinct in the solid
tumor space and how he'snavigating a difficult funding
(01:11):
environment globally forearly-stage companies.
Thanks so much for being heretoday, Oury.
Oury Chetboun (01:17):
Well, thank you, Ben, for having me today with
you.
Ben Comer (01:20):
Glad to have you.
I wanted to start off as we do,Oury, with your background and
experience, and maybe we couldbriefly take it all the way back
to the beginning.
What appealed to you about thelife sciences industry initially
, and how did you get started?
Oury Chetboun (01:39):
get back to years ago.
So while I was doing my masterin science, I really liked the
biotech.
I really liked the life sciencespirit, which wasn't exactly
black or white.
It was in between.
The data shows things that youhave to interpret, and I found
(02:01):
that very appealing and alsovery stimulating.
At one point in time during mystudy I wanted also to have
something else, which wasanother angle of the real life.
The labs, the bench was reallytremendous.
The bibliography, theliterature, all the data you
(02:22):
could get if you were going andstudy were also very exciting.
But there was something missingfor someone which obviously had
at the time a kind ofentrepreneurial spirit already,
and that's the reason why, aftermy immunology study, I was
graduated from Foster Institute.
(02:43):
I wanted to add something elseto my background and that
something was to me actuallypretty obvious.
It was the business side ofthings.
So I moved into the MBA programfor people with a scientific
background, which at that timegave me an overview of what was
(03:03):
the business, life sciencereality.
And the reason why I'm still inthe life science business is
because I felt that with mydouble background it was very
interesting to be able tomaintain, continue and keep
going in the life science withall I mentioned before, but with
(03:24):
a complementary angle.
I could have moved into a purebusiness and maybe in finance,
but I found that in between wasreally interesting and that's
the reason why I've beenspending 20 years doing business
development in between.
Ben Comer (03:41):
Yeah, right, and you know I went through your resume
there in the introduction andyou worked in business
development, you've worked in IP, you've worked in a number of
different capacities across anumber of different companies.
What could you say about thoseprevious experiences and, kind
(04:02):
of, I guess, how they helped youprepare for eventually
co-founding and leading Seekyoas CEO?
Oury Chetboun (04:11):
Well, that was the question I asked myself
before taking on the Seekyocreation inception at the time,
and I wanted to make sure thatall I had done in my past life
was an addition.
Every single step was anaddition to the previous one.
So I started very soon with thepure technology and then, as
(04:38):
you described, I added the IP,and then I did some business at
Angle and then I worked for atechnology transfer firm which
was the largest in the world wecalled at the time BTG and then,
moving on, I joined Up2, Iwould call it Up2 Basilea.
In that position I looked at aninnovative product, but product
(05:03):
which all the Engel you canimagine from the r&d, including
the clinics, but also includingeven small things like packaging
.
What are you going to produceif you give a license to someone
on the other side of the world?
So all those aspects at onepoint slime, were kind of
integrated in my experience andat that time I felt that, maybe
(05:27):
wrongly, I felt that I gatheredenough experience from several
angles without being an expertin any but at least a glance of
everything which allowed me tosay, well, if I create tomorrow
a company, I would haveexperience.
I would have experience.
I would have some knowledgeabout every single point that a
(05:48):
company needs to have me,Although I will not be an expert
in any, but at least I can askright question.
I can challenge people in theteam.
I can do a lot of differentthings.
Helps and I'm always helpedwith people very skilled in one
single topic.
Ben Comer (06:07):
Yeah, I mean, is that you know kind of a level of
experience that's broad ratherthan deep?
Has that served you well as CEO?
Obviously you know the CEO iscaptaining the ship, in
particular for you know asmaller preclinical biotech
company.
Were there additional pieces ofthe CEO role that you had to
(06:30):
learn, or had you experienced alot of those aspects across your
past work experiences?
Oury Chetboun (06:38):
I would say that I've learned a lot since the
creation of CTO.
Ben Comer (06:42):
Yeah.
Oury Chetboun (06:43):
New things, but based on knowledge I had so like
.
If you look at the finance, forexample, I've learned a lot in
finance since the creation ofthe company, but still I was
able to understand and tointeract with finance people
because I had the background todo so.
I wasn't reaching their levelsbut at least, as I said before,
(07:06):
I could interact properly.
Whether there was other type ofknowledge I had to learn, I
would say yes, of course, on thescience side.
I'm not the inventor of thescience, so although at the time
I was able to understand.
But I find myself myself eventoday keeping learning new
(07:28):
things from my co-associates.
He keeps telling me things thatI didn't know before, some kind
of interaction betweenmolecules or direction we could
take or feedback that we havefrom others, that he's the I
would say, the only one tounderstand the proper language
and have that deep knowledge.
(07:49):
So it's a real personalchallenge and you can take on
that kind of role only if youare open to keep learning and to
admit that, regardless of whatyou know, you have to learn and
to keep learning.
But I would like to give you twoauditors, not advice, but maybe
(08:12):
my perception, because you saidsomething earlier.
Either you can see from earlystage company that the profile
of CEO are either a veryscientific one who's got deep
knowledge about the science, oryou have people like myself,
(08:33):
which I call generalist, whoknows a bit of everything but
nothing.
At the end of the day, it'salways the question of how far
you want to go.
If you are a real deep biotechcompany and if you want to go
fast and far, I would say thatyou need both profiles A very
(08:54):
strong scientist on board on aneveryday basis and someone who's
got something else, theadditional stuff that is missing
to the guy.
And actually it's what we'vedone at CQ.
I have that generalist profilethat I bring everything but the
science, whereas my associatebrings the proper deep
(09:16):
scientific backgrounds.
Ben Comer (09:19):
Absolutely, and I think you hit on an important
point about being able to askthe right question as a CEO.
I think that's it, regardlessof the domain or piece of
function of the business thatyou're talking about being able
to place that question.
You know that that is going todeliver an answer that's going
(09:40):
to help the company move forwardin whatever it is.
I wonder if you could give anexample of you know, whether
it's on you know to thescientific team and research,
whether it's you know workingwith CDMO partners to figure out
.
You know manufacturing, as youare now scaling up for inhuman
clinical trials, whether it'syou know questions to board
(10:03):
members or to investors.
Can you give our audience asense of some of those areas,
maybe, where you didn't have adeep expertise but knew enough
to ask the well-placed question?
Oury Chetboun (10:19):
I have two actually in mind.
The first one was with a CROwhich we were supposed to do our
um pdx study at the time.
So pdx, in a few words, is thattumor coming from proper
patients and planted into mice.
So it's a very expensive workto be carried out because you
(10:39):
have to grew up the mice andthen you have to inject and then
to sacrifice and then to alsomeasure the size of the tumor.
So it's a lengthy, veryexpensive work and when you go
to to meet with cro, they havevery deep knowledge and they
also are a salesman.
At the end of the day they wantto sell their services because
(11:01):
the more you do, the betterthey're getting paid.
Uh, and I had that very lengthydiscussion about the how.
I mean they came up with a.
We explain our needs.
They came up with a verydetailed um proposal protocol
and all these things and theyadded as much as they could and
(11:23):
they did a great job.
I'm not saying otherwise, but atthe end of the day I came with
every single line of paper and Iasked to follow them to justify
what kind of added value everysingle line could bring to the
company, whether, for example,if I do nine instead of 10,?
(11:43):
Would that really jeopardizethe type of data we would
generate If I do 10 milesinstead of nine, or if I do nine
miles instead of 10.
And in either way, in one way,of course, you reduce the cost,
but on the other hand, on theother round, you increase the
(12:04):
statistical data.
And could that make youstronger in front of investors?
Or whether that wouldn't changeanything having 10 or 9?
And every single line has to bediscussed.
And I got reply for everysingle stuff, reply for every
single stuff, and I can tell youthat at the end of the day, I
(12:26):
think I cut the overall budgetby 30%.
Ben Comer (12:32):
Wow.
Oury Chetboun (12:33):
Just because of asking that.
It was the same thing when wehad the type of discussion with
CDMO for the CMC production Canwe save some money?
Do we need to have that donenow, or can we delay that a bit
later without changing anything,Without jeopardizing the data
(12:55):
or even the production, andevery single step.
And obviously I was doing thatbecause I'm very keen on making
sure the budget is tight.
But it was always the samething and I even learned that
actually from my previousexperience.
I used to have a CEO because Iused to report to CEO and every
(13:17):
single it wasn't so much aquestion of being challenged to
be challenged there's alwaysstupid people who do that but
most of the time when you havethat tricky questions, when you
have to reply, then you thinkyou could find an alternative
solution.
Right, that's something youhave to oblige yourself.
(13:41):
So that's something you have tooblige yourself.
I'm being asked by my committeefor this kind of question
whether I can do better.
Ben Comer (13:51):
So I have to think before and I do the same thing
with the team or with potentialpartners, making sure that we
optimize.
That's excellent.
