Complexity is the attraction: Steve Harr on the pull of cell and gene therapy

Cell therapy and gene therapy aren’t distinct opportunities in Steve Harr’s eyes. Rather, the platform he is building as president and CEO of Sana is one that combines the two, and capitalizes on the collective knowledge and experience of the Juno graduates who found themselves wanting to do more, after the company’s acquisition by Celgene.

On The BioCentury Show, Harr discussed his view of how the cell and gene therapy field is evolving, and both the technical and talent challenges that will be required to drive success at scale.

Harr launched  Sana Biotechnology Inc. (NASDAQ:SANA) together with Chairman Hans Bishop in January 2019, with ambitious goals to fix any cell in the body that’s been damaged, replace any cell that’s too far damaged, and have “access never determined by where a patient is born,” he said.

The company has made a splash, announcing $700 million in venture financing in 2020, and going public a year later with one of the biggest IPOs in biotech history, raising $675.6 million.

Bishop had been president and CEO of Juno Therapeutics Inc. and Harr CFO and head of corporate development, leading the deal with Celgene Corp. that closed in March 2018. Celgene was acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb Co. (NYSE:BMY) in November 2019.

Harr said that after the acquisition, many of the Juno team felt there was unfinished business, not having gotten drugs across the finish line, and there was momentum to work together again. He said the complexity of the goal was the attraction, but it was not simple to work out the best operating model.

“If there’s ever a book written on Sana, Chapter One will be about the decision we made out of the gate, which was to start the company to build our capabilities more or less at equal size and scale across three different cities: Seattle, San Francisco, and Cambridge.” 

That allowed them to tap into different talent pools, but also added further challenges in what is already a complex area. “History will be the judge,” as to whether it was a good decision or not, said Harr.