AUTM 'VCs Talk Back' Part 2 - Deb Palistrant and Josh Resnick with Orin Herskowitz

In this audio interview, Columbia Technology Ventures’ Executive Director Orin Herskowitz interviews venture capitalists Deb Palestrant (Partner, 5AM Ventures, head of 4:59) and Josh Resnick (Managing Director, RA Capital).

Topics included:  

• Minute 0 - introductions by Deb and Josh, including overviews of their firms, their funds' areas of interest, and how they became VCs in the first place
• Minute 9 - "Early-Stage vs. Company Creator" VCs.  How the life science VC field has changed over time to focus on earlier-stage deals and creating companies around raw ideas.
• Minute 19 – current areas of interest; investment hypotheses; what kinds of deals to show them; how TTOs should stay current on what VCs are looking for
• Minute 23 – how VCs source deals, especially from outside the top-tier universities in major coastal startup hubs
• Minute 31 – common failure points / best practices in getting deals done with university TTOs and launching startups based on university innovations; whether patenting and commercialization should count towards tenure
• Minute 40 -  does the coronavirus crisis impact the kinds of opportunities you are looking for; are your firms 'open for business'

This interview was conducted via Zoom during social distancing, so please excuse the audio quality, background noise, and other glitches.