Will Bruey and Delian Asparouhouv, co-founders of Varda Space Industries, sit down with Yahoo Finance senior reporter Akiko Fujita to gain insight into the benefits of pharmaceutical research in microgravity.
Bruey outlines how microgravity works and how the company is using it here on Earth: “It’s ubiquitous, and it’s impossible to create it on Earth forever. And so we’re essentially building space production modules because we can change the outcome of chemical systems like no one else on Earth can.”
“In 2019, Merck (MRK) published a particularly interesting result, where they took their blockbuster monoclonal antibody, Keytruda, and it brings them $25 billion in revenue every year, financial analysts estimate it represents about $125 billion of their market cap,” Asparouhouv explains, adding:
“They were able to show that… when you turn off gravity, the chemical system changes, and it changes in a very unexpected way. And the result of that change was that they actually… found a version of the drug in space that, instead of having to be administered through an IV the way it is now, where you have to go in every two weeks for a four- or six-hour appointment… Instead, they could just send you home with a syringe that you could take in the safety and comfort of your own home.”
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This post was written by Nicholas Jacobino
Video transcript
There are definitely a few different categories within the aerospace industry.
We focus primarily on the production of space products for use here on Earth.
That means you basically take raw material from here on Earth, manufacture it, basically modify it in the unique microgravity environment of space, and then bring it back here on Earth for use. We believe that’s basically the largest and closest application to the commercial market.
There is definitely another category within space manufacturing. It is similar to producing products in space for use in space. However, there are not as many buyers or customers in space.
Most people who buy something are here on Earth.
And so we focus more on that kind of former, former category.
What makes micro-microgravity so suitable for pharmaceuticals?
Yes.
So microgravity affects the outcome of chemical systems.
So that’s the fundamental thing we need to understand, just as temperature can affect the outcome of chemical systems.
So microgravity is free in space, it is ubiquitous, and it is impossible to create it on Earth forever.
So we’re essentially building space production modules because we can outperform or change the output of chemical systems like no one else on Earth can.
And good.
Which chemical system should we change then?
First?
Pharmaceuticals is the clear answer, both from the aspirational aspect of what is best for humanity and from the perspective of dollars per kilogram. It is a large market and the most expensive chemical systems per unit mass.
And we are not the first to think about this.
People have been talking about pharmaceutical production in space for 50 years. The current national department of Bill Nelson did this in the early 80s. The top 20 BioPharma has also done these kinds of small-scale experiments on the International Space Station, led by Merck Eli Lilly Janson and Janson Bristol Myers Squibb.
And in 2019, MER published a particularly interesting result, showing that their blockbuster monoclonal antibody Kru was only generating $25 billion a year in revenue.
Financial analysts estimate it represents about $125 billion of their market capitalization.
They were able to show that when you turn off gravity, the chemical system changes. They changed it in a very unexpected way.
And the result of that change was that they actually found a drug, a version of the drug in space that no longer has to be administered in the current way, through an IV where you have to go every two weeks for a four- or six-hour appointment.
It is extremely disruptive.
Instead, they can simply send you home with a syringe, which you can then take in the safety and comfort of your own home.
And so it’s a huge benefit for the patients.
Obviously it’s a huge boon for Merck, as they now have an improved performance enhancing drug that extends their patent period.
But ultimately, the International Space Station wasn’t the place where they could do this on a commercial scale, you know, low budget, high pace.
The thesis behind Varta was that SpaceX had created reusable rockets and that access to space was therefore very cost-effective.
But we had to provide them with a platform that was also cost-effective.
They had no people on board, were autonomous and could do all that pharmaceutical work.
And so we partner with the top 20 mid-stage biopharmaceutical companies in their biotechnology to help them achieve results like Merck achieved in 2019.
Simply put, for those who aren’t as familiar with it, when you talk about crystallization, what exactly is it about microgravity that makes it so well suited for that process?
And when we use the word crystal, we actually just mean a powder, like you see in a pill.
The reason it is called a crystal is that the technical term ensures that the way the molecules are arranged determines the macroscopic properties of the drug.
An example of this is the comparison between a graphite pencil and a diamond pencil.
They are both carbon atoms, but they are arranged in a different way.
This setup determines the difference between the hardness of the diamond and the softness of your pencil.
And for our pharmaceutical companies, things like solubility are important.
How quickly does this dissolve in the bloodstream?
So that is a macroscopic property that depends on the way the atoms are arranged, or in technical terms: the crystallization of the product.
In microgravity there are fewer disturbances from the crystallization process.
It does.
And so you see that these crystals are formed in suspension instead of sinking, which creates turbulence, sedimentation, buoyancy. All of those effects disappear in microgravity, and because of that you can create different atomic structures and therefore different macroscopic properties.
So he gave a nice example of the transition from an IV bag to an injection.
Another way would be to replace a pill with an inhalable, because you can make the particle size distribution narrower.
So we don’t necessarily invent medicines.
What happens is that a pharmaceutical company comes to us with a molecule and we say, hey, we can convert that molecule into a better version of the drug using microgravity, in the same way that another pharmaceutical formulation provider might say, we have a special technique that can also change the formula, like a special ingredient or something.
So our business model is not new because there are numerous companies that are engaged in drug formulation and they are working with the top 20 biotechnology companies in the pharmaceutical sector to formulate drugs.
We are just one being with one button, gravity, that no one else has.