Investing in Longevity (Nils Regge, Apollo Health Ventures)

Translating Aging

Joining Chris on the podcast today is Nils Regge, Co-founder and Managing Director of Apollo Health Ventures. As a social entrepreneur, company creator, and biotech expert, Nils built Apollo Health Ventures in 2016 to help health tech companies develop methods to prevent and reverse the aging process and extend the healthy human life span.

At Apollo, Nils makes use of his dealmaking skills, business knowledge, and prior experience growing startups to help boost the success of biotech and health companies. As the general public becomes increasingly interested in longevity and medical advancements continue to take place at rapid rates, Apollo is a leader in funding and fueling efforts to ensure healthier and longer human lifespans. At the moment, things are looking up as there is a lot of excitement in the industry - however, Regge finds it important to temper that enthusiasm with the right kind of skepticism. In a field in which any new advancement is seemingly revolutionary, it’s crucial to stay grounded.

The Finer Details of This Episode:

• Incentive and organizational structures
• Filtering for good ideas
• Apollo’s portfolio of companies
• Fusing European and American techniques for company building
• The heightened need for funding
• Bringing drugs into the clinic

Quotes:

“If you have something that makes you live 10 years, 20 years, longer, healthier, I think it's the biggest market ever.”

“We do company creation, but we also invest in outside companies.”

“Because we are in this for the long run, we want to make investors money, we want to show the investors that this is a good place to invest or a good space to invest. And then ultimately, we want to be able to raise more money from other bigger institutional investors.”

“You want to create an incentive structure and organizational structure that encourages the right kind of skepticism…you almost want to avoid a certain kind of optimism early on.”

“But because of the excitement in the field, and kind of what I think of as the ‘True Believer' phenomenon, I think we are vulnerable to a little bit of hype. And I think that it's a very good idea to bring that down to earth and say, ‘Okay, that's a good idea. Let us figure out the best way to see if it's gonna fail, and do that first.’”

“So first of all, it's about getting a drug to the market, that's the most important thing, and making sure it's safe and that it's working.”

“There's great science here in Europe, right? So I mean, the universities are great, the people are smart. They're just not as entrepreneurial as they are in the US, per se.”

Links:

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Translating Aging on Twitter: @bioagepodcast

BIOAGE Labs Website BIOAGELabs.com

BIOAGE Labs Twitter @bioagelabs

BIOAGE Labs LinkedIn

Apollo Health Ventures Homepage: https://www.apollo.vc

Nils Regge on LinkedIn: nils-regge-62ab7a28