Dr. Paul Wotton, Executive Director of the Rice Biotech Launchpad and Managing Partner of RBL LLC, joins host Solomon Wilcots on the Russo Edge Podcast. In this episode, Dr. Wotton shares how his leadership is transforming groundbreaking research into clinical applications.
Discover the unique advantages of Houston’s thriving biotech ecosystem, the challenges of translating research into treatments, and the strategies biotech CEOs can use to effectively communicate and secure funding. Tune in for a compelling discussion filled with actionable insights and innovative solutions for life science leaders.
Solomon Wilcots: Hello everyone. Today’s guest on the Russo Edge Podcast is leading a bold initiative to turn groundbreaking research into real world cures faster. We’ll hear how this cutting-edge accelerator is transforming innovation into impact for patients, while also offering valuable lessons for life science CEOs.
Solomon Wilcots: Welcome everyone to the Russo Edge Podcast. Today’s guest is Dr. Paul Wotten, managing partner of RBL LLC and the executive director of the Rice Biotech Launchpad, an accelerator that’s revolutionizing the translation of groundbreaking research into clinical application. Paul is a seasoned life science leader and innovator with a career spanning several biotech startups, leadership roles, and board positions across the industry. Let’s dive into his journey and how he is shaping the future of healthcare innovation with the Rice Biotech Launchpad and RBL LLC. Paul, how are you doing today?
Dr. Paul Wotten: Hi, Solomon. I’m just feeling great. Thanks very much.
Solomon Wilcots: Look, it’s always great to chat with you. And look, we’re inspired by all the work that you’re doing. We want to know what inspired you to take on the role at Rice Biotech Launchpad and become the leader of the RBL LLC.
Dr. Paul Wooten: That’s a great question. I started my journey to Houston about eight years ago when a colleague of mine, Amit Faizer, became a professor down at Rice University and I’d visited him down there. And then I got involved with a company that sponsored its first clinical trial through MD Anderson based in Houston and realized that there were some things happening down in Houston that other people may not have seen.
One is that there’s superb technology down there as a result of people like Amit at Rice University. And then he works with colleagues like Ravi Ganter at Baylor or Amir Jaziri at MD Anderson. So there’s a lot of tech down there that can really make a difference to patients.
And secondly, I’d worked on a program where we wanted to take an engineered T-cell therapy into the clinic and normally the clinical entry takes years to actually execute against. But what we saw down in Houston was a manufacturing facility, really able physicians, and a huge organization at MD Anderson that can be leveraged to make clinical trials quicker and reading out much faster as a result.
And we went actually from product concept to treating our first patient in just over three years, which is just amazing. And the first patient who was a stage four melanoma patient was a responder to the treatment. And I understand that that lady is still alive today, nearly three years later.
Yeah. So it all worked out because Houston just has this wonderful ecosystem for biotech companies to get into the clinic fast and really make a meaningful difference to patients’ lives.
Solomon Wilcots: That’s really great examples. I want to ask you, what makes it so difficult to turn breakthrough research into real-world treatment where you’re really helping people?
Dr. Paul Wotten: So the method that I use is something I’ve been doing for decades now, but it’s really to look at what the market needs are. And this is market needs in terms of what patients require and what physicians want to do for their patients. And then what we have at Rice is a bioengineering school, and they have a host of technologies that can be used to make some of these complex biological agents more deliverable.
And so I think what we have to do as executives is to make sure that there’s a need for the product we want to develop, identify what that product should look like, and then take the research platform that’s been developed at universities and develop a pathway so we can actually get those technologies into the clinic.
And it does require a number of skill sets. And I work with a number of very, very smart people to be able to make this happen. And we brought them into the Launchpad as consultants.
Solomon Wilcots: Well, I’ve had the pleasure of visiting you on the campus at Rice University and being amongst some of the great leaders that you have assembled on that campus to build this great ecosystem. I think it’s absolutely wonderful. I’m excited about what’s going to come out of it. You guys are already doing some great work.
I wanted to also ask you from your experience, what is key for biotech CEOs to communicate effectively with investors as well as partners?
Dr. Paul Wotten: That is a good question. And actually, I’m going to use the Launchpad as my example of what makes good communications happen.