Thank you for that, ori.
I want to ask next about thecircumstances that led to the
founding of Seekyo.
You know well, let me startthere.
(14:12):
How did that initially cometogether?
Where did the tech come from?
You know who were the otherco-founders?
Oury Chetboun (14:29):
Yeah, sure.
So the inventor of the science,professor Papo, who's the
co-founder of the company.
He's the inventor of thescience, he's a professor in the
National Research Agency inFrance, cnrs, and he's been
working on that type of approach, type of technology, for the
past 20 years.
For the past 20 years, at onepoint in time he had the feeling
that if he wanted to make a gapbetween his lab down to the
(14:50):
road to patients, he had to gothrough a technology transfer.
Ben Comer (14:55):
Right.
Oury Chetboun (14:56):
He met with the technology transfer agency local
agency, and they evaluated thetechnology.
That was on the one side.
On my personal side, I alsocame back from Basel.
I was living in Basel and atone point in time, with my
entrepreneurial spirit, I wantedto do something for myself,
(15:20):
something for which I will seethe fruit of my hard work.
So I said to myself, what can Ido?
I've been working in biotechand oncology fields for the past
20 years.
Maybe that's where I can addvalue.
So I start calling my networkasking whether they knew
something of interest.
Maybe we can link withtechnology transfer arm, maybe
(15:42):
we can link it with technologytransfer arm.
And all these two things onseparate side came to one point
during a meeting in France, inPoitiers, actually outside
Bordeaux, and I was introducedto Sébastien.
Sébastien was introduced tomyself and he explained me the
technology, explained me that hewas kind of maturing the
technology and we each other dida due diligence on the other,
(16:09):
he did on myself, I did onhimself.
Or we met several times makingsure that we can get along well
and making sure that if wecreate a company we won't have
any kind of conflict.
And we found that we could workalong very well.
So at that time we decided thatit was the right time to make
the inception of the company.
(16:30):
So we decided to go ahead.
It wasn't done.
The day after I had tonegotiate a licensing agreement
with the national agency, makingsure that we got an asset in
the new company to come, and theday I had the agreement almost
(16:50):
signed, the following day wecreated the company.
So the day after that we signedthe license, because the
license has to be hosted into acompany.
So within 24 hours we createdSQL as well as we got an
exclusive license for theinitial technology.
Ben Comer (17:11):
And where did the initial investment come to do
that licensing deal?
Oury Chetboun (17:15):
From out of our pockets.
Really, sebastian and I putmoney into the company at the
very beginning.
After having done that, we wentaround.
There are small agencies whocould loan you money in order to
have that, what they call akind of initial loan.
(17:36):
Sure, you, as a company, youcan start, and once you have
money, once the company iscreated, once you've done your
initial fundraising, then youcan get the money back with no
interest.
So it was also a nice way toget started, so we did so.
(17:57):
We then competed againstseveral contests.
There are several contests asan early stage company.
So you, you're being known andyou can earn some uh, kind of
subsidiary and and stuff likethat.
So you don't have to reimburseanything, and that's an initial
way to to get started.
Once we've done that, then ofcourse, we needed further money.
(18:20):
But maybe one point before thatwhen we we created CQ with the
initial patents, we weren't surewhether the technology nor
whether the current developmentcould lead to what it is K1, our
lead compound today.
So it was also a bet on whetherdata could be generated and
(18:44):
nice data.
So we started with an initialpackage, which is not what it is
now.
So SkyOne was the fruit of twoor three years of hard work
during the inception till we gotto a new patent called SkyOne.
(19:28):
Okay, so it was a shift in termsof target, or able to drop one
compound, an active compound.
That was the usual drug ratioof one, but we wanted to
increase that.
We wanted to have somethingwhich was kind of like very
effective, very hard killing andbeing able to deliver a huge
(19:51):
quantity of of drug.
That the reason why, after thatwork, we find a scheme, one
which is actually the ability todeliver three copy of the
active compound instead of one.
But that was a bex.
I mean, no one knew whetherthat would work, whether we
could also induce a hightoxicity, and all that had to be
(20:15):
tested.
Ben Comer (20:16):
Right and you've been doing that testing in animal
studies thus far.
However, you are on theprecipice, I believe, of a first
in human trial with your leadcandidate.
You mentioned SkyO1.
Well, let me ask where you areright now with that, how far
away you are potentially, youknow, from getting into clinical
(20:40):
trials and anything else youmight say Ori about.
You know how you got to thisnear clinical stage.
Oury Chetboun (20:50):
Okay, well, we got there thanks to business, to
very healthy business angels.
They allowed us financiallyactually to get money in order
to go step by step, and actuallythose steps were twofold.
The first one was related tothe cmc prediction whether we
(21:10):
can get a product which was fromthe lab scale up to a potential
drug Right.
From milligram to gram and thatsmall scale.
It's also a matter of futureproduct.
It's really important to theindustry.
But that's not enough.
You need to demonstrate thatyou are efficient and what we
(21:32):
did over time is to carryseveral types of experiments in
animals small animals like mice,and also large animals like
dogs, because you have to do atthe end of the day, for
regulatory purposes, you have todo and to go through dogs.
So we did, at a smaller scale,some dogs in order to define the
(21:55):
concentration, the ratio, butalso to define the potential
toxicity In both cases, mice anddogs.
We've been very lucky.
We keep having tremendousresults.
But that's one matrix.
What we also did was anothermatrix which was, instead of
(22:17):
only testing SCA1, our leadcompound, against one indication
, we tested and we developedSCA1 against several indications
.
So what we do is actually, inorder to target solid tumors, we
use and we'll get into thatfunctional protein present in
(22:39):
the tumor microenvironment andbecause those functional
proteins are always, alwayspresent in the tumor
microenvironment, we are able totarget several indications and,
luckily enough, we got the samelevel of tremendous data, have
all indications and, luckilyenough, we got the same level of
tremendous data in allindications.
Ben Comer (22:59):
Interesting.
Yeah, I do want to pick it upwith Sky01 and the kind of
approach on targeting themicroenvironment, but before I
do I have one or two justfollow-ups on getting into
clinical trials.
First, what is themanufacturing scale-up for
(23:22):
clinical trials look like?
Can you explain kind of how thecompany is approaching creating
enough medicine you know topower a human trial creating?
Oury Chetboun (23:34):
enough medicine, you know, to power a human trial
.
Well, one of the things that wewanted with Sébastien at the
very beginning was obviously tohave a drug which is powerful in
terms of efficacy, which isvery safe as well, because it's
also key things.
But in addition to that, wealso wanted something which is
(23:54):
not expensive or reasonably notexpensive.
The reason why we had that inmind was that there's out there
several potential options totreat patients, and I have in
mind the antibody drugsconjugate treat patients, and I
(24:18):
have in mind the antibody drugsconjugate.
There are drugs, but actuallythey don't work so well in solid
tumors.
But let's let's that aside.
If you just look at the cost ofADC, it's a real massive cost.
That means some countries, somepatients, will not be able to
afford because the country can'tafford and can't support such a
(24:39):
massive cost.
That's right yeah, which iscalled tumor-activated therapy
to be able to create a drugwhich would be easily and
affordable, easily to produceand also affordable to maybe
(25:02):
less healthy countries.
That's the reason why we usethe click chemistry.
Click chemistry is like Legoyou take one piece, you add the
other piece, you add the otherpiece and then, at the end of
the day, you've got yourmolecule.
And that is the way we createdSkyOne, its platform.
(25:23):
That's the way also we aredoing the scale-up, so we are
able to produce separate piecesof the jigsaw and, at the very
end, to be able to assemble allof those pieces in order to get
the final product, and by doingso, we are able to reduce the
(25:46):
overall costs.
Ben Comer (25:49):
Interesting.
Can you explain how Sky-01 isdifferent than an ADC?
How do they differ?
Oury Chetboun (26:00):
Well, adc by nature uses the antibody-antigen
relationship.
So the ADC targets specificantigens present at the surface
of cancer cells.
But not all cancer cells,although in the same tumor,
would express the same antigen.
(26:22):
Although you are in the sameroom, not everyone has the same
look and that means when youcome with your ADC you are
facing an extra difficulty.
One is obviously to penetrateinside the solid tumor, but also
to find the right door key, Iwould call it.
(26:45):
Not every single cell has thesame door key relationship.
That means your ADC doesn'ttarget all cells and that is
being called the heterogeneityof the tumor.
So that's a limitation, a verystrong limitation.
What we thought was that insteadof targeting a door, we could
(27:09):
use something which is presentand well-known present in the
tumor microenvironment.
We target functional proteins.
Those functional proteins arealways present at a high
concentration in the tumormicroenvironment.
So actually we have the triggerwhich is in the tumor
(27:31):
microenvironment and once K1reaches this trigger, then it
does release the active payload.
So it's like if you drop a bombhere and then it destroys all
surrounding cells around you andby doing so we actually are
able to overcome thatheterogeneity.
