Most biotech gets funded to treat disease after it happens. Nikole Kimes built a company to stop it from happening at all.

Nikole co-founded Siolta Therapeutics with her UCSF postdoc mentor, Susan Lynch, to chase a radical idea: that a defined set of naturally occurring organisms could reprogram an infant's immune system toward tolerance instead of allergic disease. She started as VP of R&D, then became Chief Scientific Officer, and only took the CEO title once it was obvious she'd already been doing the job: Steering a brand-new kind of live biotherapeutic through the FDA and into the hardest population to study: newborns.

In this conversation we talk about:

 * Why she never planned to become a CEO, and evolved into the role instead of choosing it
 * The gut microbiome science behind preventing allergic disease before it ever starts
 * Why dosing newborns with a novel live drug was seen as a dead end and how Siolta found a path through
 * The fork in the road between building a probiotic food product and a regulated drug
 * Why prevention is so much harder to fund than treatment, and how Siolta found investors willing to play the long game
 * How the Bay Area biotech incubator community shaped building a company in a field that didn't exist yet

If you enjoyed this conversation, subscribe for more honest conversations with founders, builders, and operators about what it really takes to build something worthwhile.

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Connect with Nikole:

 * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikole-kimes-4b357786/
 * Siolta Therapeutics: https://www.sioltatherapeutics.com/

E4 - Preventing Disease Before It Starts | Nikole Kimes (Siolta Therapeutics)

Most founders think building the technology is the hard part. Dr. Chinmoy Hazarika learned that building something the world has never seen requires much more than great engineering.

After years as a practicing dentist, Chinmoy left clinical practice to found GentleDental.ai, a company building an AI-powered toothbrush designed to detect oral and systemic health issues while fitting seamlessly into people's daily routines.

In this conversation we talk about:

• How to build something that doesn't exist yet
• Knowing when to pivot—and when to trust your vision
• Why building in public attracts mentors and investors
• Finding believers instead of just hiring employees


If you enjoyed this conversation, subscribe for more honest conversations with founders, builders, and operators about what it really takes to build something worthwhile.

Get future episodes, insights, and lessons from people who chose to build anyway:

https://goodbuildanyway.substack.com/

Connect with Dr. Chinmoy:
• GentleDental : https://gentledental.ai/
• LinkedIn : https://www.linkedin.com/in/drchazarika/

E3 - Why You Should Build in Public | Dr. Chinmoy Hazarika (GentleDental.ai)

Most founders think building the product is the hard part, Ben Spak learned the something else.

After years as a developer, founder, and Air Force veteran, Ben has launched multiple startups, killed products that seemed promising, pivoted more times than he can count, and discovered that the biggest challenge is finding customers.

In this conversation we talk about:

 * Why technical founders often avoid sales
 * Knowing when to pivot—and when to keep going
 * Building communities instead of products
 * Why most startup ideas fail to find product-market fit
 * The emotional side of building something from nothing
 * What Ben is building with Builders.to

If you enjoyed this conversation, subscribe for more honest conversations with founders, builders, and operators about what it really takes to build something worthwhile.

Get future episodes, insights, and lessons from people who chose to build anyway:

https://goodbuildanyway.substack.com/

Connect with Ben:
• Builders.to: https://builders.to [https://builders.to/]
• X: https://x.com/BuildersXOff



E2 - When to Pivot and When to Keep Going | Ben Spak (Builders.to)

Dr. Rajalakshmi is helping build Path-iQ, a platform designed to modernize pathology workflows, improve collaboration between labs and specialists, and bring cancer diagnostics into a more connected digital future.

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E1 - Building the Future of Pathology | Dr. Rajalakshmi (Path-iQ)

A short introduction into what the show is about and why I'm doing it.



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E0 - Intro

Good. Build Anyway. is a show about building because of the hard parts.  I talk to founders, builders, and operators about what building  actually looks like from the inside: the resistance, the wrong turns,  the moments when quitting made more sense than continuing.

The premise  is simple: conditions are never good. Yet every company, product and  project exists because someone chose to build anyway. 

This is how they  did it.

If you enjoy the show, subscribe to get episode notes, transcripts, and updates delivered straight to your inbox.

https://goodbuildanyway.substack.com/

Torbjørn Thomsen

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