The Biotech Startups Podcast 🧬 The Hidden Skills Scientists Need to Build Real Companies | Caitlyn Krebs (Part 2/4)
Apr 16, 2026
24:49
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"If you are capable of acquiring knowledge, of applying the knowledge, and you like it, you can succeed. It doesn't matter what it is."
In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, Caitlyn Krebs, co-founder and CEO of Nalu Bio, traces her path from building the Bay Area's biotech ecosystem to operating at the cutting edge of science and business. She shares how launching BayBioNEST taught her what it really takes—beyond great science—to build durable companies, before diving into her time at Entelos, where she helped pioneer virtual patients and digital twins nearly twenty years before AI became a buzzword, and unpacks what BD actually means in biotech, from navigating black-box skepticism to running "bake-off" pilots that let the data speak for itself. The conversation then shifts to Tethys Bioscience, where Caitlyn helped bring a prediabetes diagnostic to market—winning over physicians, employers, and major payers like Aetna, United, and Cigna—only to watch a single Medicare/CMS misstep shutter a well-funded company, and what every founder can learn from that hard-won experience.
Key topics covered:
- Building BayBioNEST: Launching a scrappy pre-accelerator to give academic scientists the business skills they never learned at the bench.
- Pioneering virtual patients: Building biological models and digital twins decades before AI hype to reshape drug development.
- What BD really is in biotech: Structuring deals, overcoming skepticism, and using “bake-off” pilots so the science sells itself.
- Selling prediabetes diagnostics: Winning physicians and employers over to a predictive test for an under-recognized disease.
- The power and peril of reimbursement: How one Medicare/CMS call can wipe out strong data, major payers, and massive funding.
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Subscribe to the Podcast:
Find our guest, Caitlyn Krebs at these links:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caitlynkrebs/
Website: https://www.nalubio.com/
Find our host, Jon Chee, at these links:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonchee
Learn more about Excedr:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/excedr/
Website: https://www.excedr.com
Intro & Outro Songs Created by OkKyojin, Owned by Excedr:
Website: https://flow.page/kyojin
Resources & Articles:
What Is Business Development in Biotech & Pharma? https://chivanta.com/what-is-business-development-biotech-pharma/
What Is Quantitative Systems Pharmacology (QSP) Modeling? https://www.news-medical.net/life-sciences/What-is-Quantitative-Systems-Pharmacology-(QSP)-Modeling.aspx
How CMS/Medicare Reimbursement Works for Diagnostic Lab Tests https://www.fiercebiotech.com/medical-devices/diagnostics-companies-strike-back-at-cms-lab-test-rule
Top Biotech Accelerators and Incubators in 2026 https://www.peony.ink/blog/top-10-biotech-startup-accelerators
Quantitative Systems Pharmacology (QSP) Modeling – University of Florida Course Overview
US Medicare Sets Reimbursement Price for PromarkerD — A Case Study in Diagnostic Reimbursement
Companies, Universities, & People mentioned:
Pfizer: https://www.pfizer.com
Aetna: https://www.aetna.com
UnitedHealthcare: https://www.uhc.com
Cigna: https://www.cigna.com
George Rathmann: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Rathmann
Timestamps:
00:00 Intro
02:16 Fundraising and Running BayBio's Membership Organization
02:30 Launching BayBioNEST: A Pre-Accelerator for Academic Scientists
06:55 The Rise of Biotech Incubators and Early Ecosystem Building
09:50 Transitioning from Ecosystem Builder to Operator
10:36 Entelos: Pioneering Virtual Patients and Digital Twins
11:52 What Business Development (BD) Really Means in Biotech
15:44 The "Bake-Off" Strategy: Letting the Models Speak for Themselves
18:51 Moving On: The Pull Toward a Product Company
19:36 Joining Tethys Bioscience and Selling Prediabetes Diagnostics
21:52 Mapping the Healthcare Ecosystem: Patients, Physicians, and Employers
22:52 The Medicare/CMS Misstep That Shut Down a $200M Company
23:32 Outro
The Biotech Startups Podcast gives you a front-row seat to the business and science of building a biotech. Hosted by Jon Chee, CEO of Excedr, the show features honest conversations with founders, execs, and investors about their work, their companies, and how they got there. From scientific breakthroughs to startup lessons, each episode explores what it really takes to grow a life science company—from pre-seed to IPO.