Founders Readers - Ep 35 - Dr Hernan Bazan of South Rampart Pharma

The Founders Keepers podcast, podded

Feb 9

The Founders Readers pod-letter is not a transcript, but an accompaniment to the weekly podcast detailing key insights from that exact conversation.

Whether you’re too short on time to listen to the full episode or just prefer written content, you can find it here 👇

This is a special segment podcast episode with a focus on questions around conferences, given that it’s currently conference season for bio, med and health tech organisations in the US.

This week, we’re speaking with Dr Hernan Bazan and his company, South Rampart Pharma: A clinical-stage life science company dedicated to advancing the safe treatment of pain by developing new targeted therapies....

💬 Quote from the pod:

“Society as a whole needs better and safer pain management… we’re optimistic that we will be able to move forward with the mission to introduce safer approach to pain.”

- Dr Hernan Bazan, Co-founder and CEO

🔑 Key insights from the episode:

The idea for SRP: Hernan and his team had long followed the status on regulatory changes to pain medicine quantities that could be purchased in countries outside of the US, as well as observing first-hand the impact of the US opioid crisis on his patients: Giving him and co-founder the idea to develop a drug that doesn’t result in liver toxicity by using a small molecule non-opioid drug approach.
The value of “heavy science”: Hernan states that the NIH grant awarded to SRP that has funded some of their early Phase 1 study work was strongly reliant on the quality of the underpinning science; something he believes has often been missed by previous work done in the pain management R&D space.
Feedback from investor conferences: Attending conferences as a physician and a business founder can be complex and demanding: Hernan claims that typically he will receive three main types of feedback on showcasing SRP’s work:
1) “Wow, the science is great - but we need more follow-up”: Investors will often want Phase 2 data before committing to funding.
2) Commending their business model: The financing approach of SRP is fundamentally different to other competitors.
3) Apprehension: The pain space is “iffy”, and many investors have been burnt before with poor investments where assets haven’t had good mechanisms of action or poor study design, leading to failure.
On looking for business partners and fundraising: Hernan claims that it can take a lot of time and energy when looking for the right approach and partnership for driving their work forward, and convincing investors that their concept actually works. He states that while capital markets haven’t been “kind” in the past year, money was still raised, and across the board he anticipates that the money raised will still be utilised for worthwhile endeavours.
Raising capital in the pain space: Regarding pain drug development, in the past there have been track records of poor success where the science behind ventures didn’t necessarily make sense, or trials proposed were not well designed. For Hernan, “We have high confidence that the end points of the trials we have will be very clear”, and that he and his team are “resetting” the innovation landscape in pain.
Forecast for 2023: Hernan cites a 2018 report that alludes to whether the pain therapeutics “pendulum” will shift, and he is confident that it will - “there is a large void”: The market for investment stands at US$74 billion per year for pain therapeutics and devices, and over $30 billion in acute pain alone; and this is ripe for the taking for clinically-validated assets with good mechanisms of action that are being developed.

📖 Background:

Founded: 2016
Location: New Orleans, Los Angeles, United States
IPO status: Private
Industry: Biotechnology Research
Employees: 2-10
Total funding to date: US$7.75 million
Lead investor(s): Ochnser

🔍 What:

A clinical-stage life science company dedicated to advancing the safe treatment of pain by developing new non-opioid small molecule solutions that lack the liver and kidney toxicity present in current pain medicines.

🔧 How:

Drug development; South Rampart Pharma focuses on developing and commercializing novel non-opioid small molecules to treat acute, neuropathic, and chronic pain. Its lead asset, SRP-3D (DA), is currently in Phase 1 clinical trials. Funded in part by an NIH STTR ‘Fast-Track’ grant, the company’s composition of matter IP covers its proprietary compounds that reduce pain and fever in pre-clinical studies.

🏙 Company tagline: