BY JULIANA LIGHTSEY ’26

Rice is rebelling against the traditional role of an academic institution, according to Paul Cherukuri, vice president for innovation. New methods of developing research into full-fledged products ready to help patients — and help them faster than ever before — are situating the university at the forefront of the biotechnology industry.

Rice’s Biotech Launch Pad was introduced in September 2023 as an accelerator designed to help guide Rice researchers through the complicated processes of funding health and medical technological breakthroughs, performing clinical trials and, finally, creating full-fledged companies based around their products. According to Cherukuri, who is also a member of the Biotech Launch Pad’s advisory council, this has positioned Rice to be a leader in the increasingly important biotech field.

“The Biotech Launch Pad was created to de-risk the development of technology that was invented at Rice, to get it to a stage so that it could get launched into the real world,” Cherukuri said.

The accelerator, which is headed by Omid Veiseh, a professor of bioengineering, and Paul Wotton was made possible through funding from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) and Rice.

Although the initial launch of the accelerator focused more on the academic aspects of facilitating biotechnology innovation and development, the Biotech Launch Pad has since branched out: Late last year, it established RBL LLC, a venture creation studio located in the Texas Medical Center’s new Helix Park (see “Rebel With a Cause,” Page 31). RBL is designed to create companies out of the technologies developed through the Biotech Launch Pad, uniquely solving some of the problems that can accompany the innovation process.

“There are multiple choke points that stop innovation from coming out of a university. One of them is that the technology’s not ready; that’s why we created the Rice Biotech Launch Pad,” Cherukuri said. “The other one is that it’s not commercially viable, and that’s why we’re creating RBL LLC.”

Ten years from now, I think people will say, ‘Why didn’t we think of that?’ We broke the mold and we helped people faster than ever thought possible. I think that’s what we’re going to be known for.

— Paul Cherukuri

Through RBL, biomedical technology developed at Rice can branch out into multiple companies for practical use in the medical field, bridging the gap between scientific discovery and the commercial realm.

“That’s why RBL needs to be created,” Cherukuri said. “Because after you have the patent, the patent doesn’t mean anything until you put it into a company that can then have a CEO as well as a scientist working together to develop the product.”

According to Cherukuri, the speed at which the Biotech Launch Pad and RBL LLC facilitate technological development and successful biotechnology startups is what makes the Rice-based initiatives stand out.

“Investors are looking at this going, ‘This is something different, this is not traditional academia,’ and that’s why I like the name RBL,” he said. “We’re rebelling against tradition.”

Compared to a more hands-off approach taken by most universities after the research and development stages of technology, Rice sets itself apart through its involvement in the rapid creation of companies and facilitation of investment in the products of such deep tech.

“The target is two to three companies every year from RBL. So within the first year, we’re going to be in the top tier of universities that are creating companies,” Cherukuri said.

Starting a company that survives is extremely hard, he said. “And our companies, I think, will be known as something you can bank on, you can depend on. That’s the Rice brand.”

One example of cutting-edge technology coming out of the Biotech Launchpad is Rx On-site Generation Using Electronics (ROGUE), an implantable device that contains cells that can produce the drugs needed to remedy Type 2 diabetes or obesity within a patient’s body (see “Living Pharmacy,” Page 32). The technology was developed in the lab of Veiseh, who also serves as faculty director of the Biotech Launch Pad.

Another unique aspect of the Biotech Launch Pad is its ability to convene a vast variety of individuals involved in each step of a technology’s development, ensuring a quality product for patients. The accelerator connects researchers, clinicians, developers and investors to guarantee every step of the process is conducted in the best way possible.

“One of the things about the Biotech Launch Pad is that it is driven by a clinical need, directly informed by practicing physicians in the Texas Medical Center,” Cherukuri said.

“They tell you, ‘I know my patients over here would benefit from it.’ So our faculty and students invent the technology that patients need. Those same clinicians get to speak to the engineers who are developing it, so that the technology gets developed to a stage where you overcome all the issues to make it rock solid.”

Cherukuri said these interdisciplinary connections are vital to the success of biotechnology innovations.

“In order to make something, you have to be able to reproduce it a thousand times, without error. That’s where clinicians come in, to help you do that,” Cherukuri said. “The business side of it is really driving the financial sustenance of that company. You put those two together, and then you get a bona fide company that takes off.”

Thanks to the deep levels of collaboration through the Biotech Launch Pad, Cherukuri said the researchers themselves will have ample opportunities for involvement and oversight as their technology is transformed into a commercially viable product.

“Many times, the students at Rice who invented the technology want to be a part of the company,” Cherukuri said. “So they take it all the way through to development, and I think that’s the wonderful thing about it. You’re now getting students to think bigger than just the invention.”

Cherukuri noted that a fundamental distinction of the university’s new initiatives are the ways in which they promote creativity and entrepreneurship — values that Rice emphasizes at all levels of education and research.

“Rice doesn’t just teach students who will then go get a job in the real world, we train students to create their own job,” Cherukuri said. “That’s essentially what we’re doing at the Biotech Launch Pad and across our university.”

When he considers the future of the Biotech Launch Pad and RBL LLC, Cherukuri said that the ventures are setting up both Rice and Houston to be on the front lines of biotechnology research and commercialization.

“Ten years from now, I think people will say, ‘Why didn’t we think of that before?’” Cherukuri said. “With RBL, we broke the mold, and the world will see that we have helped treat people with better therapies faster than ever thought possible. I think that’s what we’re going to be known for.”