(27:52):
By doing so we actually areable to overcome that
heterogeneity.
Ben Comer (27:54):
So is it just so I'm clear?
Is it similar to an ADC in thatthere's a linker to an antibody
and a payload?
But it's just that the targetis functional proteins, and that
is what makes it different.
Or am I misunderstanding?
Oury Chetboun (28:09):
it.
There are a few things whichmake a really different scale.
So, first of all, we don't needto get into the cell.
Okay, we can get the cell fromthe outside, and that makes
things easier.
We're not depending upon thekind of pH variation, which is
(28:33):
the way that the ADC releasesthe payload inside the cells.
We have developed and we havedesigned a molecule which is
responsive to this functionalprotein.
Actually it's calledbeta-glucuronidase, it's an
enzyme, and that specific enzymeinduces a release which is 0, 1
.
Yes, no.
So that makes the system verysafe, very active, and that
(28:58):
makes the huge difference interms of safety, but also in
terms of activation.
So what we've designed,actually it's something which
has changed the modality, theway we treat solid cancer today.
It's a new paradigm.
I'd call it.
Ben Comer (29:19):
Yeah, and so are the functional proteins that are on
a given tumor in an individualpatient similar to other
patients that have similartumors, or do these therapies
need to be personalized, kind ofon an individual level?
Oury Chetboun (29:36):
No, that works for everyone.
It's been in the literaturethat for a long time.
Beta-glucuronidase enzyme ispresent in all patients with all
types of solid tumors.
Ben Comer (29:49):
Okay, all right.
And then how far off are youfrom that first in-human
clinical trial?
Can you give an estimate?
Oury Chetboun (29:57):
Well, we are 4 million and 18 months away from
the first in-human.
Okay 4 million is dedicated toroughly the preclinical
regulatory step and that wouldrequire about 18 months.
Ben Comer (30:16):
Okay, all right.
So you're in fundraising moderight now to get you to human
clinical trials.
Oury Chetboun (30:22):
I would say like every single biotech, like every
single day indeed.
Ben Comer (30:27):
That's right.
You're never out of fundraisingmode as an early stage biotech.
Yes, that is a point that'swell taken and it's also a good
segue to my next question, whichand you mentioned earlier on in
our conversation Ori agenciesin France that were providing I
think what it sounded like wassome non-dilutive funding early
(30:49):
on.
But I wonder if you could kindof describe and I want to
preface this by saying I realizethat the biopharmaceutical
industry is global, investorscome from anywhere to invest in
companies anywhere else but canyou describe the investment
climate in France in particularright now and kind of how you've
(31:11):
managed to keep the companyfunded up to this point and
going forward?
Oury Chetboun (31:17):
Well, I think we have a nice but not the best,
but a nice environment in Franceand in Europe in general.
We have a mix of businessangels with early stage VC.
We have a mix, also in Franceand also in Europe, of
non-dilutive public institutionwhich would actually provide you
(31:40):
it's a non-dilutive, it's not afree, but they would provide
you one euro for one euro raisedsometime, or zero five for one
raised and that actually makes aleverage effect on your own
fundraising and that helps thecompany moving forward.
That's a very nice thing.
(32:01):
On the other hand, as youcorrectly said, we are playing
in a global environment.
So what you could see all overthe world about certain type of
hard time funding early stagecompany.
Ben Comer (32:18):
Yeah.
Oury Chetboun (32:18):
Also very much true in Europe and in France as
well.
So there's always that what wecall the debt valley.
It's actually where we standand where CQO stands.
It's in between early stage,lead discovery and initial steps
and the clinics.
Once you have data on clinicsunless you have bad data you're
(32:44):
pretty much on the safe side.
If you're at the very beginning, there will always be some
people to lend you money and tohelp you moving to the next step
.
But in between, that's the veryhard part of the fundraising
for companies In Europe.
In France, we have severalkinds of tools.
(33:06):
One of the key actually inFrance is called the French Bank
of Innovation, which is a veryhelpful institution backed by
the French government in orderto allow technology companies to
have financial resources to acertain level, to a certain
(33:27):
extent, with certain conditions,but still you can have money
from that.
In France we also have whatthey call the tax credits.
So if I spend, for example,hundreds during R&D pure R&D-
this is an R&D tax credit.
Absolutely yes, Sorry.
Ben Comer (33:47):
Yeah, yeah.
Oury Chetboun (33:48):
Although you could also add IP work in that
basket.
Let's call it R&D tax credit.
If you spend $100, at the endof the year you could claim back
$30.
Okay, Okay.
Only based on the pure R&D workdedicated, so it won't be my
(34:09):
salary, but it would be a partof the salary of my colleagues
in the R&D department.
Ben Comer (34:17):
With the angel investors that you mentioned,
that you've worked with.
Were those French-based, or howdid you, I guess?
How did you connect with thoseangel investors, I guess?
Oury Chetboun (34:28):
how did you connect with those angel
investors?
Well, I made at the verybeginning I made a decision,
which was at the very beginning,to only focus on local players
to make my life easier and makeit quicker.
So actually in France we haveone or two very strong networks
of investors business angels Imean and those people were able
(34:52):
to, as a group, to provide CQwith several roles of investment
and up to now, if we also addthe leverage effect I mentioned
earlier with the French Bank ofInnovation, all together we're
talking about 2.5 million raised.
That's, for an early stage, thesize of CQ.
(35:17):
It's a nice level of money andactually that helped us to reach
the point where we are today.
And basically it's two or threeproducts, several patents, and
that also includes a diagnostictool, that includes early
(35:37):
discovery, but also preclinics,dogs and mice.
I think it's not too badactually.
Ben Comer (35:44):
Are you considering partnerships as a kind of ladder
into your first clinical trial,like I don't know, for example
co-development deals or evenout-licensing at this point?
Is that something that you'reconsidering?
Oury Chetboun (35:59):
Absolutely, absolutely.
I mean the aim.
I mean Sebastian and I have adream, or actually we are
fighting every day with onesingle objective, which is to be
able us or someone else tobring sky one, or even sky two
to the patient beds.
So it doesn't have to be withus, it doesn't have to be under
(36:22):
secure name, as long as theproduct reaches the patient at
one point in time.
So if the best option is tohave a full, direct license to
Lilly, to Merck, to whoever youwant you name it, I will be
happy to do that.
Ben Comer (36:41):
Got it, got it, all right.
Oury Chetboun (36:43):
That's for free.
Ben Comer (36:45):
Yeah, right, of course you mentioned cost of
therapy earlier in theconversation, ori, and I wanted
to pick up on this becausecancer is, no surprise, an
extremely expensive disease forpatients.
As you look at moving intoclinical trials, how do you
(37:08):
think about the cost of therapyand what are some of the
benefits of keeping costs low, Iguess in terms of patient
access?
Ultimately, if you get acrossthe line and get an approval?
Oury Chetboun (37:22):
Well, it's getting back to what I mentioned
earlier.
The technology we developedtumor-activated therapy is an
easier type of technology toproduce.
It's a click chemistry and thathas a positive impact on the
overall cost.
Therefore, it would have also apositive impact on the
(37:42):
reimbursement pricing pricingand then, of course, if a health
system can afford a lower price, then obviously it would open
up to a massive number ofpotential patients.
So it is a way to spread and togive access to patients who, in
(38:04):
the normal situation, may nothave access to that type of
treatment.
And that's one of the thingsthat we are doing today in
trying to keep the CMC port thelowest as possible.
We know that the cancer therapyare today very expensive.
(38:26):
We know and you mentioned thatearlier that are we getting to a
personalized type of medicine?
Yes, we are to some extent.
But on the other way around, ifyou look at SCA1, and as I
mentioned before and you askedcorrectly the question whether
the activation of SCA1 could bealigned with all type of
(38:51):
indication or all type ofpatient, yes indeed, and that
reduce or that keep us away asmuch as possible away from the
personalized medicine and itsmassive costs.
I'm not saying that SCAE1 ischeap.
I'm not saying that SCOne ischeap.
I'm not saying that SkyOne cando everything.
I'm just saying that we bringto death a potential alternative
(39:12):
to the existing usual massivecost treatment per patient.
And I want to add up with oneof the things which goes along
this line Like every single drug, you have to test how many or
how often you have to treat thepatient.
And what we found out in miceas well as in dog, that because
(39:35):
of the mechanism itself which,by the way, you the albumin we
can reduce the number ofinjection and get a speedier,
quicker data, quicker results.
So in one hand, you don't haveto inject that often and on the
other hand, you get a betterresult, quicker, and that goes
(39:57):
in the same direction Cheaper,less often, therefore cheaper,
and so on for force.
Ben Comer (40:04):
Right and, of course, you're correct in saying that,
particularly in countries, lowersocioeconomic situations
countries, the cheaper yourproduct, the more patients.
Have you had, though, anyinitial conversations with
(40:29):
health authorities in Europe?
Payers, you know who I'm justcurious about if there is
interaction there.
If they have any, you knowprovide any thoughts or feedback
in terms of you know youpresent this new medicine that
you're developing for solidtumors.
Do those conversations happenor not?
Oury Chetboun (40:48):
yet we have kind of in full discussion because we
are early stage, because whenwe had that discussion we were
even earlier than today.
But we have that kind ofinteraction with regulatory
people and what they felt wasthat, because of the mechanism
(41:09):
of action, because of theubiquitous type of interaction
we have with different type ofindication, we could be a
potential solution to have onedredge for several indications,
and that was also thanks to thatfeedback.
That was also the way we arethinking of having an umbrella
trial during the clinical step.
(41:30):
Umbrella trial means that inone clinical phase you can
enroll all type of indicationthat you are thinking of.
We have the supporting data.
We have data on lung,colorectal, pancreas and triple
negative.
That is the current data weshowed at the time.
(41:51):
We showed that to theregulatory agency and they felt
yes, potentially you could go toan umbrella trial where you
would recruit people likepancreas, triple negative, lung
and colorectal.
And that's a very positivefeedback because that gives us
the opportunity to have severalindications treated at the same
(42:15):
time and potentially to see inwhich one we are better.
Luckily, we'll be best in allof them, but at least there will
be one or two for which we willstand for.
Ben Comer (42:29):
Yeah, that's really interesting and I wish you all
of the luck in getting thatfinal funding amount to get you
into the clinic.
While we're talking abouthealth authorities, though, I
have to ask, because I'm curiouskind of to get the perspective
from France, as it were, aboutthe current turmoil at the FDA.
(42:51):
There's a lot of firing, somereorganization happening under
the Trump administration.
I'm curious, ori, if you seethat as kind of business as
usual, with the changing of theguard at the very top, a new
president coming in, you know,making his mark or her mark
maybe one day, or do you see itmore as a real threat to the,
(43:16):
you know, the larger lifesciences industry at this point?
Oury Chetboun (43:20):
I will join you on the latter comments.
The US market, the Japanese,the European markets and maybe
one or two which escape rightnow top of my head, are the ones
who drive the life scienceindustry, because we can sell
innovative products into thosemarkets at a reasonable price.
(43:43):
That price helps the pharmacompany to cover the marketing
cost, to cover the innovationcost, to cover the innovation
cost.
Also to make money on their own.
That's obvious.
But that's also a way to drivedown the road the innovative
companies such as CQ, but also away to drive down the road the
(44:03):
LPs, the one who provides moneyto the VC, who themselves
provide money to companies likeCiccio.
So if at one point you have aslowdown or even a stop, you
can't sell products on the USmarket, or you can't register
fast enough a new product, oryou are asked to lower down the
(44:25):
price of your product I'm notsaying everything was great
before.
I'm saying adjustment needs tobe done, but nevertheless, if
you're asking a new innovativeproduct to be sold at the price
of aspirin, then the pharma willnot do a new product.
Therefore, the LPs and the VCswill not be attracted by the
(44:47):
pharma market and they will gosomewhere else, and then CTO
will not have its money to carryon the work.
So, yes, I have some concern,but, like in any changing
situation, there will always bea way to go around to overcome
the situation.
But on the other hand, therewill always be like in any
(45:11):
situation debts, the situationwhere you have to close down the
company, even though you have agood technology, just because
of the money is not flooding,and that would be the shame.
But on the other hand, therewill be a situation where
obviously we'll find solutions,where that's actually also one
(45:33):
of the messages sent by theregulatory agency, trying to
move away from the animaltesting.
It's also a new change, a newparadigm that we have to take
into account.
Ben Comer (45:47):
I actually wanted to ask you about that.
What are your thoughts about,you know, oregon on a chip and
moving away?
Do you think that you know, say, in the next five years, with
you know, with AI, with newtechnology coming online
seemingly every day, is itrealistic to think that we could
completely move away fromanimal testing?
(46:09):
Or is it more of using lessanimal testing?
Or just you know, what do youthink about that?
Is it possible in the shortterm?
Oury Chetboun (46:22):
At CQ.
Actually we had that kind ofthinking with Sebastian.
We went to meet with EI BiotechTechnology.
We felt that they could providedata to us by us explaining
them how SkyOne works and thengenerating data.
But then we realized by talkingwith them and others, we
(46:42):
realized that in order togenerate data, you have to have
the previous data.
If you come with a new modality, then there's no data.
Ben Comer (46:55):
Right.
Oury Chetboun (46:56):
How can you generate new data?
Having said that, I agree and Ithink that in the long run,
using less animals, having morepredictive stuff meaning that if
the computer can tell you thatinstead of using those four you
could directly go to those fivethen there would be a way to
(47:19):
reduce the number of animals,because today you need to do
those four and those five thatmay be a good way to reduce the
number of animals, also a way tospeed up, also a way to reduce
the number of, also a way tospeed up, also a way to reduce
the cost of our initial work andthen, obviously, at the bottom
line, all everyone costs.
But having a situation by whichtomorrow, because of organic
(47:40):
stuff or organoids, sorry orbecause of very strong computer,
will just make animals and allthe previous safety disappearing
, I don't really trust in that.
Ben Comer (47:53):
Yeah, well, it's interesting.
People have very strongopinions that I've heard on
either side of this.
But you know your point too andof course, you know the kind of
ethical dilemma of animaltesting aside.
Those animals are veryexpensive, right, extremely
expensive, and I guesspotentially, you know, if we
(48:16):
were able to move to some of thenon-animal models, perhaps it
could bring costs down as well.
Oury Chetboun (48:22):
Yeah, absolutely In a situation like myself.
We mentioned dogs, but actuallyI have to prove that the usual
stuff that is being used all thetime by the industry was the
monkey.
But because monkey is gettingless in terms of number and more
expensive, then you have tojustify, if you want to use
(48:43):
monkey, that you can't doanything but the monkey, so you
have no alternatives.
And that's also a good way.
It's less true for dogs, butit's also a good way to preserve
and to reduce the animaltesting.
So you have to find the bestmodel which suits your needs.
But you have also to justifywhy this one and why you can't
(49:07):
choose anything else.
But you have also to justifywhy this one and why you can't
choose anything else.
Ben Comer (49:16):
It's somehow a shift in what was done over the past
20 years, right, right.
Well, we are coming up on theend of our time here, ori.
Maybe just do you have anyfinal thoughts, I guess, about
your top priorities for the restof 2025?
I know you're out therepounding the pavement looking
for funding, you know, for yourinhuman clinical trial.
(49:36):
Any other priorities or kind ofnext steps for CQ that you want
to mention here before we wrapup?
Oury Chetboun (49:43):
Well, we just on our side, we're developing at
the same time a diagnostic tool,which is a new technology which
helps us predicting theefficacy of Sky1 or even
stratifying the potentialenrollment of patients.
And we also, because it's aplatform, we have several
(50:04):
potential other types ofproducts coming soon which, in
one hand, skyone is a cytotoxindrug, skytwo could be an
immunostimulant drug and,working it together, one will
destroy cells, whereas the otherone will stimulate the immune
system to destroy cancer cells,and that is also a kind of dual
(50:26):
approach that we would like tofurther explore because it would
go to the benefit of patients.
It's going to be a nice dualproduct if every single one
works on its own, but bringingthem together it would be
something which will reduce thecost, will reduce the time, will
(50:50):
reduce also the concentrationthat we need to inject into
patients.
Ben Comer (50:57):
So yeah, go ahead.
Oury Chetboun (50:59):
No, no, I was going.
It's a very challenging butalso very exciting end of the
year and, I believe, 2026, we'llsee also new things coming up.
Ben Comer (51:12):
We'll be in the clinic in 2026?
.
Oury Chetboun (51:17):
If I've got the money tomorrow, I will be in the
clinics in 2026.
Ben Comer (51:23):
Well, I think that's an excellent way to end, ori.
We've been speaking with OriChetbalm, co-founder and CEO at
Seekyo.
I'm Ben Comer and you've justlistened to the Business of
Biotech.
Find us and subscribe anywhereyou listen to podcasts, and be
sure to check out our new weeklyvideocast of these
conversations every Monday underthe Business of Biotech tab at
(51:45):
Life Science Leader.
We'll see you next week andthank you, as always, for
listening.
Welcome back to the Business of Biotech.
I'm your host, Ben Comer, ChiefEditor at Life Science Leader,
and today I'm speaking with OuryChetboun, co-founder and CEO at
Seekyo, a French biotechdeveloping treatments for solid
tumors that target functionalproteins in the tumor
microenvironment.
Ori began his career in lifesciences with a pair of training
(00:30):
programs at Medtronic andSharing before joining BTG, now
a part of Boston Scientific.
He worked in businessdevelopment at Genzyme and
corporate development atEurapharma and consulting at
Alira Health, and was head of BDand licensing at Basilea before
co-founding Seekyo, which isnow on the cusp of entering
(00:51):
first in human clinical trialswith its lead candidate, SKY01.
I'm grateful to Oury forjoining the podcast today to
talk about his experiences as afirst time CEO, what he's
learned so far, what makesSeekyo distinct in the solid
tumor space and how he'snavigating a difficult funding
(01:11):
environment globally forearly-stage companies.
Thanks so much for being heretoday, Oury.
Oury Chetboun (01:17):
Well, thank you, Ben, for having me today with
you.
Ben Comer (01:20):
Glad to have you.
I wanted to start off as we do,Oury, with your background and
experience, and maybe we couldbriefly take it all the way back
to the beginning.
What appealed to you about thelife sciences industry initially
, and how did you get started?
Oury Chetboun (01:39):
get back to years ago.
So while I was doing my masterin science, I really liked the
biotech.
I really liked the life sciencespirit, which wasn't exactly
black or white.
It was in between.
The data shows things that youhave to interpret, and I found
(02:01):
that very appealing and alsovery stimulating.
At one point in time during mystudy I wanted also to have
something else, which wasanother angle of the real life.
The labs, the bench was reallytremendous.
The bibliography, theliterature, all the data you
(02:22):
could get if you were going andstudy were also very exciting.
But there was something missingfor someone which obviously had
at the time a kind ofentrepreneurial spirit already,
and that's the reason why, aftermy immunology study, I was
graduated from Foster Institute.
(02:43):
I wanted to add something elseto my background and that
something was to me actuallypretty obvious.
It was the business side ofthings.
So I moved into the MBA programfor people with a scientific
background, which at that timegave me an overview of what was
(03:03):
the business, life sciencereality.
And the reason why I'm still inthe life science business is
because I felt that with mydouble background it was very
interesting to be able tomaintain, continue and keep
going in the life science withall I mentioned before, but with
(03:24):
a complementary angle.
I could have moved into a purebusiness and maybe in finance,
but I found that in between wasreally interesting and that's
the reason why I've beenspending 20 years doing business
development in between.
Ben Comer (03:41):
Yeah, right, and you know I went through your resume
there in the introduction andyou worked in business
development, you've worked in IP, you've worked in a number of
different capacities across anumber of different companies.
What could you say about thoseprevious experiences and, kind
(04:02):
of, I guess, how they helped youprepare for eventually
co-founding and leading Seekyoas CEO?
Oury Chetboun (04:11):
Well, that was the question I asked myself
before taking on the Seekyocreation inception at the time,
and I wanted to make sure thatall I had done in my past life
was an addition.
Every single step was anaddition to the previous one.
So I started very soon with thepure technology and then, as
(04:38):
you described, I added the IP,and then I did some business at
Angle and then I worked for atechnology transfer firm which
was the largest in the world wecalled at the time BTG and then,
moving on, I joined Up2, Iwould call it Up2 Basilea.
In that position I looked at aninnovative product, but product
(05:03):
which all the Engel you canimagine from the r&d, including
the clinics, but also includingeven small things like packaging
.
What are you going to produceif you give a license to someone
on the other side of the world?
So all those aspects at onepoint slime, were kind of
integrated in my experience andat that time I felt that, maybe
(05:27):
wrongly, I felt that I gatheredenough experience from several
angles without being an expertin any but at least a glance of
everything which allowed me tosay, well, if I create tomorrow
a company, I would haveexperience.
I would have experience.
I would have some knowledgeabout every single point that a
(05:48):
company needs to have me,Although I will not be an expert
in any, but at least I can askright question.
I can challenge people in theteam.
I can do a lot of differentthings.
Helps and I'm always helpedwith people very skilled in one
single topic.
Ben Comer (06:07):
Yeah, I mean, is that you know kind of a level of
experience that's broad ratherthan deep?
Has that served you well as CEO?
Obviously you know the CEO iscaptaining the ship, in
particular for you know asmaller preclinical biotech
company.
Were there additional pieces ofthe CEO role that you had to
(06:30):
learn, or had you experienced alot of those aspects across your
past work experiences?
Oury Chetboun (06:38):
I would say that I've learned a lot since the
creation of CTO.
Ben Comer (06:42):
Yeah.
Oury Chetboun (06:43):
New things, but based on knowledge I had so like
.
If you look at the finance, forexample, I've learned a lot in
finance since the creation ofthe company, but still I was
able to understand and tointeract with finance people
because I had the background todo so.
I wasn't reaching their levelsbut at least, as I said before,
(07:06):
I could interact properly.
Whether there was other type ofknowledge I had to learn, I
would say yes, of course, on thescience side.
I'm not the inventor of thescience, so although at the time
I was able to understand.
But I find myself myself eventoday keeping learning new
(07:28):
things from my co-associates.
He keeps telling me things thatI didn't know before, some kind
of interaction betweenmolecules or direction we could
take or feedback that we havefrom others, that he's the I
would say, the only one tounderstand the proper language
and have that deep knowledge.
(07:49):
So it's a real personalchallenge and you can take on
that kind of role only if youare open to keep learning and to
admit that, regardless of whatyou know, you have to learn and
to keep learning.
But I would like to give you twoauditors, not advice, but maybe
(08:12):
my perception, because you saidsomething earlier.
Either you can see from earlystage company that the profile
of CEO are either a veryscientific one who's got deep
knowledge about the science, oryou have people like myself,
(08:33):
which I call generalist, whoknows a bit of everything but
nothing.
At the end of the day, it'salways the question of how far
you want to go.
If you are a real deep biotechcompany and if you want to go
fast and far, I would say thatyou need both profiles A very
(08:54):
strong scientist on board on aneveryday basis and someone who's
got something else, theadditional stuff that is missing
to the guy.
And actually it's what we'vedone at CQ.
I have that generalist profilethat I bring everything but the
science, whereas my associatebrings the proper deep
(09:16):
scientific backgrounds.
Ben Comer (09:19):
Absolutely, and I think you hit on an important
point about being able to askthe right question as a CEO.
I think that's it, regardlessof the domain or piece of
function of the business thatyou're talking about being able
to place that question.
You know that that is going todeliver an answer that's going
(09:40):
to help the company move forwardin whatever it is.
I wonder if you could give anexample of you know, whether
it's on you know to thescientific team and research,
whether it's you know workingwith CDMO partners to figure out
.
You know manufacturing, as youare now scaling up for inhuman
clinical trials, whether it'syou know questions to board
(10:03):
members or to investors.
Can you give our audience asense of some of those areas,
maybe, where you didn't have adeep expertise but knew enough
to ask the well-placed question?
Oury Chetboun (10:19):
I have two actually in mind.
The first one was with a CROwhich we were supposed to do our
um pdx study at the time.
So pdx, in a few words, is thattumor coming from proper
patients and planted into mice.
So it's a very expensive workto be carried out because you
(10:39):
have to grew up the mice andthen you have to inject and then
to sacrifice and then to alsomeasure the size of the tumor.
So it's a lengthy, veryexpensive work and when you go
to to meet with cro, they havevery deep knowledge and they
also are a salesman.
At the end of the day they wantto sell their services because
(11:01):
the more you do, the betterthey're getting paid.
Uh, and I had that very lengthydiscussion about the how.
I mean they came up with a.
We explain our needs.
They came up with a verydetailed um proposal protocol
and all these things and theyadded as much as they could and
(11:23):
they did a great job.
I'm not saying otherwise, but atthe end of the day I came with
every single line of paper and Iasked to follow them to justify
what kind of added value everysingle line could bring to the
company, whether, for example,if I do nine instead of 10,?
(11:43):
Would that really jeopardizethe type of data we would
generate If I do 10 milesinstead of nine, or if I do nine
miles instead of 10.
And in either way, in one way,of course, you reduce the cost,
but on the other hand, on theother round, you increase the
(12:04):
statistical data.
And could that make youstronger in front of investors?
Or whether that wouldn't changeanything having 10 or 9?
And every single line has to bediscussed.
And I got reply for everysingle stuff, reply for every
single stuff, and I can tell youthat at the end of the day, I
(12:26):
think I cut the overall budgetby 30%.
Ben Comer (12:32):
Wow.
Oury Chetboun (12:33):
Just because of asking that.
It was the same thing when wehad the type of discussion with
CDMO for the CMC production Canwe save some money?
Do we need to have that donenow, or can we delay that a bit
later without changing anything,Without jeopardizing the data
(12:55):
or even the production, andevery single step.
And obviously I was doing thatbecause I'm very keen on making
sure the budget is tight.
But it was always the samething and I even learned that
actually from my previousexperience.
I used to have a CEO because Iused to report to CEO and every
(13:17):
single it wasn't so much aquestion of being challenged to
be challenged there's alwaysstupid people who do that but
most of the time when you havethat tricky questions, when you
have to reply, then you thinkyou could find an alternative
solution.
