Failures are common in the world of drug discovery where a tiny minority of early-stage research ends up as a commercialized drug. Contending with failure such that they become fountainheads of wisdom and not sources of demoralization is the far better approach should you envision a career in the field.
That’s the perspective of Ho Cho, senior vice president of Biodiscovery Therapeutics at biopharma company Bristol Myers Squibb. In a podcast episode, sponsored by the company, Ho told MedCity’s editor-in-chief, Arundhati Parmar that looking for lessons in failure is the method he employed after experiencing a particularly stinging defeat.
While losses are hard to stomach, experiencing failure inevitably helps one appreciate success even more. One such success came recently for Cho and Bristol Myers Squibb. In February, the company announced a licensing agreement with Rockefeller University by which it would commercialize the research from the institution to create a new monoclonal antibody treatment of the Sars-CoV2 virus that causes Covid-19. The speed by which this occurred is unprecedented especially given the fact that Cho worked with the lead scientist from the Rockefeller University entirely over Zoom.
Listen to the podcast below to learn of new drugs Bristol Myers Squibb is developing, advances in treatments for diseases like multiple myeloma and how the world of archery and discovery are analogous.