And we started out with the Launchpad in September of last year. Actually, that was 2023. We launched the academic version of the Launchpad as opposed to the commercial version, which is what I’m leading now, on the almost the sixtieth anniversary of Kennedy’s “we’re going to reach the moon” speech in the early nineteen sixties, which was actually given at the Rice University Stadium.
And we overlooked that when we launched the initiative. And we actually worked with David Schull and some of your colleagues from Russo to host that event.
From day one, we had a very, very focused campaign to make people aware of what we were trying to do down in Houston. And David and the team from Russo were very proactive with that.
And you came down to our first advisory board meeting in May of last year—or this year. And making people aware of what we’re doing in Houston has made a big difference.
We have had since we launched it in just over a year, people coming to us from other universities within Texas, people coming to us from outside the country, all wanting to get involved and knowing how we did this initiative at the RBL LLC and how it evolved from the Launchpad.
So that was really critical. The other thing I think which has been critical is if you look at the advisors we have at that board level, people like Bob Langer, people like Josh Richardson at Goldman Sachs, people like Farhan Pratt at MD Anderson, to name a few, we’ve also got an incredible network of people that can help us get the word out and publicize what we’re doing.
And ultimately that leads to our own visibility increasing and more people wanting to do business with us then. So it’s like a snowball rolling down the hill. It just gathers momentum.
Solomon Wilcots: What examples maybe can you share of things that you’re working on with the Launchpad that really excites you? I know some of it is proprietary, but maybe what examples can you share with us?
Dr. Paul Wotten: Well, I’m a scientist by background, so I really like it when you can translate science into a medical product. That’s why I went into the industry in the first place. And we’ve got some programs down there which I think are really super exciting.
There’s one which is going to go into the clinic soon, which is a little implant that can go into the peritoneal cavity to secrete cytokines to treat ovarian cancer. And we are very excited about getting that into the clinic again.
We have another program which we’ve developed on the back of an ARPA-H grant to Aminevasa, which the whole idea then is to manufacture a little implant that could be a cell factory, making any protein, any antibody, any cytokine, and a little subcutaneous implant that will manufacture that for up to a year in your body.
So you basically bring the manufacturing now to the patient. And we are able to make dosing much easier for patients and compliance much easier. And ultimately, the treatment will be much better.
Dr. Paul Wotten: So those are two examples. And then there’s all sorts of high-tech stuff that we’ve got behind that that’s cooking. Things like gene editing DNA mitochondria, for example, which—don’t even ask me how you do it—but it sounds very, very exciting. And I’m sure it will be.
But we’re looking at that for cardiovascular disease, which I think could be a big win.
Solomon Wilcots: Yeah, it sounds very exciting. I want to know, how do you foster the collaboration between researchers, industry leaders, and investors? It’s so vitally important to bring everyone together in order for the Launchpad to really get going, to yield good, positive results. How do you go about doing that?
Dr. Paul Wooten: So I think one of my strengths, actually—which I don’t say this myself, other people tell me this—I’m good at getting people together and focused on doing something that’s hopefully inspirational.
And I think just getting people around the table, focusing on a problem, and working with a plan is the best way to get all of this achieved. So I’m big on planning, and I’m big on having open group meetings and making sure that we’re honest with each other.
Dr. Paul Wotten: And sometimes it can get a little bit, I guess, feisty. But all I’m after is the truth of making sure that the right thing happens. And then when we go to investors, we actually have a story to tell. It’s well thought through, and we’ve covered all the aspects of what we’re trying to do, whether that’s with the scientists or it’s with physicians or it’s even with people who have sold products like that in the past and can tell us what all the commercial upside can be for something like this.
So it’s just getting the whole story pulled together.
Solomon Wilcots: It’s very important to get the story put together. There’s no doubt about it. It really, at that point, the information sort of continues to gain momentum and can yield positive results.
I want to know, what’s your advice to give CEOs trying to secure funding and to share their vision together? I know you just kind of answered some of it with putting that story together, but what more can you tell us about bringing those two worlds together and sharing that vision?
Dr. Paul Wooten: Well, I think the first thing to do is to have a vision, right? That from day one, decide what you want to be. And that involves making choices. And with platform technologies, like the ones that come out of Rice, it means we have to make decisions quickly on what we want to be, but more importantly, what we don’t want to be.
And then you just get everybody focused on that vision and the mission. And then the mission statement for me is something that everyone has to share. And that has to be very deadline-driven and also very focused.
And once you’ve actually designed that, you can map out all of your programs, what you need to do to get something into the marketplace. And actually, you’ve got a credible timeline of events, you know how much it’s going to cost to be able to get a product into the clinic and out again and into the FDA that you can share with investors and show them how you’re going to meet those milestones along the way.
Dr. Paul Wotten: And I think the most important advice though, is just surround yourself with fantastic people and let them get on with it.
Solomon Wilcots: The RBL LLC and the Launchpad is located in Houston, and that Texas Medical Center—I’ve been there, I’ve seen it—it’s a beautiful facility. By the way, you guys are doing some great work. It’s continuing to evolve and continuing to grow. It’s a great collaboration. But I want to know, how does this amplify the work that you’re currently doing? I can see it serving as a tremendous launchpad to provide some excellent solutions in the industry.
Dr. Paul Wooten: So there’s a change down in Houston that’s happening right now. And at Rice, for example, we’ve got new leadership with Reggie DeRoche, who is very aggressive in pushing timelines at Rice. And that’s helped us get funding for what we’re doing at the Launchpad, amongst many other things.
But the other part of this is across the street from us—and it literally is just across the street—is the Texas Medical Center. And Bill McEwen has done a wonderful job building out what is now known as Helix Park, which is now part of the Texas Medical Center.
So the secret weapon we have is for me to be able to execute an advanced biological program in this new age of biology, which is where we’re at. Cell therapies and gene therapies are becoming really, really important these days, and they’re going to be more important as we go into the future.
But in Houston, we have everything we need to be able to get those into patients fast. So we have the researchers at Rice, we have researchers at the Texas Medical Center—places like Baylor and MD Anderson. We have a manufacturing facility down there which is a jointly owned manufacturing facility between CTMC—well, it’s called CMT, TCMT—but the actual ownership of that is Resilience in combination with MD Anderson.
And there’s a very able group of people there that can actually turn an idea and research into a development program and get it into the clinic with GMP quality.
And then beyond that—and probably the most important thing—we are slap bang in the middle of numerous academics, physicians, and people who can make things happen fast. And it’s just a matter of literally walking across the street with, hey, can you take part in this? And everyone down in Houston is very open to making that happen.
And it’s just an environment that’s really, really healthy, very can-do. I think the other thing that people don’t know about Houston is that it’s got not only the most advanced medical center in the world—and we’re now part of that—but in terms of doing business, it’s more cost-effective too, because it’s a state which is very tax-friendly.
And in terms of what you want to do, getting your product shipped—and these complex products require a lot of complex shipping—we have two airports there. We’re in the middle of everything. We can ship across the United States and also internationally as well.
So it’s very, very accessible to the point where most of the major manufacturers in cell and gene therapies are now setting up shop in Houston. So it’s all coming together, Solomon.
Solomon Wilcots: And now we’re getting the money coming down as well.
Dr. Paul Wooten: That’s right.
Solomon Wilcots: Well, I can tell you, having been there and seen it, you can see, feel, and touch it. It’s a beautiful facility, obviously, a great incubator for so many people working in the same space to come together. As you just mentioned, you’ve done a wonderful job of giving us a clear illustration of what’s taking place in Houston. So we want to wish you the best of luck.
Dr. Paul Wotten: Thank you.
Solomon Wilcots: Keep up the great work. We want to thank our guest, Dr. Paul Wotten, executive director of the Rice Biotech Launchpad and managing partner of RBL LLC, for sharing his insights and experience with us today. I’m Solomon Wilcots, the host of the Russo Edge Podcast. Thanks for listening, everyone.
The Russo Edge Podcast is hosted by Solomon Wilcots and features candid conversations at the intersection of biotech, healthcare, and innovation, spotlighting leaders, scientists, and investors moving medicine forward. The following transcript has been edited for clarity.