Right, that's something youhave to oblige yourself.
(13:41):
So that's something you have tooblige yourself.
I'm being asked by my committeefor this kind of question
whether I can do better.
Ben Comer (13:51):
So I have to think before and I do the same thing
with the team or with potentialpartners, making sure that we
optimize.
That's excellent.
Thank you for that, ori.
I want to ask next about thecircumstances that led to the
founding of Seekyo.
You know well, let me startthere.
(14:12):
How did that initially cometogether?
Where did the tech come from?
You know who were the otherco-founders?
Oury Chetboun (14:29):
Yeah, sure.
So the inventor of the science,professor Papo, who's the
co-founder of the company.
He's the inventor of thescience, he's a professor in the
National Research Agency inFrance, cnrs, and he's been
working on that type of approach, type of technology, for the
past 20 years.
For the past 20 years, at onepoint in time he had the feeling
that if he wanted to make a gapbetween his lab down to the
(14:50):
road to patients, he had to gothrough a technology transfer.
Ben Comer (14:55):
Right.
Oury Chetboun (14:56):
He met with the technology transfer agency local
agency, and they evaluated thetechnology.
That was on the one side.
On my personal side, I alsocame back from Basel.
I was living in Basel and atone point in time, with my
entrepreneurial spirit, I wantedto do something for myself,
(15:20):
something for which I will seethe fruit of my hard work.
So I said to myself, what can Ido?
I've been working in biotechand oncology fields for the past
20 years.
Maybe that's where I can addvalue.
So I start calling my networkasking whether they knew
something of interest.
Maybe we can link withtechnology transfer arm, maybe
(15:42):
we can link it with technologytransfer arm.
And all these two things onseparate side came to one point
during a meeting in France, inPoitiers, actually outside
Bordeaux, and I was introducedto Sébastien.
Sébastien was introduced tomyself and he explained me the
technology, explained me that hewas kind of maturing the
technology and we each other dida due diligence on the other,
(16:09):
he did on myself, I did onhimself.
Or we met several times makingsure that we can get along well
and making sure that if wecreate a company we won't have
any kind of conflict.
And we found that we could workalong very well.
So at that time we decided thatit was the right time to make
the inception of the company.
(16:30):
So we decided to go ahead.
It wasn't done.
The day after I had tonegotiate a licensing agreement
with the national agency, makingsure that we got an asset in
the new company to come, and theday I had the agreement almost
(16:50):
signed, the following day wecreated the company.
So the day after that we signedthe license, because the
license has to be hosted into acompany.
So within 24 hours we createdSQL as well as we got an
exclusive license for theinitial technology.
Ben Comer (17:11):
And where did the initial investment come to do
that licensing deal?
Oury Chetboun (17:15):
From out of our pockets.
Really, sebastian and I putmoney into the company at the
very beginning.
After having done that, we wentaround.
There are small agencies whocould loan you money in order to
have that, what they call akind of initial loan.
(17:36):
Sure, you, as a company, youcan start, and once you have
money, once the company iscreated, once you've done your
initial fundraising, then youcan get the money back with no
interest.
So it was also a nice way toget started, so we did so.
(17:57):
We then competed againstseveral contests.
There are several contests asan early stage company.
So you, you're being known andyou can earn some uh, kind of
subsidiary and and stuff likethat.
So you don't have to reimburseanything, and that's an initial
way to to get started.
Once we've done that, then ofcourse, we needed further money.
(18:20):
But maybe one point before thatwhen we we created CQ with the
initial patents, we weren't surewhether the technology nor
whether the current developmentcould lead to what it is K1, our
lead compound today.
So it was also a bet on whetherdata could be generated and
(18:44):
nice data.
So we started with an initialpackage, which is not what it is
now.
So SkyOne was the fruit of twoor three years of hard work
during the inception till we gotto a new patent called SkyOne.
(19:28):
Okay, so it was a shift in termsof target, or able to drop one
compound, an active compound.
That was the usual drug ratioof one, but we wanted to
increase that.
We wanted to have somethingwhich was kind of like very
effective, very hard killing andbeing able to deliver a huge
(19:51):
quantity of of drug.
That the reason why, after thatwork, we find a scheme, one
which is actually the ability todeliver three copy of the
active compound instead of one.
But that was a bex.
I mean, no one knew whetherthat would work, whether we
could also induce a hightoxicity, and all that had to be
(20:15):
tested.
Ben Comer (20:16):
Right and you've been doing that testing in animal
studies thus far.
However, you are on theprecipice, I believe, of a first
in human trial with your leadcandidate.
You mentioned SkyO1.
Well, let me ask where you areright now with that, how far
away you are potentially, youknow, from getting into clinical
(20:40):
trials and anything else youmight say Ori about.
You know how you got to thisnear clinical stage.
Oury Chetboun (20:50):
Okay, well, we got there thanks to business, to
very healthy business angels.
They allowed us financiallyactually to get money in order
to go step by step, and actuallythose steps were twofold.
The first one was related tothe cmc prediction whether we
(21:10):
can get a product which was fromthe lab scale up to a potential
drug Right.
From milligram to gram and thatsmall scale.
It's also a matter of futureproduct.
It's really important to theindustry.
But that's not enough.
You need to demonstrate thatyou are efficient and what we
(21:32):
did over time is to carryseveral types of experiments in
animals small animals like mice,and also large animals like
dogs, because you have to do atthe end of the day, for
regulatory purposes, you have todo and to go through dogs.
So we did, at a smaller scale,some dogs in order to define the
(21:55):
concentration, the ratio, butalso to define the potential
toxicity In both cases, mice anddogs.
We've been very lucky.
We keep having tremendousresults.
But that's one matrix.
What we also did was anothermatrix which was, instead of
(22:17):
only testing SCA1, our leadcompound, against one indication
, we tested and we developedSCA1 against several indications
.
So what we do is actually, inorder to target solid tumors, we
use and we'll get into thatfunctional protein present in
(22:39):
the tumor microenvironment andbecause those functional
proteins are always, alwayspresent in the tumor
microenvironment, we are able totarget several indications and,
luckily enough, we got the samelevel of tremendous data, have
all indications and, luckilyenough, we got the same level of
tremendous data in allindications.
Ben Comer (22:59):
Interesting.
Yeah, I do want to pick it upwith Sky01 and the kind of
approach on targeting themicroenvironment, but before I
do I have one or two justfollow-ups on getting into
clinical trials.
First, what is themanufacturing scale-up for
(23:22):
clinical trials look like?
Can you explain kind of how thecompany is approaching creating
enough medicine you know topower a human trial creating?
Oury Chetboun (23:34):
enough medicine, you know, to power a human trial
.
Well, one of the things that wewanted with Sébastien at the
very beginning was obviously tohave a drug which is powerful in
terms of efficacy, which isvery safe as well, because it's
also key things.
But in addition to that, wealso wanted something which is
(23:54):
not expensive or reasonably notexpensive.
The reason why we had that inmind was that there's out there
several potential options totreat patients, and I have in
mind the antibody drugsconjugate treat patients, and I
(24:18):
have in mind the antibody drugsconjugate.
There are drugs, but actuallythey don't work so well in solid
tumors.
But let's let's that aside.
If you just look at the cost ofADC, it's a real massive cost.
That means some countries, somepatients, will not be able to
afford because the country can'tafford and can't support such a
(24:39):
massive cost.
That's right yeah, which iscalled tumor-activated therapy
to be able to create a drugwhich would be easily and
affordable, easily to produceand also affordable to maybe
(25:02):
less healthy countries.
That's the reason why we usethe click chemistry.
Click chemistry is like Legoyou take one piece, you add the
other piece, you add the otherpiece and then, at the end of
the day, you've got yourmolecule.
And that is the way we createdSkyOne, its platform.
(25:23):
That's the way also we aredoing the scale-up, so we are
able to produce separate piecesof the jigsaw and, at the very
end, to be able to assemble allof those pieces in order to get
the final product, and by doingso, we are able to reduce the
(25:46):
overall costs.
Ben Comer (25:49):
Interesting.
Can you explain how Sky-01 isdifferent than an ADC?
How do they differ?
Oury Chetboun (26:00):
Well, adc by nature uses the antibody-antigen
relationship.
So the ADC targets specificantigens present at the surface
of cancer cells.
But not all cancer cells,although in the same tumor,
would express the same antigen.
(26:22):
Although you are in the sameroom, not everyone has the same
look and that means when youcome with your ADC you are
facing an extra difficulty.
One is obviously to penetrateinside the solid tumor, but also
to find the right door key, Iwould call it.
(26:45):
Not every single cell has thesame door key relationship.
That means your ADC doesn'ttarget all cells and that is
being called the heterogeneityof the tumor.
So that's a limitation, a verystrong limitation.
What we thought was that insteadof targeting a door, we could
(27:09):
use something which is presentand well-known present in the
tumor microenvironment.
We target functional proteins.
