Justin Byers is a scientist by training. Spent years at Illumina and Fujifilm watching drug programs get delayed. Not from bad science, from data trapped in the wrong systems. The breaking point? Telling a founder after 18 months and $2 million they couldn't manufacture at scale. That became Axio BioPharma. Lab built at Forward BIOLABS in two weeks, first client two weeks later. He's also launching Midwest BioCapital, a fund for pre-seed Midwest biotech.
This episode is for biotech founders, life science pros, or Madison startup builders. Justin breaks down why AI tools are only as good as the data feeding them, Wisconsin's early-stage capital gap, and how contract manufacturing works. We dig into data pipelines, finding a co-founder through Y Combinator, and a federated biopharma network.
This was the core of the conversation. Justin spent years watching drug programs get delayed, not because of bad science, but because critical information was trapped in silos. Physical lab notebooks, electronic lab notebooks, separate computer systems for each piece of equipment. Nobody knew what data they had or where it lived.
The breaking point was telling a founder, after 18 months and nearly $2 million, that their drug could not be manufactured at scale. When they looked back to figure out why it took so long to discover the problem, the answer was straightforward: the information was there the whole time. It was just stuck in the wrong systems in the wrong formats. That moment pushed Justin to build Axio.
For anyone outside pharma, the takeaway is universal. Data fragmentation kills speed in every industry. When your critical information lives in five different places and nobody knows the full picture, you're making high-stakes decisions with incomplete context. Justin saw that pattern at the highest stakes possible, where the cost is measured in patient lives and years of delay.
Everyone wants to use AI in drug development right now. Justin's team considered building their own AI models before realizing the industry doesn't need more models. There are plenty, and more being built every day. What's missing is structured, high-quality data to make the models that already exist actually useful.
That's where Axio is focused. Building the data pipelines that get manufacturing information from early research into the hands of contract manufacturers in a clean, AI-ready state. Without that foundation, the AI tools don't work. With it, they become genuinely powerful.
This is a lesson that extends well beyond pharma. The companies that will get the most out of AI aren't necessarily the ones building models. They're the ones that have their data in order. If your information is scattered across notebooks, spreadsheets, and disconnected systems, no model is going to save you.
Axio originally planned to build a large contract manufacturing organization on par with companies like Lonza and Samsung Biologics. They also considered building their own AI models. They walked back both. The clinical manufacturing space already has strong players investing heavily. The AI model space is already crowded. What's missing is the early preclinical manufacturing infrastructure and the data pipelines connecting it all.
Staying focused on that specific gap is what allowed Justin to move fast. Lab set up at Forward BIOLABS in two weeks. First client two weeks after that. That kind of speed doesn't come from doing more. It comes from doing less, but doing the right thing.
For founders in any space: if you're trying to do everything at once, you're probably not doing any of it well. The pivot that narrows your focus is often the one that unlocks your speed.
One of the first things Justin did after bringing on his co-founder was build an advisory team. Not after the first roadblock. Not after the first raise. Before any of that. His advisors, including Greg Black who helped start Gala Designs (which became Catalent Biologics) and Graham Burley who headed up several Catalent sites, helped him avoid spending years trying to raise hundreds of millions for a clinical manufacturing site the industry didn't need from him.
Justin was direct about what makes a good advisor: they can't be an echo chamber. If your advisors are telling you yes on everything and never challenging your ideas, you're going to find yourself in trouble. You need people who know your specific industry and who are willing to tell you when your idea isn't the best one. That pushback is what saved Justin from spinning his wheels and let him move to revenue in weeks instead of years.
His advice for finding the right advisors: look for people with deep domain expertise in your space, not just general business experience. And make sure they have the courage to push back. The advisors who tell you what you want to hear are the most dangerous ones.
Justin met his co-founder Brian Staats through Y Combinator's founder matching program. They didn't rush into it. They spent months going back and forth virtually, then Brian flew from Seattle to Madison so they could meet in person. After about six months total, they both decided it was a good fit.
The complementary skill sets matter. Justin handles process development and commercial sales. Brian handles software engineering and bioinformatics. Brian was one of the early software engineers at CrowdStrike when they were still pre-revenue, which gave him firsthand experience building federated network effects from zero. That's directly applicable to what Axio is building in biopharma.
Justin recommends every founder approach the co-founder search the same way you'd approach a marriage. You're going to be working closely with this person for years. The relationship matters as much as the resume.
Madison has one of the deepest life science talent pools in the country. Exact Sciences, Catalent, Arrowhead, PPD. Companies that either started here or grew substantially here. The universities produce strong scientific talent and established companies produce experienced operators. Justin said it usually surprises outsiders just how much biotech depth exists in the area.
What's missing is early-stage capital. There are established VCs in Madison, Chicago, and St. Louis, but very few focused on pre-seed and seed stage biotech. Justin saw this gap firsthand at Forward BIOLABS, where companies were spinning out of UW Madison with solid business cases and strong founding teams but nowhere to turn for early funding.
This is a theme I keep hearing across the podcast, not just in biotech. Wisconsin has the talent, the ideas, and increasingly the infrastructure. The capital gap at the earliest stages is what's holding back velocity. Justin isn't just talking about it. He's doing something about it.
Justin is building a fund that is 100% focused on pre-seed and seed stage biotech startups in the Midwest. No off-thesis allocations. No coastal deals. Just early bets on Midwest founders who have strong science and strong teams but no access to the kind of early capital that gives them a real runway.
He's still bringing on general partners and building out the team, but the problem it's solving is clear and urgent. The fund came directly from what he observed at Forward BIOLABS: too many strong companies with nowhere to turn for that first check.
What's interesting is the parallel to his Axio work. Both are about filling gaps in infrastructure. Axio fills the data pipeline gap. Midwest BioCapital fills the capital gap. Justin sees them as complementary forces in the same ecosystem.
