T1D Cure Bait: Sernova CEO, Jonathan Rigby, Says It's Not Being Kept from You

Ginger Vieira (0:00)

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Welcome to the Diabetes Nerd Podcast. I am your host, Ginger Vieira. I've lived with Type 1 Diabetes for about 27 years, and my guest today is not only deeply invested in developing a functional cure for Type 1 Diabetes, he also lives with it. Please welcome Jonathan Rigby, the CEO of Sernova. Hello, Jonathan.

Jonathan Rigby (1:06)

Hello, Ginger. Thank you for having me on. Thank you for the introduction.

Ginger Vieira (1:09)

How many years have you lived with Type 1?

Jonathan Rigby (1:11)

Too many. Well, over four decades, put it that way, Ginger. So the vast majority of my life, I've been living, breathing and battling this condition every single day.

Ginger Vieira (1:28)

Yeah. Just because you have the brain of a biotech CEO, doesn't mean managing Type 1 is really any easier.

Jonathan Rigby (1:36)

That is very true. It's not any easier. You as a T1D and all of your folks listening, this is a, it never abates. You know it and it's very interesting. I think there's a big misconception in the world. People hear Type 1 diabetes, they hear diabetes, they hear Type 2 I don't think most people really understand the difference, but there are differences and both conditions need to be fixed.

An interesting story, I speak to investors almost daily.

And a few weeks ago, I spoke to a wonderful young man, his prime 26 years old. I graduated from a prestigious university and he said to me, Jonathan, why are you working on Type 1 diabetes? Why are you wasting your time? The problem is fixed. We have insulin, you have a continuous glucose meter and you have an insulin pump.

The problem has been solved. Oh, the great technology. Why are you committing your life to doing something different with cell therapy? And the answer is quite simple. It's not being fixed. It's nowhere near, nowhere near fixed. And we have a lot of work to do here and we at Sernova and with our partners for Axis, we will become beta nova. And we're trying to put this disease in the rearview mirror.

Ginger Vieira (3:11)

I think I just want to touch on this, that I think a lot of people in the type 1 diabetes community don't realize how much companies like yours, you start out as this small little team and you have to go fight for money from investors and you need millions of dollars to develop these therapies, even just develop enough to get close to a clinical trial, let alone actually then launch a clinical trial. Can you talk a little bit about that whole challenge in that whole world of raising that money?

Jonathan Rigby (3:44)

I can, Ginger. It's a big question.

I've been raising money for decades and it's always difficult. But the only way you can do it is if you can elucidate that there's a problem, and it's a problem that needs to fix. With Type 1 Diabetes, people who understand the disease or know somebody with T1D, they relate to it much quicker, that kind of investor. But people are dying from this condition every single day.

People say, my Auntie Joan died of kidney failure. They don't say Auntie Joan died of kidney failure because of her Type 1 Diabetes. They say, my neighbor Jim, he's blind. They don't say Jim is blind because of his Type 1 Diabetes. The list goes on. And it's something that I've been fighting for a long time. The number of times people have said to me, you can't do that, Jonathan, because you're Type 1 diabetic.

It gets me on my haunches. It makes me stand up and it makes me fight. I've done 11 Iron Man Triathlons with Type 1 Diabetes.

Ginger Vieira (5:06)

Ah, all right. That's not easy.

Jonathan Rigby (5:08)

And raising money is a bit like an Iron Man Triathlon. But we actually, you know, today, just this morning, we raised some capital that went out on the news earlier today. And we have a team that's committed to fixing this. You know, we want today when people say, do you remember Type 1 Diabetes? Remember that when that was a problem?

That's what we're shooting for.