Meet Venture Leader Kobi Benenson's Advanced Gene Therapies' Startup

13.05.2019 14:00, Guillaume Tinsel

Ten Venture Leaders will represent Switzerland in Boston in June. Meet Kob Benenson, co-founder of Pattern BioSciences. Learn more on programmable therapies to better target disease cells and Kobi's expectations on his roadshow in Boston.

My name is Kobi Benenson, and I am a co-founder of the start-up Pattern BioSciences. The company develops the next generation of advanced gene therapies. We build programmable therapies. In other words, we program a therapeutic agent to perform its task in the best possible way, somewhat reminiscent of programming a computer. A successful therapy should be able to target all the cells that cause a disease and only them, and either fix or eliminate them. Many current therapies have side effects because they either target the wrong cells or fail to reach all the disease cells. We solve this problem by programming, or tailoring, our therapies to function successfully even in complex cases when the disease cells differ only slightly from healthy cells or when the disease cells are different from each other, a situation one often finds in cancer.

What attracted you to Boston as a business development destination?

Boston is a leading biotech hub. I spent five years in Boston as a Bauer Fellow at Harvard’s Center for Systems Biology, where my colleagues and I developed some of the technologies currently commercialized by Pattern Bio. Boston ecosystem is an example of seamless translation of basic research to real world applications and commercialization, and there is a lot to learn from this example.

What do you hope to achieve from the trip? What are your expectations and goals?

I hope to learn first-hand about the way Boston ecosystem works. Of course, I will use the opportunity to present the company to potential investors and industry partners and convince them in the prospects of Pattern Bio as a groundbreaking Life Science enterprise. Another important goal is to get as much feedback as possible in order to develop the company in a way that is consistent with the business practices in the US and keep the door open for the expansion to North America.

Why is Venture Leaders Life Science beneficial for your startup?

The program provides unique opportunity to immerse into the major global biotech hub. The trip is also a great way to get to know colleagues from Switzerland, so both the international and the national networks get strengthened as a result of the program.



What is pushing you towards international expansion?

Biotech is a global business, and therefore global expansion must be planned right from the start. US is the largest global hub in terms of companies in the advanced therapy area as well as in terms of capital invested in these companies. A tight link to the US financial and professional networks is essential for the long term success of the company.

What do you foresee as the largest hurdles towards expansion into the American market?

As any startup, Pattern Bio must be competitive globally, yet every country and continent present unique cultural, legal, and regulatory challenges. In-depth understanding of the playing field in the US will be crucial for company’s success there.

What makes you most nervous or excited about the trip?

I am excited to be back in Boston and get an insider view of what has happened and what has changed in the last years. 

  Venture Leaders Life Sciences is sponsored by Rothschild & Co Bank, Kellerhals Carrard, swissnex Boston, Ypsomed, Paul Schererr Institute, Canton de Vaud, EPF Lausanne and ETH Zürich.