Justin came from the commercial sales side of the industry, which meant he arrived at the founding stage with a larger network than most technical founders. He credits that network with much of his early momentum, including finding advisors, landing clients, and raising capital.
His advice for founders starting with a smaller network is simple and actionable: ask every person you meet, even if they're not the right fit for you, to introduce you to two people who might be a better fit. Do that consistently and the compounding effect is significant. It's not a new concept, but Justin's emphasis on consistency is what makes it work. One introduction leads to two, which leads to four. Over months, that snowball builds a network that would have taken years through traditional channels.
The long-term vision for Axio goes beyond individual data pipelines. Justin wants to build an interconnected, federated network connecting pharma sponsors to their contract manufacturer of choice so information flows seamlessly from development to clinical manufacturing. Think of it like CrowdStrike's model applied to biopharma: when one participant in the network flags a bad raw material, that information gets pushed to every other participant so they can flag it too.
The near-term focus is on early proof of concept programs. But if the network scales, the implications are massive. Drug development timelines could be cut in half. Risk goes down. Costs go down. And the drugs that patients need reach them faster.
[00:00:00] Justin Byers: we also thought we were gonna build a very large contract manufacturing organization, on par with some of the largest companies like Lonza, Samsung Biologics, and others.
[00:00:10] And what we quickly realized is that's not what the industry needs. What we need is. the data pipelines, as well as the high throughput manufacturing right here in the US.
[00:00:20] I think that's where we're finding a lot of value, is staying focused and to bring a lot of value to our customers.
[00:00:26] Jacob Miller: Hey everyone, and welcome back to the Startup Wisconsin Podcast, a show where you can learn about Wisconsin's growing tech scene through stories of startups, founders, investors, and the talented people making it all happen.
[00:00:39] My guest today is Justin Byers, founder and CEO of Axio BioPharma. They help drug development teams move faster by building data pipelines that get information from early research into manufacturing, cutting timelines and reducing risk. So life-saving drugs can reach patients sooner. Justin [00:01:00] is a scientist by training with a biochemistry and molecular biology degree. He spent years at companies like Illumina and Fujifilm watching drug programs get delayed, not because of bad science, but because critical data was trapped in the wrong systems in the wrong formats.
[00:01:17] The moment that pushed him to start. Axio was telling a founder after 18 months and nearly $2 million that they could not manufacture their drug at scale. The information was there the whole time. It was just stuck in a lot of different places. What stood out to me was the speed that he moved. Once he committed to the idea, he set up his lab at Forward BIOLABS in Madison in two weeks and had his first client two weeks after that. Very impressive.
[00:01:44] We talk about why Madison has deep biotech talent, but a gap in early stage capital. How AI is making it easier to start companies, but only if you have the structured data to feed it, and why he's now building Midwest BioCapital [00:02:00] a fund focused 100% on pre-seed and seed stage startups in the Midwest.
[00:02:05] Alright folks, let's get into it.
[00:02:08] Jacob Miller: you spent a big part of your career in healthcare and the biosciences world, but what led you to actually start your own biotech company to, to start this thing?
[00:02:16] Justin Byers: Yeah. Um, I'll, I'll be honest, it wasn't a straightforward path that led me here today. I mean, my background, I got my degree in biochemistry and molecular biology, so I'm a scientist by a, uh, training a scientist at heart, and really spent a lot of my early cl career at the bench, but. Quickly found myself in a role where I was really the in-between, uh, meaning I helped translate the information from my scientists at companies like Illumina, Danaher Fujifilm, to our clients that we were working with.
[00:02:51] And so I gotta see a lot of kind of how, uh, drugs are manufactured, how that information really goes from early discovery and development [00:03:00] into the clinical manufacturing. And let me tell you, I, it's. It's kinda shocking how, how much, uh, things get delayed, how long it really takes to kind of translate a lot of that information.
[00:03:13] And what I really saw was, uh, more times than not, it wasn't the science that really was the problem. Uh, it was the inconsistent data, trying to move the context, move the information from where it was at in its silo, fragmented state to where it needed to go. So what led me down this journey was that I knew there needed to be a better, faster way, and I wasn't seeing anybody else build it.
[00:03:38] And my clients kept demanding, there's gotta be a better way here, Justin. And so it's like, okay, if nobody else is going to do this, I'm gonna jump in with both feet and I'm gonna make it happen.
[00:03:48] Jacob Miller: Yeah. Wa was there like a, a moment like that was like, you know, you were like, okay, this is the time to do it. Because you obviously saw it, uh, slowly unraveling in your mind as you're in the industry working [00:04:00] on things and you're like. Why is this like this? Does it have to be this way? And, and a lot of people probably ask themselves those questions, but like, what created like conviction for you to be like, I'm gonna be the person to do it Because not a lot of people have like either that courage, the capital for example, or the right team around them or the support system.
[00:04:19] Like what, what was it that led you to say, this is the time.
[00:04:23] Justin Byers: Yeah, I, I mean, you're exactly right. It wasn't something that, happened overnight. I kept getting this conviction slowly over time, but there was one moment that really kind of, uh, pushed the needle forward and really, uh, made me realize, okay, I need to do this. And that was a. A client program that I was working very closely with.
[00:04:42] I knew the founder, the CEO of the early startup company very well. Uh, we had spent over a year and a half working together, getting their early idea, um, and trying to take it from that early idea into manufacturing so they could get their drugs to market. [00:05:00] And after. 18 months, nearly $2 million spent. I wound up having to tell that, uh, founder, I'm sorry, but, uh, we're not gonna be able to manufacture your drug at scale.
[00:05:11] And when we looked back and tried to figure out why didn't we know that ahead of time, why did it take us 18 months to get there? It was because. We did have the right information, but it was trapped in the wrong system, in the wrong format, and we never really realized it. And so that was the aha moment where I, I realized I don't wanna have to tell clients that anymore.
