This week’s episode of “WisBusiness: the Podcast” is with Justin Byers, founder and CEO of Axio BioPharma.
This Madison-based company is a contract manufacturing and development organization, with customers ranging from early-stage biotech firms to top-10 U.S. pharmaceutical businesses. It’s focused on drug substances and research materials such as specialty proteins.
“What’s really setting Axio apart is that we’re using AI at the foundation of the company, specifically we’re using AI in the process development cycle,” said Byers, who previously worked as a process development scientist.
He explains the standard approach for this process is “very time-consuming, costly” and he wanted to find a better method. By using AI to examine and integrate the data the company generates through its own manufacturing process, Axio BioPharma is skipping the iterative process development cycle, “saving years for our clients.”
After launching in August of last year and coming fully online in November, the company has hit the ground running.
“Kickstarting this year with over half a dozen programs already starting here in January, so we’re really happy, starting off the year very busy,” Byers said.
The business is still raising its seed investment round, and Byers sat down with dozens of investors at the recent J.P. Morgan Health Care Conference in California earlier this year.
“We’re already thinking ahead to what’s that next step, so our long-term plan is to build the company out here in Madison, and build out a large campus of several manufacturing buildings, where we can do more than just our current focus,” he said.
By this summer, Byers is targeting a ten-fold expansion of its production capacity at a larger facility and plans to hire up to four more scientists.
The conversation also touches on the state’s biotech and life sciences industry, related workforce development and more.
