How do you combine grants and VC to fund a medical device?

Jason Kirby (00:02.002) Hey everyone, welcome back to the show. Your host, Jason Kirby, here with Fundraising Demystified. And today we have Mustafa joining us, co-founder and CEO of Aztec Diagnostics. Welcome to the show. Mustafa Al-Adhami (00:14.71) Thank you, thank you for having me. Jason Kirby (00:16.354) I'm excited to have you on the show, excited to learn more about Astek, but let's just go ahead and have you tell a little bit of background on what Astek Diagnostics is and how you conceptualized the idea for the business. Mustafa Al-Adhami (00:27.934) Yeah, so we have developed a rapid antibiotic sensitivity test. So every time you go to a doctor and you get an antibiotic, it's a guess. Physicians are guessing that you have a bacterial infection, and they're guessing that the specific antibiotic will actually work. A couple of years ago, my grandfather kind of went delirious overnight, and we had no idea what was going on. It was later discovered that he had a UTI. and it took doctors four days to determine what antibiotics to give him. In the meantime he had fallen broken his hip, he had no idea who anyone was and that really changed his life forever. So that day I thought you know I had this idea might as well try to make it happen if anything it's for my own grandfather and that's why our product is called the Jiddu, this is what I called my grandfather growing up. Jason Kirby (01:21.203) Yeah, wow, that's quite the personal origin story for solving a very important problem to you and that's impacted you and your family. So I guess kind of walk us through like a little bit about your technical or research background that allowed you to be capable of kind of pursuing this field and pursuing a product like this. Mustafa Al-Adhami (01:41.854) Yeah, so I have a PhD in mechanical engineering with a focus on blood hemodynamics. So I studied the sedimentation rate of blood. So I always was close to the biomedical field. And on the side, I was doing this project where we were trying to detect bacteria in water. I'm from Iraq. And in Iraq, we had cholera. So you know. right in the museum, some people are dying of cholera, and I was like, hey, maybe I could help solve that. So we built this device, and by the end, I took it to a friend who worked at the UNHCR, I was like, hey, you know, we can detect cholera in water, and he was like, we have these straws that are called live straws. They filter out bacteria, so even if there's cholera, really, we don't care to know, because they're filtered out. So my whole idea of that kind of went out the window. So I went back and I was doing a PhD at that point, and one thing led to another, and my grandfather got sick, and we pivoted into doing diagnostics. Jason Kirby (02:49.238) Gotcha. And so basically seeing this process, having an idea, didn't work out, pivot to a new solution. At what point did this idea come about and you guys started the process of actually building the product and building the company? Mustafa Al-Adhami (03:05.322) Yeah, so the idea was there and then I decided the second I graduate I need to pursue this full time. So that was May of 2020. So that's when I got the first investment check for Aztec and we decided to, my co-founder and I, we decided that we should just do this full time and focus on it. And one of the biggest things that we accomplished is in the pandemic, in my basement within one year we were able to build a prototype that was actually verified in a clinical setting on blood, even harder than urine. We're doing urine now mostly, but we did it on blood. So that's like, was the biggest, biggest accomplishment. Jason Kirby (03:47.078) Wow. And like, so you set up basically a facility in your lab in your basement is effectively what you guys did to kind of get to this kind of stage. Mustafa Al-Adhami (03:58.682) Well, I wouldn't call it a facility, so a couple of things. So prior to Aztec, I had invented a method to bond acrylic sheets without affecting the specifications of acrylic. So the idea is all you need is alcohol and oven. So in my basement, I have alcohol, check. My wife's kitchen, I have an oven, check. Jason Kirby (04:00.858) Yeah. Mustafa Al-Adhami (04:24.45) The only thing that was missing is because we're doing microfluidics is I needed to engrave on this plastic sheet. So what we ended up doing is, have you seen these engraving pens? They're like for jewelry. So we started with getting these, we buy plastic, we engrave it, put some alcohol on it, you know, just compress it, put it in the oven. And this is how we built our microfluidics. But then on the other hand, Kevin is a software developer, so his life was a little bit easier. So he built the software, I built the hardware, and that's how we got our first prototype. Jason Kirby (05:09.534) Wow. So it sounds like finding the right co-founder was an important part to this. And walk people through the process of, all right, you get a prototype, you have something here, you're raising a little bit of money. How did you get your first outside capital? And how much did you raise? And kind of what was that experience? How did you find those investors? Mustafa Al-Adhami (05:14.027) Absolutely, absolutely. Mustafa Al-Adhami (05:31.274) Yeah, so early on I knew what I was going to do once I graduate. So I spent the last year of graduate school kind of cultivating these relationships. So I tried to present at places and like the business idea, just get to meet people, have some coffee chats because one of the biggest lessons that I learned early on is like investors do not invest in like a point, they like to see a line, see that what you have accomplished if you're sticking with it. So I knew the second I graduated. I was gonna get that check from Tedco here in Maryland. So it was 150K convertible note that we received and we knew that was like, that was our budget to build the prototype. Once it started working, I had already been in contact with Y Combinator. So that became our second check. And we went through IC. Unfortunately, I got very sick through IC, so I was not one of the hot companies coming out of IC, did not raise about 20. But we raised enough to stay alive and that was supplemented with a grant from the NSF to build our second generation prototype that was kind of more consistent and was not made in my basement. Yeah. Jason Kirby (06:55.736) You mentioned something a couple of points that I want to highlight for founders listening is investors don't invest in a point, they invest in a line. And I think that's a very valuable quote there in the sense that they want to see multiple points over a period of time of you progressing and the progress of the product or the business over a period of time. And that requires you to kind of establish those relationships prior to ever needing money. And so it sounds like you worked on that. And then you mentioned with YC, before you applied, you already were in talks with them. Can you kind of elaborate on that? Did you connect with the partners or other members? How did you go about building a relationship to get into YC? Mustafa Al-Adhami (07:34.966) So I actually connected with a bunch of companies that did YC and kind of learned how things are done there. So what I learned was do not overthink the application. That was like the biggest thing I learned. It's like I sat half hour, I wrote the application because it was just exactly my thoughts how I'm like talking to you right now. So just between that and having like knowing who the partners are, who they would be and what they have done before, I kind of like wrote it to them. And that was the strategy. Jason Kirby (08:06.534) Nice, that's good advice. Kind of connecting with the founders that were already in it, that have been through it, and then learning the tricks to kind of tailor your application. So for those that want to get into YC, it's some good tips to listen to. So you get the YC money, YC didn't seem to maybe be the best possible experience, seems like it got sick and other things came up, but you still were able to kind of take the business to the next level. You raised a seed earlier this year. Mustafa Al-Adhami (08:15.541) Exactly. Mustafa Al-Adhami (08:26.626) Yeah. Jason Kirby (08:35.598) So kind of walk us through the fundraising cycle post-YC. Mustafa Al-Adhami (08:40.931) Yeah, so post-YC, it gave us about an eight month runway. And I challenged my team, at that point we were four, I was like, hey, by Christmas, you need to get me clinical data. And I had it like on my office door, I had like a counter, like a countdown to Christmas. And if you're a part of the team, you'd think. You know what this is about. If you're not a part of the team, you think I'm excited for my presence. So by Christmas, we had 36 samples tested. And I was like, all right, this is exactly what we need to show. So what happened was all these people that I had already met before, we had already had these coffee chats. I was like, hey, do you wanna come see our product, like live? So we had... Jason Kirby (09:11.452) Hahaha Mustafa Al-Adhami (09:33.438) all these investors come to the hospital at the University of Maryland Medical Center. It's like, all right, sit down here. Let's chat until we get a patient's sample. Some of them said no. Some of them were very excited about the idea. Some of them brought two physicians with them to make sure we're legit. And once, think about it, you need days to get results for antibiotic sensitivities. By the time we're having a quick chat, the results came. And that was enough to push to get two people through the finish line. Like one of them was like, you know, he kept on having a meeting after meeting after meeting, but it was until he saw how the product was working. It was like, all right, I'm in, right? So to me, and once we got the first couple of checks, things got a lot easier. We had new investors who knew other investors and you know, just kept on, you know, adding. adding on and in the end we had to stop raising because we needed to focus on kind of building our product and making sure we hit milestones. Jason Kirby (10:41.027) How many investors did you nurture or reach out to and try to build those relationships with and how many ended up actually investing in the business? Mustafa Al-Adhami (10:50.186) So that was 36 and for all the people that I was talking to. And in this last round, we had five of them invest and four new investors came on board. Jason Kirby (11:04.826) And were these all individuals? Were they VC funds? What was the makeup of them? Mustafa Al-Adhami (11:08.95) It was a bunch of everything. So we had two VC funds. We had some angels. Yeah, it was two VC funds that had about 750 between the two and then everything else was individuals. So we had this awesome advantage here. Because we're in Maryland, there's something called the Maryland Biotechnology Tax Incentive, whatever, BITC. Every check that we get, the investor gets 33% back as tax credit. So if you're a part of Maryland, you're getting the tax breaks. If you're outside of Maryland, you're actually getting cash. So that helped us a lot, especially in the current economy. Jason Kirby (11:42.054) Mm-hmm. Jason Kirby (11:54.658) So this is something that I'm glad you brought up. And I also want to talk about your grants as well. So, you know, not really in New York or California, like the big, you know, venture markets, but in some of these other markets that have less venture activity, there are these different types of credits that investors get and are incentivized to invest in your companies if you file for them and get the proper applications through and you qualify. It's usually around, you know, research and development or... building out facilities that are going to employ lots of people. There's usually some kind of tax incentive to look for. So if you're outside of California and New York, definitely something worth looking at. So I'm glad you shared that about Maryland. Now, something that also you guys leverage throughout the entire experience, we talked specifically about going out and raising equity, but you also went out and got was about $1.6 million in grant funding. Can you talk to us a little bit about how you identified which grants were available to you acquiring those grants. Mustafa Al-Adhami (12:55.106) Right, so I guess the most basic grant that you get as a startup is the SBIR, the Small Business Grant. So NSF, NIH, DOD, they all have them. So we tapped into those. We got one from the NSF, and that was the very first grant. And then there are so many research grants that if you partner with a hospital or a university, you could also get some of those. So... For example, the Maryland Industrial Partnerships, they had a very nice grant program that we always utilize. This is, I think we received $300,000 from them. The whole project was actually started with a grant from the Maryland Innovation Initiative, where I got some money to provide proof of concept, and this was even before the company formation. So that was another big one. Jason Kirby (13:49.049) Thank you. Mustafa Al-Adhami (13:51.778) As far as the large grants that you see, you have to really fit within the scope of the specific government agency and with BARDA and DARPA and the other big agencies, you have to really fit within their scope. So we have not been able to get those yet. Jason Kirby (14:12.43) And did you guys use any resources? Did you guys do all the grant writing yourself? Did you hire a grant writer? What was that process like? Mustafa Al-Adhami (14:19.394) So there's a part of the grant that you have to write, right? It's your vision, it's your innovation. You have to know exactly what risk you're trying to mitigate with the grant that you're writing. So that part is always ours. The very first grant that we wrote, Kevin and I just put our heads down and wrote that. It took us pretty much full time for a month and a half. And we have a product to build. So we thought it was not the best use of our time. So once we had enough money to hire a grant writer, we would kind of lay everything out, like lay our vision, write what risk, what aims, and they would make it look pretty for the SF or the NIH. Because the language that you use has to be specific, and that was the most time consuming thing. Everything else was pretty easy for us. Jason Kirby (15:16.95) And roughly what did you spend on the grant writer and any kind of grant writing services that you might have used? Mustafa Al-Adhami (15:22.866) Right, so it depends. Some places just take a flat fee. Others would split it into two, which is, you know, like for example, for a phase two, I think we paid, for a phase two SBIR through the NSF, we paid $17,000 and then there's a 5% success fee. But you're talking about a grant that's over 100 pages in total, so it's like a lot of work. For the phase one, it's like 7,000 up front and like, 2500 after you get the grant so it was it was something like that to be honest it sounds like it's a lot but it's totally worth it Jason Kirby (16:01.218) Yeah, you know, it's effectively free equity free money, you know, non dilutive money coming into the business. Um, and it is a lot of work and a lot of businesses don't qualify, but, you know, if you are building something heavy on R and D that could be advantageous to. The population as a whole and, you know, um, or towards the government or, you know, whatever the incentives are into what you are applying a grant, it's, it's something worth exploring for, for a lot of businesses that are developing some real. Mustafa Al-Adhami (16:05.015) Yeah. Jason Kirby (16:30.35) new technology, innovative technology. Appreciate you kind of diving in and sharing that experience. So, you know, kind of tell us where the business is at today. So you've, you went through YC, you raised about 2 million bucks in your seed. You know, what's the process, you know, where are you guys at in the clinical trial process and what are you expecting to happen after? Mustafa Al-Adhami (16:37.363) I'm sorry. Mustafa Al-Adhami (16:56.01) Yeah, so we're still about a year and a half from the market. And we're doing all of these studies right now with different patient populations just to make sure that, you know, because when we say UTI, like we're thinking about like healthy individuals who get a UTI, go to a doctor, you know, get basic antibiotics and drink cranberry juice. But in our case, it's a little bit further, right? You have all of these populations, very specific populations, right? So for example, Pregnant women, women who are postmenopause, these are a little bit, there's already bacteria from the floor that could be in urine. So we needed to address all of these things. And then we discovered another population that was hard. So it's patients with neurogenic disease. So they have no control over the bladder. So they said, the physician that we worked with was like, if you can make it work with this population, it will work everywhere. So I was like, all right, team, this is exactly what we're doing. So we had our first rate with this population and we had accuracy of 95.9, so which is above our target accuracy. So we still need a couple of months to finish this study. Following that, we're just going to do our presub and then run our very official trials and then we get to the market. Mustafa Al-Adhami (18:22.966) I'm not sure I'm allowed to tell you this, but like, we need another raise to get to the market. These things are very, very expensive. Jason Kirby (18:30.342) Well, that's to be expected as a business. Future capital needs can always be a requirement. But when it comes to these clinical trials and what you're going through on this part, how did you know what to go through? Have you done clinical trials before in your research? Do you have advisors that help navigate the process for you? How did you know what to do? Mustafa Al-Adhami (18:50.954) You just have to surround yourself with people who've done it and who are smarter than you. Because especially you're talking about like medical devices. It's like you have to juggle 15 things at the same time. Like you're talking about regulatory, clinical trials, reimbursement. Even like fundraising is different. Grant writing is like weird. It's just so from day one, I made sure I rely on advisors and more experienced individuals. So the company started with me and Kevin kind of like building a product, building a prototype for fun almost. And then slowly, so we hired a chief operating officer, Ted Olson, he has 25, 30 years of experience and he sold his diagnostic company like two years ago. So he's been there, done that. We have, anyway, for everything, it's like there is a person who's experienced, telling us exactly what we have to do. Jason Kirby (19:51.618) And coming from a research PhD background, also, you know, being an immigrant, moving to the U S like, what's it like kind of starting up your first company and like, what are some of the things that kind of punched you in the face that you weren't really expecting? Mustafa Al-Adhami (20:05.63) Yeah, so just a little bit of background. So 10 years ago, I was a refugee. Like, if you had asked me like what my biggest hopes were, probably like, I don't know, like the most basic job in the United States would have been like perfect for me. Just like, like then I came to the US for, you know, do my PhD and then next thing I know is like, when you're a refugee, you think someone will fix it, they will get it done, right? Someone will figure out how to find color on water. But then I was on a PC, I was like, wait, I am they now, I have to find the solution that I was relying on someone else to do it. So, and that was kind of changed how I looked at everything, instead of just getting a job in cruising. I was like, no, I need to find a big problem and I need to focus on it and solve it. I self-identify as a smart guy so might as well work on a big problem. Antibiotic Resistace kind of found me, I did not find it, it's just like for my grandfather I decided to solve it. Jason Kirby (21:21.37) But still, going through the refugee process, which I'm sure is a whole other story, I have some friends that have gone through those experiences. But with coming to the US, it's one thing to kind of solve a problem from a research perspective. But to now build a business, convince investors that this business is worth their money and getting it ready to take it to the main stage and go to market. Mustafa Al-Adhami (21:26.882) Yeah. Mustafa Al-Adhami (21:30.603) Yeah. Jason Kirby (21:49.134) I guess, how'd you feel, self-identified smart person, sure. What did you do to prepare yourself? You surrounded yourself as a smart people, but what were some of the steps that you took to get the company to the point now? Mustafa Al-Adhami (22:03.31) Well, so I made so many mistakes. I was called stupid so many times and it's fine because I learned a lot. Just be curious, ask questions. I don't think people ask enough questions, so that's what I try to do. I put myself in so many uncomfortable situations so I can learn, right? This is kind of a story, but so. First time I present in English, right? It was a conference, downtown Baltimore. I was like, all right, I'm proud of my research, let me go talk about it. I stood there and I pretty much froze. My voice was shaking and it was just terrible. So the next day I went and tried to work on it. So I saw flyers like, hey, PhD students, there's this competition, public speaking competition called the three minute thesis. I was like, hey, I'm gonna do three minute thesis. So I did. Jason Kirby (23:00.622) Thanks for watching! Mustafa Al-Adhami (23:03.782) Did the NBC one? Then somehow I won state Southern states United States and Canada ended up being like I won the whole thing I was like so wait so like, you know, so uncomfortable but in the end I learned how to public speak and With every single situation it just like you keep trying keep going at it Like I mean, of course, I say we you know we had 36 investors that I was working with and then five of them signed up, but I didn't tell you about the 150 meetings that I felt very embarrassed after, or like the meeting at 10pm and I couldn't sleep after because of how bad the meeting went, right? So just put yourself in the situation and see, you know, like what is the worst that could happen? They call you stupid and then what? Jason Kirby (23:35.504) Okay. Jason Kirby (23:51.29) That is some incredible insights and feedback. And I feel a lot of people are afraid of the no or the denials and it's upsetting. And it is. It's like, it doesn't change the fact that it still sucks to be told no or, you know, to have people pass on you. But I think you share some great insights on just put yourself out there and see what opportunities come about. And or it's a practice run. And that was my first company. I had no idea how to raise money. I had a small business that was doing well and gave me a good lifestyle. But when it came to like my next venture of like raising money, no idea. I burned bridges because I didn't know what I was doing. I was like, you know, it's safe things and people look at me weird. And I didn't have the refugees. Yeah, I had no excuse. Yeah, I was just bad. And yeah, but I learned exponentially. Mustafa Al-Adhami (24:27.758) Yeah. Mustafa Al-Adhami (24:34.818) I have that excuse, right? Jason Kirby (24:42.55) from that experience to where I got so grinded down on that experience. And despite that failure, the next company I went to basically raised money for, raised $11 million for, it was a nine day difference. I was like, all right, I had my trial run and now I'm ready for the big leagues. And that's something that I think a lot of founders should take into consideration and not be worried about being perfect. Because especially with investors, you can catch them at a bad day. You can just... Mustafa Al-Adhami (24:47.351) Mm-hmm. Mustafa Al-Adhami (24:58.478) Yeah. Jason Kirby (25:10.062) million things that are outside of your control as a founder that you just should not be concerned about, but you're better off putting yourself out there. Um, so amazing. Mustafa Al-Adhami (25:16.458) Yeah. And by the way, if you speak English, you are already a step ahead of me in this situation. Like, I knew English from M&M and 50 Cent. That English did not fly in the United States when I moved here. Right? So I had to catch up on that as well, which was, you know, by itself, you know, like, not exactly easy. To be comfortable speaking with you right now took me years. Jason Kirby (25:29.264) That doesn't work so much in the VC world. Jason Kirby (25:42.058) Yeah, no, and it's actually incredible. Like, you know, 10 years, especially coming to the US with very middle English in two years, in your twenties, it's extremely difficult. Uh, I'm married to an immigrant who, you know, had struggled for a long time to kind of pick up the pace. You know, now she's great, you know, amazing leader within her own company and everything like that, but it was definitely struggling. She still struggles. They're still definitely like, wait, what do I say in this email here? Yeah. Mustafa Al-Adhami (26:07.446) right, i ask people all the time, it's like, hey, is that the word i want? like, but you have to be okay with it, right? you have to ask uh, yeah Jason Kirby (26:15.758) Yeah, if you don't ask, then you never know. And I think that's a great lesson in life for people to take into consideration, whether they're an immigrant or not. So let's kind of, you know, went off on a little tangent there, but I think it was a good one. I think it was a good story. So kind of going into just the healthcare space as a whole, you know, and there's all kinds of different. Mustafa Al-Adhami (26:18.986) Yeah. Mustafa Al-Adhami (26:24.703) Absolutely. Jason Kirby (26:38.514) you know, verticals within healthcare, there's health tech, there's, but you're, you're really in the meat of it in terms of clinical studies and clinical research. You know, what are some of the things that you're having to deal with in terms of the bureaucracy and the process that, you know, I guess most business, you know, B2B founders or SaaS founders don't necessarily know about. Mustafa Al-Adhami (27:00.862) Absolutely. I mean, you know, there are hurdles, right? Like the people ask you who's going to pay for it, right? It's a huge question in healthcare, so much harder than, you know, talking about SAS and all that, right? So that's one big hurdle. Like reimbursement is not easy. Of course, going through the FDA is not easy. You have to say the right thing at the right time and you have to, you know, get the professionals really involved and early on. But having said that, we understand that we're building a medical device. We understand that it's people's lives that are, you know, like... So when I go to a hospital and they run a test on me, I trust that someone vetted this test and this test is legit. And as a founder, I'm on the other side, and I understand why everything is done, is to give the patients this peace of mind. And it's because of this process. It's a crazy process. Don't get me wrong, right? Instead of going to the market in two months, we're going to market in two years. But, you know, in the end it's worth it. It's definitely worth it. It's an awesome process. We're enjoying it. We're 100% enjoying it. Jason Kirby (28:18.886) I think you're the first person that's ever talked about the FDA process as an awesome process. I think it's necessary and it saves lives because we do it. But most founders struggle with it and hate the process, but they have to abide by it. But that's an interesting outlook. Mustafa Al-Adhami (28:36.83) I have seen the alternative. I have seen where like anyone could sell anything with no regulations and that is terrible, right? You get sick, you go to the hospital, you have to trust them. And that's because of these hurdles or at least for part of it, but yeah. Jason Kirby (28:55.734) No, that's valid. And, you know, when it comes from an investor profile, like when they look at these types of deals, you know, they typically, you know, two potential, well, three potential outcomes. One, crash and burn, you don't get through clinical trials and the tech doesn't work. Or you get through clinical and either go to market yourself and you raise a substantial amount of money to do so and build out that team to get it to market or you basically sell to a much larger, you know, organization that has the distribution already. Mustafa Al-Adhami (29:08.471) Yeah. Jason Kirby (29:24.922) kind of what do you see your future holding for Aztec? Mustafa Al-Adhami (29:30.85) It seems like acquisition is the most plausible option for us. But as I tell my team always, when people ask this, like, especially internalized, like, all we can do is build a great company and then, you know, companies are bought and not sold. Right? But just because of what we're building and what it would take to have these distribution sales channels, acquisition makes the most sense. So we have set a couple of critical milestones that once we hit these milestones, the conversations with these acquirers will resume. And just like with investors, we get coffee with the strategics to make sure that. they know what's going on and when we are expecting to get the specific milestones that they would think about acquiring us or even honestly just build our product for us at scale or distribution or sales because we could do that as well. Jason Kirby (30:36.302) Gotcha. When it came to choosing your investors, what did you look for? You met with a lot, 150 meetings that didn't go so well, and then 36 that went better, and then five that ultimately came in. How did you end up picking your investors? Was it the only ones that were interested? Was it you had more and then you were choosing? What was that experience like for you? Mustafa Al-Adhami (30:56.674) Well, the investors have to understand that this is very risky, that we're building something that was not possible before. It is really hard to do what we do. They have to understand that the process takes longer than cybersecurity or SaaS or anything like that. And they have to believe in the problem we're solving, because in the end, you have to think about the impact as a part of the... the investment. Now luckily the our market is huge considering that even though we're