[00:05:32] and if you can standardize that manufacturing information, make it readily available and usable, Across different sites, across different partners. Then for every one of these drugs that are trying to be developed and manufactured, you can cut out months of time, reduce lots and lots of upfront costs, and overall just pull down the risk of these, uh, programs failing.
[00:05:55] And so that was the program that really pushed me forward. And it's like, okay, I, I need to do [00:06:00] something here. I can't stand seeing this happen anymore.
[00:06:03] Jacob Miller: Yeah. Now I'm thinking through, so you, you knew what these problems were. You had the idea of what the solutions could be, but like what, so what does Aio Biopharma do? Like, is it a mixture of software and like services like, because I, I'd imagine there's a little bit of. politics within all of this stuff, you know, obviously there, there's funding, there's FDA, again, I'm trying to just understand this whole, the whole universe of, of pharmaceuticals and the health sciences, but how were you approaching it with Axio?
[00:06:34] Like what, what was kinda like the first step and like how did it kind of evolve?
[00:06:38] Justin Byers: Yeah. So, it would be helpful to give, uh, you know, a little bit of context. How does this. Typically flow. How do you get from having a great idea for a blockbuster drug to getting it actually out there to customers and patients that desperately need this and the journey? It is, uh, never a straight one, but it typically follows [00:07:00] this type of a path.
[00:07:01] A, a new startup biotech or even a top 10 pharma comes up with a, a brand new drug idea. It's at this point, it's a more of a on paper idea than actually having any physical material. And that's usually where contract manufacturers are engaged and they wanna get their hands on some of the material, see if it really does what they think it's going to do.
[00:07:22] Uh, test it out in some, uh oh. Functional test to see if it has the performance that they expect it to have. And then it slowly makes its way into further and further applications, seeing how it actually performs, uh, against living cells and seeing, the safety profile of this as, and it continues to make that journey while all along that way, uh, there's transfers of information, so you have to transfer that.
[00:07:49] Original kind of idea to your first contract manufacturer. That contract manufacturer then has to, transfer that information to somebody who's gonna scale it up and make it even, at a [00:08:00] larger scale and so on and so forth. So you get a lot of these, gaps of information, gaps of context that really causes a lot of.
[00:08:09] Sand in the gears, so to speak. And so what Axio is doing that's different is a couple of things. First and foremost, we are a contract manufacturer, so we do high throughput, manufacturing. So we help with that first stage, taking the idea and actually, bringing it into reality. Providing a little bit of material, but a whole lot of data.
[00:08:31] The second piece and the more important piece is that we're building the data pipelines or the data tollways, so to speak, to get the information from where it's at, to where it needs to go. And that's really the kind of the fundamental, the key piece that's missing in the industry right now, especially with all this context around AI and wanting to use AI tools.
[00:08:53] Your AI tools are only as good as the data flowing into it. So, us building these data pipelines right now [00:09:00] is really the best moment to be building these. And we're finding a lot of value, not just in terms of getting the information to the manufacturers, but also getting it there and AI ready state.
[00:09:12] Jacob Miller: And I'm sure like in this moment, like you're saying, with all these possibilities, I'm sure there's a lot of. Distractions that seem interesting to you, like within, the use cases that you're finding with AI or machine learning or whatever it may be, but how are you kind of staying focused on like, you know, your true north of like, Hey, this is what we came to solve.
[00:09:31] Like, those things are interesting, but what we might adventure into those later is, is that happening to you as you're kind of like, creating these solutions and, and leveraging like these new tools that keep coming out?
[00:09:41] Justin Byers: Oh, absolutely. Uh, when we were originally going down this path, There's a lot of distractions that can happen with any new company that you're building. And for us, it was hard not to ignore the noise about, all of the different AI models that are being spun up. And in fact, we even went down the path of do we want to [00:10:00] build out our own AI models as well?
[00:10:02] And we realized the same thing that the rest of the industry is realizing, which is. there's not a need for more and more AI models. There's plenty out there right now, and there's more being built every single day. What there's a need for is the great, highly structured, high quality data to come in and actually make these models useful.
[00:10:22] And so that's what's really missing right now. And so staying focused on that problem set is what's really allowing us to move forward quickly and allowing us to bring a lot of value to our pharma companies.
[00:10:34] Jacob Miller: Yeah. because it sounds like producing a new drug, uh, to go to market is difficult. So what has been difficult about building a company inside kind of this machine that makes that already difficult? Like, I'm kind of curious.
[00:10:47] Justin Byers: building inside, uh, pharma is incredibly, incredibly challenging. Uh, there's a lot of regulatory hurdles. There's a lot of requirements as far as, uh, needing to have [00:11:00] traceability, standardization, governance. And defensibility about what it is you're actually building. that's why pharma tends to move very slowly, is that, you need to be able to kind of back up what it is that you're implementing, especially if it's brand new and different from the status quo.
[00:11:16] And so. for us that that's one of the most challenging things that we have to build here is not just build the data pipelines, but we also have to build that standardization and that governance structure as well. How is that data gonna look when it shows up to the contract manufacturers? What state is it gonna be in?
[00:11:35] How are we gonna report simple things like pH and the manufacturing information? And then how are we gonna have that in a. traceable, auditable format as well. So that's, that's some of the really challenging parts, about this industry. But that's what we're taking head on and, we're setting what those standards are gonna look like.
[00:11:55] Jacob Miller: you just mentioned like audits and I'm like, there's probably parts of that process. Like you said, there's [00:12:00] data in different places and the context might be lost, but when an audit needs to happen, I'd imagine some of these companies are, newer companies are like scrambling to find everything they need.
[00:12:09] Justin Byers: If there is an audit, Oh, a hundred percent.
[00:12:10] Jacob Miller: Yeah. And I can imagine if you're able to like somehow collect all that and put it into. You know, some kind of thing that is easy for these auditors to, to see and understand and validate and verify and all that kind of stuff like that.
[00:12:24] I mean, that's helpful in any, like, even like taxes and things like that. It's just like, there's just so many use cases for cataloging all of this information for audit purposes. So I think that's, that's really, really interesting. Yeah.
[00:12:35] Justin Byers: No, absolutely not to, go down that path too much because I, I, I think I could talk about that for another half hour, hour just of itself, but. You're, you're, you're absolutely right. Uh, sometimes what we're finding is, our pharma sponsors don't even realize the data that they have or where it's located at, because there's so many different systems, from physical lab notebooks, electronic lab notebooks, [00:13:00] uh, computer system for that piece of equipment, one for this other piece of equipment, just.
[00:13:05] Building those connections so that all that information can flow into their own secure server and they can realize, okay, what is it that we even have to start with is a key piece of this puzzle.
[00:13:16] Jacob Miller: Yeah, yeah. what was something that maybe surprised you about kind of like. This journey, maybe either as a founder or just within the business and the model and the solution itself. what kind of surprised you The last, last year or so?
[00:13:29] Justin Byers: Oh my goodness. Um, I would say what surprised me the most is just how difficult it is to actually start up a company from scratch. I mean, everybody, told me. about how challenging it would be. I spoke with a ton of other founders here locally in the Madison, Wisconsin area, as well as within my global network, from past CEOs and other strategic leaders.
[00:13:53] But nothing really prepares you for the actual reality of it. I mean, it's not just. Technically [00:14:00] demanding, uh, you have to get it into the strategic side, and it constant. It's making lots of high stakes, decisions with very little or incomplete information and not a lot of room for error.
[00:14:12] So it's, it's a lot on the line. But, uh, what I tell other founders is that while starting a new company is almost guaranteed to be one of the toughest things that you'll ever, ever do. It's also guaranteed to be one of the most rewarding. So, uh, you're gonna get pushed past what you think is, uh, your limit for what's possible.
[00:14:32] And despite that, I wouldn't trade it for anything. Uh, while it's been one of the hardest things, it's also been one of the most rewarding. And it's amazing to look around and. See what, what I've built, what the team's built, and that's what keeps me going every single day because these pushes that we're, moving forward with these advances are what's going to cut the timelines for getting these lifesaving drugs to the patients.
[00:14:56] And that's what keeps me motivated.
[00:14:58] Jacob Miller: Yeah. That's awesome. Is [00:15:00] there anything that's been, Maybe different than you expected. for example, like when you first started it, where and where you are now. Like any small pivots or big pivots, I'm just kind of curious, you know, you thought it'd go this way and it ended up going this way.
[00:15:13] Uh, anything like that?
[00:15:14] Justin Byers: Yeah. For, for us, one of our, uh, big kind of pivots for us was, uh, one that I kind of touched on before, originally thinking that we were gonna go down building AI models. in addition, we also thought we were gonna build a. Very large contract manufacturing organization, on par with some of the largest companies like Lonza, Samsung Biologics, and others.
[00:15:35] And what we quickly realized is that's not what the industry needs. There's already a big focus on other companies building out fantastic AI models. There's already fantastic contract manufacturers on the clinical manufacturing side. What we need is. the data pipelines, like I mentioned before, as well as the high throughput manufacturing right here in the us.
[00:15:57] And so us keeping that very focused [00:16:00] effort has been challenging because there's a lot of different areas, that we could go off into, but I think that's where we're finding a lot of value, is staying focused and keeping a, a kind of, our core theme is what's allowing us to bring a lot of value to our customers.
[00:16:14] Jacob Miller: Yeah, within the US manufacturing stuff, do you find yourself spending more time on like manufacturing for like first pilots, for example? Okay, here's like the first version of this product, or. It more the first version of the product's already been done somewhere else. We're now phase two to just scale it up a little bit more for more of the trials and the FDA approval process and stuff like that.
[00:16:38] Justin Byers: For us, we're on the preclinical side, so we're not quite, uh, into any of the FDA regulated manufacturing environment yet. So what we typically see is first time manufacturers, so. Our customers are coming to us with, Hey, I've got this great idea. Don't know if you can make it, can you give it a try? And let's see what we get.
[00:16:59] That, [00:17:00] that's usually where the projects start, which, which make 'em exciting and fun because we, we truly don't know always what's gonna come out on the other side. there are some times though, where we've got repeat customers coming back and we know exactly what we're gonna get each and every time.
[00:17:14] But for us, more times than not, these are brand new first time manufacturing events.
[00:17:19] Jacob Miller: Okay. Okay. Yeah, I was kind of curious like where you guys play right now. and you feel like you'll kind of always live there now, you were saying you don't see yourself being larger. You feel like long-term for a while you'll kind of be in, in that realm.
[00:17:31] Justin Byers: Yeah. Uh, we don't see ourselves getting into the clinical manufacturing space again before that was kind of the original. Idea is that we would move into that space, but, uh, we see the industry already kind of picking up and, uh, growing on the clinical manufacturing side. we've seen a lot of announcements throughout the industry, uh, such as Fujifilm building out there Site and Holly Springs, North Carolina.
[00:17:55] We've seen other investment, uh oh announcements through a variety of [00:18:00] different companies that are coming in and expanding their clinical manufacturing sites, but we don't see a lot on the early preclinical side. So there's a gap right there of right now, and that's where we're filling that gap and also allows us to build out that data set that's needed for, building out the structured data that's needed in those early discovery, phases.
[00:18:21] So it, it goes right along with the data pipelines that we're building on our network side as well.
[00:18:27] Jacob Miller: Got it. Okay, cool. I am curious about, where you wanna go next. Like obviously that's where you're living, but within that, like what is kind of the, Hey, we, we've gotten to this point in 2026. This is kind of where we wanna make the next leap within this area that we're living in right now.
[00:18:44] Justin Byers: Yeah. Well for us, like I said, uh, right now we're, focused on the, Early preclinical manufacturing. We're doing a lot of antibody manufacturing campaigns at the moment, and we want to continue to expand how, how many [00:19:00] programs we can bring in. so. Near term. Our, uh, first focus is on scaling up operations by about tenfold.
[00:19:07] So the number of programs that we can bring, through, uh, that will allow us to do about a thousand, different antibodies every single week. so that's a lot of impact that we can bring to our clients. And then on the network side, we want to continue to build out, the high value networks, uh, through early pilots where we can help these clients get the information from, the development stage into the clinical manufacturing.
[00:19:32] But beyond that, kind of, beyond that near term of building out these early pilots and these early connections, uh, what we want to see is an interconnected, federated network that we build where we can connect, Any new, uh, pharma sponsor that comes in with their contract, manufacturer of choice. So, they can immediately see how that information can quickly flow to their contract manufacturer so that we can get their drugs to their, clinical manufacturing [00:20:00] in half the time it traditionally takes.
[00:20:02] And, that's where we want to see ourselves get to, very quickly.
[00:20:06] Jacob Miller: Yeah, I'm actually curious about your business model. are you, are people paying. It right with capital that they've, been able to raise? Or are you offering, Hey, we'll get stake in your business if this thing goes to market? what have, have you tested with that or have you just kind of been on one path?
[00:20:21] Justin Byers: No, that, that's a great idea. I mean, we, we've been sticking to the fee for service model, so, we haven't done any kind of, uh, services in exchange for equity. For us, uh, the fee for service model has been working very, very well. And on the network side, while we are service-based at the moment, what we imagine this shifting over to as we build out more and more of these pipelines is that we'll have a library essentially of different data pipelines that we can deploy.
[00:20:48] And so very quickly it becomes a subscription service. So once we've built up a, a sufficient amount of these pipelines that we can very easily deploy to a new, partner that comes in, then [00:21:00] it just. Signing up for a yearly subscription. And then as we bring in more and more partners, you get these larger and larger network effects that, um.
[00:21:09] we're all able to learn then from the aggregated, anonymized information from that network. So imagine, for example, we have a, a lot of raw material. So a bad starting material that comes in and gets flagged by one client, well, we can then push out that information to all, hundred thousand of our, network participants so that if they have that same material as well, They can also flag that in the system and they know not to use that material. So that's what's really exciting about this network that we're building
[00:21:41] Jacob Miller: Yeah. That's awesome. Like a shared intelligence thing. That's, that's super cool. reminds me of, um, I spoke with Casey Camilleri earlier on the podcast, and he works in security. That's something that they actually do is like when they have learnings within their system from one client, they'll, you know, have shared, again, I don't know how they [00:22:00] securely share do that, but I think, I think their teams have a better understanding of like, Hey, in this industry this is happening.
[00:22:06] We'll be aware of that and watching for that over here with these other clients and stuff,
[00:22:10] so that's fascinating stuff. Yeah.
[00:22:12] Justin Byers: Yeah, no, you're a hundred percent right. And it's funny that you bring that up because my co-founder, Brian Staats his background in addition to the bioinformatics, uh, background that he has. He also spent a number of year at CrowdStrike and he was one of the early software engineers that helped build out that company, uh, when they were still.
[00:22:33] Pre-revenue, pre uh, having any kind of robust customers. And so he got to see that journey and gotta be part of building that, where they actually started off with zero network effects and built that over time. Same thing where they would see a security flaw and send that patch out to everybody in their network.
[00:22:50] That's exactly where we took some of those lessons learned and thought, wait a minute, we can do the same thing in the biopharma industry.
[00:22:57] Jacob Miller: Yeah. That's awesome.
[00:22:58]
[00:24:05] Jacob Miller: Actually, I'm curious about your relationship with your co-founder. Um, how did, how did you guys find each other? Um, what was that like to say yes to each other and go in on this, this, this journey? Um, and kind of how have you been sharing responsibilities of the business?
[00:24:21] Justin Byers: Yeah, so, finding another co-founder is something that I recommend to every new entrepreneur. If they're not already thinking about it, they need to start thinking about it. And you have to go in with, with the mindset of this is like getting involved with a marriage. I mean, this is something that you guys are gonna be together for a number of years, hopefully for a very, very long time.
[00:24:43] Business is very successful. And so you don't want to jump into with, another co-founder lightly. And so that's the mindset that Brian and I took as well. We originally met through Y Combinator, in addition to their great accelerator program, they've also got a, what they call a founder match program.[00:25:00]
[00:25:00] And so we met through their. went back and forth for a number of months and then Brian came out, from Seattle to Madison and we actually met in person and, uh, spent another couple of months really getting to know each other, even better yet. So after about six months, we both decided yes, we were a really good fit for one another.
[00:25:18] He's more on the software engineering bioinformatics side. I'm more on the process development commercial sales side, and so we really complimented each other well. It was nice that we had. Different backgrounds, different strengths, different weaknesses. And so we kind of overlapped very nicely. And so after we met in person, we checked out, uh, the lab space that we were gonna move into.
[00:25:40] Uh, we both realized, yes, this is a good fit. Let's, let's go ahead and do it. And so, Brian and I have now known each other since, January of 2024. So coming up on almost two years of working together. Wow. Time flies when
[00:25:52] you're having fun.
[00:25:53] Jacob Miller: Yeah. Yeah. what made you wanna go through Y Combinator? I mean, is obviously they're, they're [00:26:00] well known, uh, they're trusted. or was that your second thing that you tried? I'm just kinda curious if that was like, no, I just went right there and that was it.
[00:26:08] Justin Byers: so myself as well as Brian, 'cause I asked him about this too, we actually both were going through and kinda looking at a lot of the different programs that are out there, both on the accelerator side as well as the kind of matching founders together. And there's a lot of 'em. Uh, Techstars is another big one that a lot of people have heard of, both in terms of their accelerator as well as their matching programs.
