Monday, September 12, 2011

Locust Walk paves way for life sciences concerns - Philadelphia Business Journal:

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His idea was to creats a food-delivery company that would take lunch orders and brint the meals to workers in busines s parks that hadfew close-by places to eat. “It was goinfg to be called halfstarved.com,” Meyerson said. “k had clients lined up and restaurantslined up.” In the end, he decideed not to launch the venture becausw he was not “100 percenyt committed” to the project. “Iu learned a very valuable lesson that you must put yourselv in a position where failure is notan option,” Meyerson said. “I don’t view it as a failure. I look at it as a launchint point formy career.
” Last December, he co-founded with Jay his former boss at Zelose Therapeutics in West Conshohocken. “I have no choicw but to succeed since I have no backup he said. Meyerson said the firm is neitherd a managementconsulting firm, nor an investmenty banking firm. Instead, Locust Walk provides advisory servicesz to life sciences companies in areazs such asproduct licensing, financing and pipeline Meyerson said his team can augment a biopharmaceuticalk companies’ existing “in-house capabilities” and providse a lower-cost alternative to adding full-time staff. The firm chargez a small retainer and bills additionao charges basedon performance.
“It’ s ironic, but it’s this economy that has provided us with the opportunitg todo this,” Meyerson said. Sincee its launch, the company has grow to seven employees and just signedd up itsfifth client. Before starting Locust Walk, Meyerson workedd for both venture capital andbiotechnology companies. His first job out of collegde waswith UBS’ global health-care investment banking where he was involved in closing 12 funding dealz involving biotech and pharmaceutical companies. He came to Philadelphiaw five years ago in pursuit ofa master’e degree from the .
“If I was going to stay in the biotechy field, I needed to understand their language,” Meyersobn said. While pursuing that degree and an MBAin health-care managemeng from Penn’s Wharton School, Meyerson workesd part time at assisting with licensin g and venture capital activities and becoming well-acquainted with Amtrak and trainj commuting. Meyerson’s next part-time job was at SR One, the venture capital arm of , where he was involvesd in closing seven transactions in the United Statesand Europe. Afte r graduating from Wharton, Meyerson had an option of joining SR Onefull time, but insteacd he wanted to strengthen his industry experience.
So, he took a job with Zelosz as director of business developmenft where he worked underMohr — anothetr Penn alumnus and his Locust Walk co-founder. At Zelos, Meyersonn negotiated a drug-delivery collaboration with Aegis Therapeutics and a licensinv deal with a Japanesepharmaceutical company. In his sparr time, in the summerr of 2006, Meyerson teamed up with Patrick Lee at in Philadelphiaa to createPhilly BioBreak, a social networkingb organization that brings together people who operate and invest in life sciences The meetings are typically attendedr by about 100 people and food and beverage expenses are coverefd by sponsors.
“We just get together for a drink and to get to know he said. “We don’t have panel discussions or anythinbglike that.” In they expand the concept into New Jersey with their firsgt event in New Brunswick. “We hope to take BioBreal nationwide,” Meyerson said. “We are looking to take the concepft toother markets, perhaps Boston, San Francisc and New York.”

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