Microsoft, Portal and Ragon Institute Team Up to Build AI-Powered Map of Immune System
Microsoft, Portal and Ragon Institute Team Up to Build AI-Powered Map of Immune System
Boba & Biotech is a candid podcast hosted by Portal Bio founder Armon Sharei, exploring the real challenges of drug development through conversations with scientists, entrepreneurs, and investors who are working to improve human health. Drawing from his own journey of raising $400M, going public, getting ousted from his first company, and starting over, Armon brings firsthand insight into the science, money, and corporate politics that shape the biotech industry.
In this episode of Boba & Biotech, I grab a delicious mango-coconut sago with Ileana Pirozzi, a former biotech investor who’s stepping off the venture sidelines and into the founder seat. From growing up in Italy to studying biomedical engineering at Stanford and working at NASA, Ileana shares how venture capital became a crash course in scientific rigor and why it ultimately felt too distant from real impact. The conversation pulls back the curtain on how VC decisions actually get made: why “no” is so hard to say, how fund dynamics and internal politics shape outcomes, and why most firms prefer to follow rather than lead. They dig into what VCs often miss when judging founders, debate generalist versus specialist investors, and call out overrated and underrated trends. The episode closes with a look at what could truly unlock the next wave of clinical impact: rethinking how clinical trials are designed and run.
Ileana Pirozzi is the Head of Healthcare Ventures at Lingotto Innovation in New York City, where she leads early-stage investments in technologies at the intersection of healthcare, life sciences, and frontier engineering. Her work focuses on identifying and backing the next generation of companies redefining diagnoses, treatment and delivery of care. Ileana holds a PhD in Bioengineering and Medical Engineering from Stanford University and a BSc from Brown University.
Links
Armon’s LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/armonsharei/
Ileana’s LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ileanapirozzi/
Lingotto Innovation: https://www.lingotto.com/
Credits
Hosted by Armon Sharei, PhD
Research by Julie Kim, MBA
Produced by Arielle Nisseblatt of Pinwheel, Shirley Mao, rvnway.com
Edited and mixed by David Woje of Pinwheel
In this episode of Boba & Biotech, I go for a tasty brown sugar milk tea with Martin Madaus, former CEO of one of the biggest technology providers in our field, Millipore, for a wide-ranging conversation on what actually creates value in life sciences.
Martin traces his unconventional path from veterinary medicine to global leadership roles across pharma, diagnostics, and life science tools, and shares hard-earned perspective on platform businesses versus therapeutics, why tool companies often struggle with adoption, and when M&A truly makes sense. He pushes back on the idea that therapeutics are intellectually “superior” to tools and highlights underappreciated technologies like MRD testing and spatial proteomics. Martin also makes a forceful case for moving beyond animal testing in favor of organ-on-chip models. The episode closes with a look at where real clinical impact may come next - from cell therapies to emerging innovation out of China.
Martin Madaus is a seasoned public-company CEO, who has led and advised diagnostics and life science tools companies for decades, including serving as Chairman and CEO of Ortho Clinical Diagnostics and as President, Chairman, and CEO of Millipore Corporation, which he led through its $7.2 billion sale to Merck KGaA. Earlier in his career, he was CEO of Roche Diagnostics North America. Dr. Madaus holds a DVM from the University of Munich and a Ph.D. from the Veterinary University of Hannover.
Links
Armon’s LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/armonsharei/
Martin’s LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/martin-madaus-3baaa728/
Credits
Hosted by Armon Sharei, PhD
Research by Julie Kim, MBA
Produced by Arielle Nissenblatt of Pinwheel, Carolyn Corbet of Portal
Edited and mixed by David Woje of Pinwheel
In the pilot episode of Boba & Biotech, I try out a homemade milk tea with my long time friend and colleague, Shirley Mao. The goal of this episode is to invite listeners into my world - inside and outside of work - and to share the vision behind this brand-new podcast. It's also the fastest way to figure out if I’m boring or insufferable :)
From an early interest in math and science, to Stanford, MIT, and the leap from academia into entrepreneurship, the conversation traces what it really takes to turn discovery into real-world impact. We unpack the highs and lows of founding the first company, SQZ Biotech - from early scientific validation and a pivotal Roche partnership to hard-earned leadership lessons along the way.
We also chat about why biotech’s public image misses the mark, how jaded leadership can emerge, and why human clinical translation, not discovery, is the hardest and most important part of the journey.
Biotech has a PR problem. It's messy, complex, and hard to understand from the outside looking in. That's why I'm starting Boba & Biotech.
I’m Armon Sharei. You might know me from my cell cartoons on LinkedIn. I was born in California, grew up in Iran and Dubai, and somehow ended up spending most of my life thinking about cells.
In this intro episode, I'll lay out my career - how I got to where I am today. Hint: I’m a chemical engineer by training and during my PhD, my colleagues and I accidentally discovered something that led to my first company: SQZ Biotech SQZ went on to operate for ten years. We raised about $400 million, partnered with Roche, went public in 2020, and tried to create a new class of cancer therapies.
Now, I'm the founder and CEO of Portal - a next-gen version of what SQZ had started. Today, we have over 100 customers, a growing team, and support from DARPA to democratize access to next gen cell therapies.
I also proudly sustain a near daily boba habit.
I ALSO believe strongly that if you make a difference through science, that difference is irreversible. No one can ever take back a cure to a disease. And that’s why this podcast exists.
Boba & Biotech is about giving biotech a real face. It’s about scientists, founders, investors, pharma leaders, and the people in between - talking without the sanitized bullshit about how this industry actually works. We’ll talk about science, clinical trials, finance, and all the other ingredients that go into making a drug.
More info:
About me
About Portal