[00:26:29] And there's others out there as well. but it came down to the network effects. So very similar to our previous conversation about network effects on the biopharma security side. Y Combinator had a fantastic, very large network of different founders from a diverse set of backgrounds. And so it was easier for me to go on there and quickly see, okay, these founders here, uh, based on their background, not a great fit for me, but, these other.
[00:26:57] 200 are a perfect fit for me. So at, at the [00:27:00] end of the day, it kind of highlights how important having a very large, robust network is. And so that's, that's why I, uh, wound up going with, uh, Y Combinator, and I'm suspicious that's why Brian went with it as well.
[00:27:12] Jacob Miller: Yeah. you talk about network effects, it makes me think about Madison, 'cause Madison obviously has a strong foundation and background in healthcare and, and biotech. what has been your experience being in Madison? Building in Madison? From two sides, maybe from as a professional and then maybe as building the startup.
[00:27:30] How has Madison been beneficial to you?
[00:27:33] Justin Byers: Yeah, I mean, uh, Madison is uh, uh, really where I started my career, in the life science industry. And so I absolutely, have fallen in love with Madison over the last decade plus. And. it usually surprises a lot of outsiders. Just how many, biotech life science companies were either started here or have grown substantially here.
[00:27:55] Everything from PPD, which is now thermo to, uh, [00:28:00] Catalent per mega, uh, exact sciences, arrowhead. I mean, I could go on and on about all the fantastic companies that are here, and that also quickly goes into. Why I want want to keep Axio here as well is because there's so much great talent, coming out of the universities as well as coming out of these, well-established companies as well.
[00:28:22] So you get a real scientific depth, and, uh, a real strong pool of talent that you can pull from for your company. Kind of on the, the flip side, I think the, the gap that might be here in Madison right now is more on the, the capital side. So as a, founder trying to start, uh, my company here in Madison, that's where I did find that there's a bit of a gap right now in the area.
[00:28:47] So it is challenging to raise funds outside of your traditional coast. Trying to pull in money from, whether it's the Bay Area or from the Boston area, can be a bit of a challenge. But once you start diving into the [00:29:00] economics of it, a lot of investors realize, wait a minute, you can get a lot better return on your money, here in the Midwest, uh, than you can necessarily in some of these larger tech hubs.
[00:29:10] Jacob Miller: Yeah. What do you feel like is maybe missing, from Madison or we could say the Midwest? in regards to, 'cause if, health sciences and technologies in that space seems to be a strength in Madison. Why isn't it, I guess obviously there's, there's things happening, you said there's, you know, capital obviously is a barrier, like people have to go elsewhere to get capital.
[00:29:32] but are there other things that you feel like could be done to also help kind of like bolster everything that's happening, the talent there, the ideas that are there? Um, 'cause it feels like it's there, but what, what is, uh, like the barrier to like more velocity, so to speak.
[00:29:49] Justin Byers: Yeah. At the, at the end of the day, I mean, the. Barrier to velocity really has to do with having a site where you can quickly get started and, uh, uh, build out your company regardless of what [00:30:00] sector you're in. But thinking specifically about the life science and biotech sectors, it's having that available lab space to quickly build out your idea from that paper kind of ideation phase into like a physical, uh, lab footprint.
[00:30:14] And so. there are shared lab spaces, like Forward BIOLABS is doing an amazing job. I have to give them a great shout out because that's, that's where we're at right now. we're able to immediately go in there with a functional lab that was already ready on day one. All I had to do was add the scientists, add the client programs, and we're ready to get going.
[00:30:34] within just a couple of weeks, I think it was two weeks to set up the lab, and then it was two more weeks and we had our first client, uh, so very, very fast. I couldn't have asked for any faster than that, it's again, on the capital side. The, that's, that's where there's a, a gap here in the Midwest right now is on the early stage investment.
[00:30:54] I think there's a lot of well established, VC companies, some here out of the [00:31:00] Madison area, some out of the Chicago area. And even St. Louis, but there's not a lot of established VC companies focused on pre-seed and seed stage. So that's where we could really, uh, use a lot of focus is getting, uh, some early stage capital into these startups.
[00:31:18] Jacob Miller: Yeah.
[00:31:18] Justin Byers: I.
[00:31:19] Jacob Miller: and it sounds like you're gonna be a part of that solution. I wanna tease a little bit, about Midwest BioCapital. You know, you're a founder. You've never, I don't believe you've ever had a fund before or managed a fund. what was the moment that said, Hey, while I'm doing this, I'm also gonna do this too? Um, because it, it's a lot. And so like, I, I'm curious, what was, uh, the thing that kind of pushed you to say, Hey, I'm gonna start Midwest BioCapital and be a part of the solution to the problem that I'm seeing.
[00:31:48] Justin Byers: Yeah. uh, you're absolutely right. It's, it's a lot to take on and my goal is not to distract from Axio at all. Axio is my number one focus day in and day out. But you're right, I do have a separate effort [00:32:00] where I'm trying to, uh, explore trying to fill some of that capital gap that I spoke about and.
[00:32:06] The reason why I am trying to focus on that is because of my time at, uh, the shared lab space. So at Forward BIOLABS I seen firsthand how many great companies are either spinning out of the University of Wisconsin at Madison or spinning, spinning up out of industry. And they've got really strong, solid business cases, really fantastic founders and founding teams, but they're lacking on that.
[00:32:33] pre-seed or seed capital and, I'm now building, uh, a very robust investor network as I continue to be successful in raising funds. And it's like, wait a minute, let's use some of that network, to help bring in some capital here locally. And so I'm working right now on bringing in some other, uh, general partners to, get Midwest BioCapital fully up and running. We do have it established, uh, but we need to bring in a couple [00:33:00] more partners and a couple interns to really get it up and kind of, churning at full speed. But the goal is that we can help fill some of this, uh, early funding gap.
