After nearly five years in operation, Doctor Cynthia Bamdad, founder and CEO of Minerva Biotechnologies Corporation (Minerva), was reflecting on the company’s next steps. In a few short years, she and her small team had managed to develop a nanoparticle process for testing new drugs that was orders of magnitude faster than traditional approaches. Using this process, they had discovered the mechanism that caused 96% of all breast cancers and identified families of small molecule therapeutics that were effective in blocking this mechanism in live cells in the laboratory. Moreover, Bamdad did not think it would be long before the company could offer an early warning diagnostic for breast cancer, which would allow less invasive treatment of the condition. The company had filed several families of patent applications in support of these claims, but the challenge was funding.
To date, Bamdad had relied on Federal Government grants and angel investors to fund the research, but the next steps would require much larger investment. Should Minerva seek to commercialize its drug development technology to help fund the riskier steps of drug development? Should it focus on a diagnostic which would make current treatments more effective? Should it license its small molecule therapeutics to one of the many well-funded companies seeking cures for cancer? Or should Bamdad raise capital to support tests in mice in order to reach the Federal Drug Administration IND (Investigational New Drug) application stage of drug discovery? This would allow clinical trials in humans, which would require more capital, but an IND would increase the value of Minerva’s intellectual capital substantially. What should Bamdad do?
Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Financing and Loans; Strategy; Decision Choices and Conditions; Biotechnology Industry;
Citation:
Wells, John R., and Benjamin Weinstock. "Minerva 2004: Discovery." Harvard Business School Case 721-389, September 2020. View Details