starting UTI it's like every single infection that could happen in the body and that takes you into like the trillion dollar market size so we do not have that issue but I know from many biotech and biotech entrepreneurs like their markets are not that big so when you go get an investor the investor has to understand the problem and they have to believe in the impact that the solution will provide. Jason Kirby (31:39.834) Thanks for watching! Jason Kirby (31:56.766) Then, are they bringing advice to the table? Are they bringing connections to the table? What additional value adds were you hoping for and ended up receiving from your investors? Mustafa Al-Adhami (32:05.686) You know with investors, the more you ask, the more you get. There's so many investors like, you know, here's money, I'm gonna stay out of your way, feed anything, let me know. I let them know. Like, hey, I'm looking for a new regulatory consultant. I need a million dollars very quickly. I need whatever. And they always like provide help. You just have to ask. Some of them, of course, ghost me, but others really like work hard with us and they are part of the team. Jason Kirby (32:37.458) Well, that's something important I'm going to mention. There are still some out there that don't bother or don't help, but there are always the ones that come in the investment with the expectation to add value because that's going to protect their investment. I think a lot of founders are scared to be honest with their investors out of fear of failure or whatever kind of judgment might be passed on them, but really, if you're not asking for help, you're not maximizing that person's investment and their expertise. Mustafa Al-Adhami (33:07.454) Absolutely, absolutely. And by the way, when you're clear with the investors with the problems that you're facing, they're gonna help you fix it. They will. I mean, these are smart people, right? You don't just become an investor. You must have done something, right? Jason Kirby (33:23.104) And how big is your team now? Seven. Mustafa Al-Adhami (33:24.682) We're seven. Seven full timers, 15 total. Yeah. Jason Kirby (33:31.642) Okay, so still relatively small team still. No, that's good. And then as we kind of share your amazing story from kind of refugee PhD to now venture backed, health tech or healthcare company, or I guess probably more diagnostic test company. Mustafa Al-Adhami (33:34.062) It's a very small team, very small team, yeah. Jason Kirby (33:54.934) What's your advice to founders out there that are looking at the health care market and considering building a company or already have built a company and how to navigate the waters? Mustafa Al-Adhami (34:06.418) Honestly, the biggest thing is ask for advice, but make sure you're the decision maker. You're the closest one to the company, to the problem. So just believe in yourself, but ask for advice. And you have to really believe in your solution because it's really not easy. You have to really believe in what you're building. Otherwise, you're going to struggle. Jason Kirby (34:34.555) It's true. Yeah, and it's also hard to convince people something that you don't fully believe in. And that's across the board. It doesn't matter health care, but you know, it doesn't matter what type of business. If the founder themselves has a hard time communicating that they are fully bought in, you know, to the opportunity, then how are they going to recruit? How are they going to raise capital? And that's one of the biggest filters for VCs. They sniff that stuff out almost immediately. Mustafa Al-Adhami (34:39.499) Absolutely, absolutely. Jason Kirby (35:01.354) If they sense hesitation or lack of commitment or fear, it just shows so obviously in conversation that it usually is a huge deterrent. Or if you're trying to convince yourself as a founder in the middle of a pitch, it's usually pretty obvious. Like, yeah, no, yeah, we're cool. Yeah, we're awesome. And we're gonna make this happen. But really great to have you on the show. Mustafa Al-Adhami (35:01.466) Yeah. Mustafa Al-Adhami (35:19.074) I'm sorry. Jason Kirby (35:29.806) What would you say is the best way to either get a hold of you or follow what you're doing at Aztec Diagnostics? Mustafa Al-Adhami (35:36.002) So I'm pretty active on LinkedIn, so Mustafa allowed me that he could find me there. I try to respond to any messages there that are not trying to sell me something I don't need. And I also have Twitter, but like I have 15 followers, so I don't post there at all. But yeah, LinkedIn is good. Our website is astechdx.com. Jason Kirby (35:56.082) Yeah. Not exactly. Ha ha. Mustafa Al-Adhami (36:03.502) If you reach out, it comes directly to the founders. So we read every single message that we get for collaboration. Otherwise, the world is open. Jason Kirby (36:15.207) Awesome. Well, Mustafa, I really appreciate you being on the show today. You know, I'm excited to get this out to our listeners and, you know, can't wait to share this with the world. Mustafa Al-Adhami (36:24.575) Alright man, thank you. Jason Kirby (36:28.198) Perfect.