[00:33:10] Jacob Miller: obviously it's called Midwest BioCapital. Are you planning to stay investing in the Midwest or are you open to investing on the coast as well?
[00:33:18] Justin Byers: Uh, we are a hundred percent focused on investing in the Midwest. So traditionally you usually allow for a 10 to 15% kind of off thesis allocation of funds. We're not gonna do that, at least with fund one of Midwest BioCapital, a hundred percent of the fund is focused on Midwest based, uh. Oh, startups.
[00:33:38] Jacob Miller: Alright. That's awesome. mean, it sounds kind of personal, like why you would choose that because it's like, Hey, I've been here, I see the talent, I see the ideas, um, the infrastructure, slowly, slowly getting into place. Do you feel like. We'll need more like, you know, bio forward type facilities to kind of like accelerate some of that stuff.
[00:33:56] 'cause if, hey, if there's more capital getting these ideas, it's like [00:34:00] expansion's probably the next thing. And is it, is it more of like more players being involved, more bio forwards, or is it bio forward just getting bigger? Like how do you kind of see that playing as part of an ecosystem?
[00:34:11] Justin Byers: Yeah, I, I think it's a couple of things. I think it's, uh, Forward BIOLABS, of course, continuing to do the great work that they're doing in the shared lab space and continuing to expand their operations. and as Midwest BioCapital and others, uh, kind of get started, I think you're gonna see kind of A synergistic effect there where these two are gonna work. In parallel, there's gonna be more lab spaces available, a little bit more early stage funding available for some of these companies to get started. At the same time, it's, it's worth, uh, not overlooking the effects of AI in this space right now.
[00:34:45] The barriers to entry of actually starting up a company, kind of going through the ideation phase are much, easier with these large language models, whether it's Claude Chat, GPT, or others. You can really start to brainstorm very quickly [00:35:00] as an early stage founder of, okay, is this a good idea? How do I actually get this started?
[00:35:04] And then if you've got the available space, the available capital, to your earlier point, the velocity's there, you can really take off like you've got rocket fuel behind your idea.
[00:35:14] Jacob Miller: Uh, are there any other organizations in the Madison area or the Midwest that you leveraged, in your journey the last couple years? You've, you've mentioned a few, but I wonder if there's any that were maybe missing from the story?
[00:35:26] Justin Byers: so for me, on, on my side, I primarily was working with Forward BIOLABS on the, the lab space side. I do want to make a mention to Merlin mentors who I worked closely with, who helped provide some early guidance to me as well. Working with their mentors was fantastic and just kind of, helping to learn from others, kind of bumps and bruises along the way, and passing that information along to me was very helpful so I could make my own mistakes and my own bumps and bruises.
[00:35:55] And then. more importantly was building my own set of advisors as well, [00:36:00] building out my advisory team, that was one of the very first things I did. After Brian joined me and I've got my co-founder established, I've brought on my first two advisors. So again, trying to learn from, a large network, learn from others that have done this before was really important.
[00:36:16] some other resources that I didn't personally, use, but I know other founders have used quite effectively would be starting block. I know they've been very great, uh, for a lot of early founders, uh, and so I know they've got a variety of different tools and different programs that are helpful.
[00:36:31] Jacob Miller: Yeah. Uh, with your advisors, have there been specific moments, in the growth of the business where they've been very, very helpful to get, get you, get you unstuck?
[00:36:41] Justin Byers: Uh, absolutely. So in the early days, uh, I, I've gotta give a big shout out to both Greg Black as well as Graham Burley. they both provided some strategic guidance on whether it was appropriate to try and. Raise hundreds of millions of dollars to try and build a clinical [00:37:00] manufacturing site, when that's not only gonna take year, two years to raise that amount of capital, but also take, you know, three to four years to build that kind of a site.
[00:37:10] And so, kind of reigning in my, uh, ambition and, uh, my ideas was really help. Full to kind of, again, stay focused on that preclinical manufacturing side and allow us to have that early speed and able to get, uh, those early revenue clients very quickly. So without them, I think I would've spun my wheels a little bit longer and would've definitely taken longer to get to where we are now, which is a fully established lab that can, uh, work with clients right now today.
[00:37:41] versus we'd probably still be. Raising money and still be dreaming about, okay, what does that space look like? Mm-hmm.
[00:37:47] Jacob Miller: You know, it makes me think about, 'cause there's a lot of advice out there, obviously for founders, for entrepreneurs or whatever, different phases of the business and the growth and strategies. And so it's hard to kinda like filter through the noise, like, well, [00:38:00] this person's telling me to do this, this person's telling me to do that.
[00:38:02] What about your advisors? what was maybe their traits or characteristics or maybe their experiences, that said, Hey, you're the right person for me and I fully trust you and your advice.
[00:38:14] Justin Byers: Yeah, it, it was a couple of things. and I give this advice to other founders quite a bit. First and foremost, you, you need advisors that know your area. Uh, specifically for me, that's the life science space, drug manufacturing. Uh, so, uh. Greg, he helped, uh, start Gala Designs, which eventually spun out and became Catalent Biologics.
[00:38:34] So not really, uh, anybody in the area that's, uh, probably more suited to help design a contract manufacturing organization, or help me, as I'm building this out, uh, similar with Graham Brewery, headed up, uh, several sites including, uh, Catalent here locally. So that, that kind of checked the box on the, the industry knowledge.
[00:38:54] But the other key piece is that you don't want advisors that are just going to be an echo [00:39:00] chamber. if you go in and you have advisors that are just gonna tell you yes on everything and tell you yes, that's the best idea ever, and not challenge you, you're gonna quickly find yourself, in a very difficult situation where.
[00:39:13] You're not hearing the best ideas or you're not getting pushed on when perhaps you could come up with a better idea. And so that was the other key piece of it too, is finding advisors that are not afraid to push back and say, no, Justin, that's, that's not the best idea. Hey, I made these mistakes, and you, you wanna learn from these.