Those functional proteins arealways present at a high
concentration in the tumormicroenvironment.
So actually we have the triggerwhich is in the tumor
(27:31):
microenvironment and once K1reaches this trigger, then it
does release the active payload.
So it's like if you drop a bombhere and then it destroys all
surrounding cells around you andby doing so we actually are
able to overcome thatheterogeneity.
(27:52):
By doing so we actually areable to overcome that
heterogeneity.
Ben Comer (27:54):
So is it just so I'm clear?
Is it similar to an ADC in thatthere's a linker to an antibody
and a payload?
But it's just that the targetis functional proteins, and that
is what makes it different.
Or am I misunderstanding?
Oury Chetboun (28:09):
it.
There are a few things whichmake a really different scale.
So, first of all, we don't needto get into the cell.
Okay, we can get the cell fromthe outside, and that makes
things easier.
We're not depending upon thekind of pH variation, which is
(28:33):
the way that the ADC releasesthe payload inside the cells.
We have developed and we havedesigned a molecule which is
responsive to this functionalprotein.
Actually it's calledbeta-glucuronidase, it's an
enzyme, and that specific enzymeinduces a release which is 0, 1
.
Yes, no.
So that makes the system verysafe, very active, and that
(28:58):
makes the huge difference interms of safety, but also in
terms of activation.
So what we've designed,actually it's something which
has changed the modality, theway we treat solid cancer today.
It's a new paradigm.
I'd call it.
Ben Comer (29:19):
Yeah, and so are the functional proteins that are on
a given tumor in an individualpatient similar to other
patients that have similartumors, or do these therapies
need to be personalized, kind ofon an individual level?
Oury Chetboun (29:36):
No, that works for everyone.
It's been in the literaturethat for a long time.
Beta-glucuronidase enzyme ispresent in all patients with all
types of solid tumors.
Ben Comer (29:49):
Okay, all right.
And then how far off are youfrom that first in-human
clinical trial?
Can you give an estimate?
Oury Chetboun (29:57):
Well, we are 4 million and 18 months away from
the first in-human.
Okay 4 million is dedicated toroughly the preclinical
regulatory step and that wouldrequire about 18 months.
Ben Comer (30:16):
Okay, all right.
So you're in fundraising moderight now to get you to human
clinical trials.
Oury Chetboun (30:22):
I would say like every single biotech, like every
single day indeed.
Ben Comer (30:27):
That's right.
You're never out of fundraisingmode as an early stage biotech.
Yes, that is a point that'swell taken and it's also a good
segue to my next question, whichand you mentioned earlier on in
our conversation Ori agenciesin France that were providing I
think what it sounded like wassome non-dilutive funding early
(30:49):
on.
But I wonder if you could kindof describe and I want to
preface this by saying I realizethat the biopharmaceutical
industry is global, investorscome from anywhere to invest in
companies anywhere else but canyou describe the investment
climate in France in particularright now and kind of how you've
(31:11):
managed to keep the companyfunded up to this point and
going forward?
Oury Chetboun (31:17):
Well, I think we have a nice but not the best,
but a nice environment in Franceand in Europe in general.
We have a mix of businessangels with early stage VC.
We have a mix, also in Franceand also in Europe, of
non-dilutive public institutionwhich would actually provide you
(31:40):
it's a non-dilutive, it's not afree, but they would provide
you one euro for one euro raisedsometime, or zero five for one
raised and that actually makes aleverage effect on your own
fundraising and that helps thecompany moving forward.
That's a very nice thing.
(32:01):
On the other hand, as youcorrectly said, we are playing
in a global environment.
So what you could see all overthe world about certain type of
hard time funding early stagecompany.
Ben Comer (32:18):
Yeah.
Oury Chetboun (32:18):
Also very much true in Europe and in France as
well.
So there's always that what wecall the debt valley.
It's actually where we standand where CQO stands.
It's in between early stage,lead discovery and initial steps
and the clinics.
Once you have data on clinicsunless you have bad data you're
(32:44):
pretty much on the safe side.
If you're at the very beginning, there will always be some
people to lend you money and tohelp you moving to the next step
.
But in between, that's the veryhard part of the fundraising
for companies In Europe.
In France, we have severalkinds of tools.
(33:06):
One of the key actually inFrance is called the French Bank
of Innovation, which is a veryhelpful institution backed by
the French government in orderto allow technology companies to
have financial resources to acertain level, to a certain
(33:27):
extent, with certain conditions,but still you can have money
from that.
In France we also have whatthey call the tax credits.
So if I spend, for example,hundreds during R&D pure R&D-
this is an R&D tax credit.
Absolutely yes, Sorry.
Ben Comer (33:47):
Yeah, yeah.
Oury Chetboun (33:48):
Although you could also add IP work in that
basket.
Let's call it R&D tax credit.
If you spend $100, at the endof the year you could claim back
$30.
Okay, Okay.
Only based on the pure R&D workdedicated, so it won't be my
(34:09):
salary, but it would be a partof the salary of my colleagues
in the R&D department.
Ben Comer (34:17):
With the angel investors that you mentioned,
that you've worked with.
Were those French-based, or howdid you, I guess?
How did you connect with thoseangel investors, I guess?
Oury Chetboun (34:28):
how did you connect with those angel
investors?
Well, I made at the verybeginning I made a decision,
which was at the very beginning,to only focus on local players
to make my life easier and makeit quicker.
So actually in France we haveone or two very strong networks
of investors business angels Imean and those people were able
(34:52):
to, as a group, to provide CQwith several roles of investment
and up to now, if we also addthe leverage effect I mentioned
earlier with the French Bank ofInnovation, all together we're
talking about 2.5 million raised.
That's, for an early stage, thesize of CQ.
(35:17):
It's a nice level of money andactually that helped us to reach
the point where we are today.
And basically it's two or threeproducts, several patents, and
that also includes a diagnostictool, that includes early
(35:37):
discovery, but also preclinics,dogs and mice.
I think it's not too badactually.
Ben Comer (35:44):
Are you considering partnerships as a kind of ladder
into your first clinical trial,like I don't know, for example
co-development deals or evenout-licensing at this point?
Is that something that you'reconsidering?
Oury Chetboun (35:59):
Absolutely, absolutely.
I mean the aim.
I mean Sebastian and I have adream, or actually we are
fighting every day with onesingle objective, which is to be
able us or someone else tobring sky one, or even sky two
to the patient beds.
So it doesn't have to be withus, it doesn't have to be under
(36:22):
secure name, as long as theproduct reaches the patient at
one point in time.
So if the best option is tohave a full, direct license to
Lilly, to Merck, to whoever youwant you name it, I will be
happy to do that.
Ben Comer (36:41):
Got it, got it, all right.
Oury Chetboun (36:43):
That's for free.
Ben Comer (36:45):
Yeah, right, of course you mentioned cost of
therapy earlier in theconversation, ori, and I wanted
to pick up on this becausecancer is, no surprise, an
extremely expensive disease forpatients.
As you look at moving intoclinical trials, how do you
(37:08):
think about the cost of therapyand what are some of the
benefits of keeping costs low, Iguess in terms of patient
access?
Ultimately, if you get acrossthe line and get an approval?
Oury Chetboun (37:22):
Well, it's getting back to what I mentioned
earlier.
The technology we developedtumor-activated therapy is an
easier type of technology toproduce.
It's a click chemistry and thathas a positive impact on the
overall cost.
Therefore, it would have also apositive impact on the
(37:42):
reimbursement pricing pricingand then, of course, if a health
system can afford a lower price, then obviously it would open
up to a massive number ofpotential patients.
So it is a way to spread and togive access to patients who, in
(38:04):
the normal situation, may nothave access to that type of
treatment.
And that's one of the thingsthat we are doing today in
trying to keep the CMC port thelowest as possible.
We know that the cancer therapyare today very expensive.
(38:26):
We know and you mentioned thatearlier that are we getting to a
personalized type of medicine?
Yes, we are to some extent.
But on the other way around, ifyou look at SCA1, and as I
mentioned before and you askedcorrectly the question whether
the activation of SCA1 could bealigned with all type of
(38:51):
indication or all type ofpatient, yes indeed, and that
reduce or that keep us away asmuch as possible away from the
personalized medicine and itsmassive costs.
I'm not saying that SCAE1 ischeap.
I'm not saying that SCOne ischeap.
I'm not saying that SkyOne cando everything.
I'm just saying that we bringto death a potential alternative
(39:12):
to the existing usual massivecost treatment per patient.
And I want to add up with oneof the things which goes along
this line Like every single drug, you have to test how many or
how often you have to treat thepatient.
And what we found out in miceas well as in dog, that because
(39:35):
of the mechanism itself which,by the way, you the albumin we
can reduce the number ofinjection and get a speedier,
quicker data, quicker results.
So in one hand, you don't haveto inject that often and on the
other hand, you get a betterresult, quicker, and that goes
(39:57):
in the same direction Cheaper,less often, therefore cheaper,
and so on for force.
Ben Comer (40:04):
Right and, of course, you're correct in saying that,
particularly in countries, lowersocioeconomic situations
countries, the cheaper yourproduct, the more patients.
Have you had, though, anyinitial conversations with
(40:29):
health authorities in Europe?
Payers, you know who I'm justcurious about if there is
interaction there.
If they have any, you knowprovide any thoughts or feedback
in terms of you know youpresent this new medicine that
you're developing for solidtumors.
Do those conversations happenor not?
Oury Chetboun (40:48):
yet we have kind of in full discussion because we
are early stage, because whenwe had that discussion we were
even earlier than today.
But we have that kind ofinteraction with regulatory
people and what they felt wasthat, because of the mechanism
(41:09):
of action, because of theubiquitous type of interaction
we have with different type ofindication, we could be a
potential solution to have onedredge for several indications,
and that was also thanks to thatfeedback.
That was also the way we arethinking of having an umbrella
trial during the clinical step.
(41:30):
Umbrella trial means that inone clinical phase you can
enroll all type of indicationthat you are thinking of.
We have the supporting data.
We have data on lung,colorectal, pancreas and triple
negative.
That is the current data weshowed at the time.
(41:51):
We showed that to theregulatory agency and they felt
yes, potentially you could go toan umbrella trial where you
would recruit people likepancreas, triple negative, lung
and colorectal.
And that's a very positivefeedback because that gives us
the opportunity to have severalindications treated at the same
(42:15):
time and potentially to see inwhich one we are better.
Luckily, we'll be best in allof them, but at least there will
be one or two for which we willstand for.
Ben Comer (42:29):
Yeah, that's really interesting and I wish you all
of the luck in getting thatfinal funding amount to get you
into the clinic.
While we're talking abouthealth authorities, though, I
have to ask, because I'm curiouskind of to get the perspective
from France, as it were, aboutthe current turmoil at the FDA.
(42:51):
There's a lot of firing, somereorganization happening under
the Trump administration.
I'm curious, ori, if you seethat as kind of business as
usual, with the changing of theguard at the very top, a new
president coming in, you know,making his mark or her mark
maybe one day, or do you see itmore as a real threat to the,
(43:16):
you know, the larger lifesciences industry at this point?
Oury Chetboun (43:20):
I will join you on the latter comments.
The US market, the Japanese,the European markets and maybe
one or two which escape rightnow top of my head, are the ones
who drive the life scienceindustry, because we can sell
innovative products into thosemarkets at a reasonable price.
(43:43):
That price helps the pharmacompany to cover the marketing
cost, to cover the innovationcost, to cover the innovation
cost.
Also to make money on their own.
That's obvious.
But that's also a way to drivedown the road the innovative
companies such as CQ, but also away to drive down the road the
(44:03):
LPs, the one who provides moneyto the VC, who themselves
provide money to companies likeCiccio.
So if at one point you have aslowdown or even a stop, you
can't sell products on the USmarket, or you can't register
fast enough a new product, oryou are asked to lower down the
(44:25):
price of your product I'm notsaying everything was great
before.
I'm saying adjustment needs tobe done, but nevertheless, if
you're asking a new innovativeproduct to be sold at the price
of aspirin, then the pharma willnot do a new product.
Therefore, the LPs and the VCswill not be attracted by the
(44:47):
pharma market and they will gosomewhere else, and then CTO
will not have its money to carryon the work.
So, yes, I have some concern,but, like in any changing
situation, there will always bea way to go around to overcome
the situation.
But on the other hand, therewill always be like in any
(45:11):
situation debts, the situationwhere you have to close down the
company, even though you have agood technology, just because
of the money is not flooding,and that would be the shame.
But on the other hand, therewill be a situation where
obviously we'll find solutions,where that's actually also one
(45:33):
of the messages sent by theregulatory agency, trying to
move away from the animaltesting.
It's also a new change, a newparadigm that we have to take
into account.
Ben Comer (45:47):
I actually wanted to ask you about that.
What are your thoughts about,you know, oregon on a chip and
moving away?
Do you think that you know, say, in the next five years, with
you know, with AI, with newtechnology coming online
seemingly every day, is itrealistic to think that we could
completely move away fromanimal testing?
(46:09):
Or is it more of using lessanimal testing?
Or just you know, what do youthink about that?
Is it possible in the shortterm?
Oury Chetboun (46:22):
At CQ.
Actually we had that kind ofthinking with Sebastian.
We went to meet with EI BiotechTechnology.
We felt that they could providedata to us by us explaining
them how SkyOne works and thengenerating data.
But then we realized by talkingwith them and others, we
(46:42):
realized that in order togenerate data, you have to have
the previous data.
If you come with a new modality, then there's no data.
Ben Comer (46:55):
Right.
Oury Chetboun (46:56):
How can you generate new data?
Having said that, I agree and Ithink that in the long run,
using less animals, having morepredictive stuff meaning that if
the computer can tell you thatinstead of using those four you
could directly go to those fivethen there would be a way to
(47:19):
reduce the number of animals,because today you need to do
those four and those five thatmay be a good way to reduce the
number of animals, also a way tospeed up, also a way to reduce
the number of, also a way tospeed up, also a way to reduce
the cost of our initial work andthen, obviously, at the bottom
line, all everyone costs.
But having a situation by whichtomorrow, because of organic
(47:40):
stuff or organoids, sorry orbecause of very strong computer,
will just make animals and allthe previous safety disappearing
, I don't really trust in that.
Ben Comer (47:53):
Yeah, well, it's interesting.
People have very strongopinions that I've heard on
either side of this.
But you know your point too andof course, you know the kind of
ethical dilemma of animaltesting aside.
Those animals are veryexpensive, right, extremely
expensive, and I guesspotentially, you know, if we
(48:16):
were able to move to some of thenon-animal models, perhaps it
could bring costs down as well.
Oury Chetboun (48:22):
Yeah, absolutely In a situation like myself.
We mentioned dogs, but actuallyI have to prove that the usual
stuff that is being used all thetime by the industry was the
monkey.
But because monkey is gettingless in terms of number and more
expensive, then you have tojustify, if you want to use
(48:43):
monkey, that you can't doanything but the monkey, so you
have no alternatives.
And that's also a good way.
It's less true for dogs, butit's also a good way to preserve
and to reduce the animaltesting.
So you have to find the bestmodel which suits your needs.
But you have also to justifywhy this one and why you can't
(49:07):
choose anything else.
But you have also to justifywhy this one and why you can't
choose anything else.
Ben Comer (49:16):
It's somehow a shift in what was done over the past
20 years, right, right.
Well, we are coming up on theend of our time here, ori.
Maybe just do you have anyfinal thoughts, I guess, about
your top priorities for the restof 2025?
I know you're out therepounding the pavement looking
for funding, you know, for yourinhuman clinical trial.
(49:36):
Any other priorities or kind ofnext steps for CQ that you want
to mention here before we wrapup?
Oury Chetboun (49:43):
Well, we just on our side, we're developing at
the same time a diagnostic tool,which is a new technology which
helps us predicting theefficacy of Sky1 or even
stratifying the potentialenrollment of patients.
And we also, because it's aplatform, we have several
(50:04):
potential other types ofproducts coming soon which, in
one hand, skyone is a cytotoxindrug, skytwo could be an
immunostimulant drug and,working it together, one will
destroy cells, whereas the otherone will stimulate the immune
system to destroy cancer cells,and that is also a kind of dual
(50:26):
approach that we would like tofurther explore because it would
go to the benefit of patients.
It's going to be a nice dualproduct if every single one
works on its own, but bringingthem together it would be
something which will reduce thecost, will reduce the time, will
(50:50):
reduce also the concentrationthat we need to inject into
patients.
Ben Comer (50:57):
So yeah, go ahead.
Oury Chetboun (50:59):
No, no, I was going.
It's a very challenging butalso very exciting end of the
year and, I believe, 2026, we'llsee also new things coming up.
Ben Comer (51:12):
We'll be in the clinic in 2026?
.
Oury Chetboun (51:17):
If I've got the money tomorrow, I will be in the
clinics in 2026.
Ben Comer (51:23):
Well, I think that's an excellent way to end, ori.
We've been speaking with OriChetbalm, co-founder and CEO at
Seekyo.
I'm Ben Comer and you've justlistened to the Business of
Biotech.
Find us and subscribe anywhereyou listen to podcasts, and be
sure to check out our new weeklyvideocast of these
conversations every Monday underthe Business of Biotech tab at
(51:45):
Life Science Leader.
We'll see you next week andthank you, as always, for
listening.
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The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show. Clay Travis and Buck Sexton tackle the biggest stories in news, politics and current events with intelligence and humor. From the border crisis, to the madness of cancel culture and far-left missteps, Clay and Buck guide listeners through the latest headlines and hot topics with fun and entertaining conversations and opinions.