Breaking into the Business of Biotech: Los Angeles Startup Spotlight

On Thursday, July 10, from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM, we co-hosted Breaking into the Business of Biotech: Los Angeles Startup Spotlight at LA BioSpace alongside LA BioStart—part of LA BioSpace—and Nucleate Los Angeles. The evening highlighted Nucleate Los Angeles and its Activator Program, part of the world’s largest student-led bio-innovation community. Attendees experienced innovation firsthand with a live pitch by Gunho Kim, a finalist from Nucleate’s 2025 cohort, and heard from the LA BioStart Alumni Panel, which featured graduates of Cal State LA’s BioStart Boot Camp—an intensive five-week program for early-stage bioscience entrepreneurs.

Moderated by Dr. Howard Xu, the panel opened with his remarks welcoming attendees to the Rongxiang Xu Innovation Center at Cal State LA. Drawing from his seven years of experience in the biotech industry before transitioning to academia, Xu reflected on the evolution of LA BioStart and its mission. He highlighted Cal State LA’s role as an anchor institution serving the public good, including its commitment to supporting underrepresented communities and fostering economic mobility. As one of the most diverse universities in the nation, Cal State LA has worked to strengthen the regional bioscience ecosystem through workforce training, infrastructure development, and entrepreneurial support. Xu described how the innovation center and LA BioStart program came to life through public-private partnerships, including county and federal funding as well as philanthropic support from the Rongxiang Xu family. He also introduced the LA BioStart program’s structure—offering entrepreneurs five weeks of training in business fundamentals, leadership, and bioscience industry competencies—and encouraged attendees to explore the incubator during post-event tours.

Dr. Brian Bender, co-founder of Intake Health and a member of LA BioStart’s fifth cohort in 2019, kicked off the panel with the story of Intake Health. The company developed a urinal-mounted device that gives real-time feedback on hydration using a simple red-yellow-green light. Bender shared how the original concept began with a more complex toilet-based health monitor aimed at capturing data from urine, but after running into engineering and market challenges, the team scaled down to a more streamlined product. That pivot—driven by funding constraints and the urgency of getting to market—ultimately allowed the company to serve elite athletes, military users, and occupational health clients.

Dr. Elizabeth Beale and her son, Nick Demetriades, co-founders of Alsteni Medical, brought a dual perspective to the panel—combining clinical expertise with business acumen. Elizabeth, an endocrinologist, described the development of a novel intraoral feeding tube designed to replicate the effects of gastric bypass without surgery or drugs. Nick, who previously worked in international real estate, recalled the moment he left his career to join his mother’s mission full-time. Their startup journey has involved careful navigation between clinical development and commercialization strategy, with initial trials at USC showing promising results—including significant weight loss and reduced insulin dependency. The team now plans to enter the enteral feeding market first, before expanding into broader weight loss applications.

Dr. Shu Li, co-founder of Petri Bio, recounted how she and her co-founder connected during LA BioStart’s 2019 cohort. Although not formally in the program herself, Li described how being “adopted” into the community helped shape their path. Petri Bio develops medical nutrition products for rare metabolic disorders and hopes to expand into oncology applications in the future. Li emphasized the importance of staying keen, building trusted networks, and reaching out fearlessly—even cold messaging senior pharma experts on LinkedIn. These early conversations, even when discouraging, saved them time and effort down the line.

Dr. Yi Huang, co-founder and CEO of Silver Spur Therapeutics, shared his transition from PhD research in biomedical engineering at USC to co-founding a company focused on nanomedicine platforms for chronic kidney disease and atherosclerosis. He described how entrepreneurship programs like the Nucleate and LA BioStart gave him the skills and exposure needed to move beyond the lab bench. The addition of a business-savvy CEO earlier this year, he noted, dramatically changed the company’s pace and trajectory.

Throughout the panel, a few common themes emerged. Many founders spoke about the importance of simplifying product design. For Bender, this meant stripping away unnecessary features to focus on solving one core user need—hydration monitoring. Others echoed the value of pivoting early and often, learning through trial and error, and constantly iterating in response to real-world feedback. Panelists also highlighted the emotional and practical importance of community. The LA BioStart experience not only provided hands-on exposure to IP, regulatory, and commercialization strategies, but also created lasting relationships. Several founders spoke about hiring former cohort members, helping each other with grants, and offering peer support through the ups and downs of startup life.

The evening also featured a live startup pitch by Gunho Kim, founder of Tunable Biosystems, a Caltech spinout developing smart implants for smarter surgeries. Kim began by framing the challenges of soft tissue surgeries—procedures like thread lifts and tendon repairs often suffer from unpredictable results and high revision rates due to tissue movement, aging, and healing variability. Tunable’s flagship product is a shape-memory polymer suture that can be remotely adjusted post-operatively using ultrasound. Once implanted, these “smart sutures” can be selectively heated with ultrasound to contract and tighten, offering a non-invasive way to fine-tune surgical outcomes weeks or even months after the initial procedure.

Kim demonstrated how the technology works with a series of lab and ex vivo tests, including successful activation in chicken breast tissue. The company is pursuing both biodegradable and non-biodegradable suture formats for cosmetic and orthopedic applications, respectively. Tunable is adopting a razor-and-blade business model—selling the ultrasound system at cost to increase adoption, while generating revenue from disposable smart sutures. The team is currently raising $2 million to support product development, preclinical testing, and regulatory planning, with long-term goals to expand into 2D surgical meshes and 3D implantable devices. Based in Pasadena and backed by a team of Caltech researchers and clinicians, Tunable is working to turn this breakthrough into a widely adopted platform technology.

The evening wrapped up with lab tours and open networking, bringing together founders, researchers, and professionals from across LA’s biotech community. A heartfelt thank you to all the speakers for sharing their insights, the attendees for their enthusiasm and engagement, and the participating companies for their generous time and support. Special thanks to our participating organizations, including Corning Life Sciences, SciSure, West Coast Biotechnology, and California Life Sciences.