[00:39:30] And so that's another key piece of advice that I tell all founders is find advisors that are going to respectfully challenge you on your ideas and are not just gonna be an echo chamber.
[00:39:41] Jacob Miller: Yeah, that's awesome. That's per, it's like, and it's hard to sometimes explain that to people or to find that person maybe, maybe that's like the more challenging part. How do you find that person, whether it's in your, um, network or in your life that you maybe have met before? and then I think the other part of it too is like, is that person willing to be an advisor to you?
[00:39:58] Do they have the [00:40:00] capacity? maybe you have the right fit in your network, but they're just not available, and it's like, ugh. So I feel, uh, I feel like you got really lucky with, uh, the advisors. You were, you were able to get, and they were willing to be a part of your journey, which is really, really cool.
[00:40:11] So,
[00:40:12] Justin Byers: No, I completely agree. And I would say that's my last big piece of advice as well is on the network side. I was fortunate I came in on the commercial sales side, so I had a large network coming into this. But for any new founders, that's gotta be a key piece is. Network as much as you can. Every person that you meet, even if they're not the right fit for you on the advisor investor side, have them introduce, uh, two people to you that, they think are an even better fit.
[00:40:37] And so if you continue doing that with each and every person, you're gonna very quickly find yourself with a very large, robust network.
[00:40:45] Jacob Miller: That's awesome. So as we wrap up, what's next for Axio? Uh, what's next for you? what are kind of the, the big things for 2026 that you wanna wanna share?
[00:40:55] Justin Byers: Yeah, for, for us, uh, we're gonna continue working on, executing, I mean, [00:41:00] 2026. We've got the lab built. So 2026 is the year of execution. now that we've got everything established here, we've made all of our purchases, all of our early hires. Now we've just gotta get the work actually done here. So on the manufacturing side, that means, filling up our capacity with the uh, space that we have right now today.
[00:41:21] And also then getting into a situation where we can justify expanding tenfold so that we can bring on even more projects. And then on the network side, it's going through these early proof of concept programs so that we can, begin building that foundation for what will become a federated network of interconnected players from early development, uh, labs to pharma to the contract manufacturers.
[00:41:48] And so, again. Executing on that vision in 2026 is what's gonna allow us to have those very large network effects going into 2027 and beyond.
[00:41:58] Jacob Miller: Cool. And [00:42:00] listeners, if they're curious about working with Axio, I'd imagine going to the website, there's probably a contact form. If they're listening and they have an idea, that's probably the best way to reach out to you.
[00:42:09] Justin Byers: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Uh, go on to axiobiopharma.com. That's the best starting point. Take a look on there. If there's a. Of different contact forms, depending on where you're most interested, especially if you're in the biologics, uh, space. definitely feel free to reach out even if you just wanna learn a little bit more about what we're doing.
[00:42:28] Jacob Miller: And if there's people interested in being part of Midwest BioCapital, is there a site up or what's the best way should they, you know, reach out to you on LinkedIn? I'm curious as, as you're kind of getting that, that all, uh, figured out and put together.
[00:42:40] Justin Byers: Yeah. So if you're interested in learning more about Midwest BioCapital, we do have a website up midwestbiocapital.com. And same thing if you're interested on getting involved on the investor side, there's uh, forms on there. If you're a new startup company and you want us to, be aware of you and you wanna get on our radar, there's a form on there, for you as a startup founder [00:43:00] as well.
[00:43:00] Jacob Miller: Awesome. Cool. Well, thanks Justin. This was like a super enlightening conversation for me, and I'm sure for a lot of folks here that don't know a lot about how that whole world works. So thanks for sharing that, and with all of us and, make it a little more clear. Best of luck to you and the entire team and everything you got going on, and, uh, I'm really grateful that you're here in Wisconsin and Madison, making a difference and building something new.
[00:43:22] So it's awesome.
[00:43:24] Justin Byers: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. Really appreciate it.
[00:43:28] Thanks for joining us on the Startup Wisconsin Podcast. Wanna support the show. Don't forget to subscribe and get updates. If you're feeling generous, you can share, rate and review our podcast to help others find us. Alright folks, until next time, let's keep moving Wisconsin forward.
Get updates on future episodes, events, and more from our newsletter.
(00:00)
Introduction
(01:17)
Justin’s background in biochemistry and molecular biology
(02:51)
The creation of Axio BioPharma
(05:00)
The challenges of drug manufacturing and data management
(07:22)
Why AI is crucial in the drug development process
(10:05)
The role of Midwest BioCapital in supporting early-stage biotech companies
(12:37)
Building data pipelines for the pharmaceutical industry
(15:45)
The importance of partnerships in the biotech startup world
(19:15)
How Madison’s ecosystem supports biotech innovation
(22:30)
The balance of growth and focus in a biotech startup
(25:50)
What’s next for Axio BioPharma and Midwest BioCapital
(00:00)
Introduction
(01:17)
Justin’s background in biochemistry and molecular biology
(02:51)
The creation of Axio BioPharma
(05:00)
The challenges of drug manufacturing and data management
(07:22)
Why AI is crucial in the drug development process
(10:05)
The role of Midwest BioCapital in supporting early-stage biotech companies
(12:37)
Building data pipelines for the pharmaceutical industry
(15:45)
The importance of partnerships in the biotech startup world
(19:15)
How Madison’s ecosystem supports biotech innovation
(22:30)
The balance of growth and focus in a biotech startup
(25:50)
What’s next for Axio BioPharma and Midwest BioCapital
We dig up what's going on every month so you don't have to.
Get updates on exciting new podcast interviews, events, startup programs, accelerators, resources, and pitch contests happening in Wisconsin.
Choosing a city only tells us the region you live in.
It does not mean you only get updates for that city.
.png)