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Educating the Next Generation of Life Sciences Executives, Investors & Financiers

Oxford Biotech Investment Club Introduction

June 2026

Holywell Street

Oxford OX1 3BN

Yushi.li@new.ox.ac.uk

https://oxfordbiotech.uk/

Address

2025-2026

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1. Aims

Create a forum to discuss investment strategies for publicly listed small- and mid-cap biopharma and medical device companies.

Help students with life sciences or finance backgrounds become well-rounded life sciences investors, focused initially on public markets.

Build skills in asset allocation, portfolio management, biotech due diligence, clinical trial assessment, and deal judgment around licensing and M&A.

This is not a standard student society format – the aim is to build a strong, vibrant, engaging community where all members actively contribute.

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2. Plan (Establishment Phase)

Plan for Cycle 1/Cohort 0 (June 2026 – June 2027):

Phase 1 – 20 member-led study sessions, followed by pub trips.

Phase 2 – alternating talk/site visits (12 sessions) + Dinners and member-led company pitches + pub trips (12 sessions)

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2.1 Plan (Mature Phase)

Plan for future cycles:

Study sessions

Odd weeks: study-led discussion around the curriculum. Prep expected before each session.

Company pitch

Even weeks: two members pitch a SMID biotech company, followed by a club vote.

Speaker series

External guests from buy-side, sell-side, VC, pharma, law, and policy.

Dinner + site visits

Dinner after each speaker session, plus at least one site visit per term.

Monthly cadence: two study sessions, one external event, and one company pitch.

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3. Member-led Study Session Curriculum (complete by Michaelmas 2026)

Session 1 — Drug development as a value and risk process

Session 2 — Reading biotech through the financial statements

Session 3 — Biology for investors

Session 4 — Time value, NPV, and decision rules for biotech investing

Session 5 — Translational risk

Session 6 — Forecasting value creation: capital budgeting adapted to biotech

Session 7 — Clinical trial design and statistics (I)

Session 8 — Valuing biotech stocks I: comps, DCF, and pipeline valuation

Session 9 — Clinical trial interpretation (II)

Session 10 — Probability-adjusted valuation and event-driven market behaviour

Session 11 — Safety and risk-benefit

Session 12 — Regulatory decision-making

Session 13 — Building biotech financial models

Session 14 — Commercial positioning and healthcare systems

Session 15 — Cost of capital, WACC, portfolio logic, and risk frameworks

Session 16 — Partnerships, IP, and rapid assessment framework

Session 17 — Equity financing, debt financing, and financing overhang

Session 18 — Collaboration economics, takeout valuation, and biotech M&A

Session 19 — Case Studies

Session 20 — Integrated Investment Framework

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3.1 Key Outcomes

1. Drug development

Where value inflects, where failures happen, and how timelines become catalysts.

2. Biology for investors

Target validity, modality fit, biomarkers, and platform vs asset judgment.

3. Clinical interpretation

Endpoints, powering, subgroup traps, safety, and KOL judgment.

4. Regulatory decision-making

FDA, EMA, approval pathways, AdComs, CRLs, and post-marketing risk.

5. Financial modelling

Cash runway, dilution, rNPV, capital structure, and valuation build-out.

6. Market structure

Competition, payers, positioning, uptake, and strategic value.

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4. Speaker Series (start in the second half of Michaelmas 2026)

Session 1 — “How a Biotech Portfolio Manager Thinks”

Buy-side portfolio manager

Session 2 — “From Science to Stock: The Biotech Analyst’s Job”

Buy-side hedge fund analyst

Session 3 — “Sell-Side Equity Research”

Sell-side analyst (e.g. Rothschild Redburn)

Session 4 — “Sales & Trading”

Healthcare sales specialist (e.g. JP Morgan)

Session 5 — “Biotech Investment Banking: Financing the Innovation Cycle”

Healthcare IB banker

Session 6 — “M&A Banking: How Biotech Deals Actually Happen”

Healthcare IB banker + CEO of a biotech company that went through M&A

Session 7 — “Crossover Investing: Between VC and Public Markets”

Late-stage VC funds (e.g. RA Capital)

Session 8 — “Biotech VC: Company Formation and Early Scientific Risk”

Early-stage VC funds (e.g. Ahren Innovation Capital, F-prime)

Session 9 — “The CEO Perspective: Taking a Biotech from Private to Public”

CEO that has taken a company through to IPO

Session 10 — “The Strategic Buyer: How Pharma Evaluates Biotech Assets”

Pharma BD executive (e.g. Viiv)

Session 11 — “Legal Architecture of Biotech Deals: IPOs, M&A, Licensing, and IP”

Biotech M&A/IPO Lawyer (e.g. Cooley, Bird & Bird)

Session 12 — “Market Access, Pricing, and Policy Risk: The Commercial Reality Check”

Policy thinktank, NICE, MHRA, etc.

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4.1 Key Outcomes

Core goal

Let students speak to experts from public markets, VC, banking, law, company leadership, and policy.

Format

Fireside chat or office visit, followed by dinner and Q&A with members.

Why it matters

Students can compare how different professionals read the same company, data readout, or deal.

Interview companies that the club wishes to long/short.

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5. Establishment Phase – Steering Committee Recruitment

In Cycle 1, the club will have a maximum of 10 members.
Consequently, each member will assume roles in some shape or form on the steering committee.
Each member will maintain observer status until the end of the study session. Successful observers, based on contribution and level of engagement, will assume full member status going into the speaker series.

Structure

Membership Officer

Curate and maintain the membership database in line with the English Law.
Help the Chair in administering the assessment of new members.
Oversee finance and membership fees.
Help with external events.

Honorary Chair

Turn up and be handsome
Help with external events.
Help the Chair to be handsome
Can assume other committee roles at the same time.

President of Oxford University Biotech Society (OUBT)

Turn up and be handsome
Provide OUBT backing
Make sure the club is run in line with the spirit and mission of OUBT
Help with liaison on matters that require the attention of the OUBT President

Chair

Turn up and be handsome.

Events Officer

Venue booking
Choice of food & drinks – establish a menu.
Help with external events.

Liaison Officer – to liaise with the OUBT Committee

Liaise with the OUBT committee, especially regarding marketing of external events
Liaise with other student societies under the supervision of the OUBT committee for external events, if relevant.
Help with external events.
Focus on site visit organisation.

Education Officer

Set the curriculum of the course
Set the agenda for the types of events to be held. Arrange the company pitch rota.
Curate a database of resources for members’ use.
Help with external events.

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5. 1 Expectations

In contrast to most student society events, participating in the Club requires the utmost level of intrinsic motivation and attending the sessions at the Club must be high up your priority list. Study sessions will likely happen on weekends and in the evenings.

It will not be a passive process in which a select group of people drive the club – every member is expected to participate and provide momentum. Anyone who is seen to exert inertia on the aims of the Club will no longer be invited to participate, subject to the decision of the Chair. This could be regularly missing the study group session without prior notice to the education officer, skipping the company pitch when it’s their turn, and not appearing involved in the discussions at external events.

Every member is expected to turn up to all external events (except the site visits) and prepare at least two questions for the speaker. The session is expected to be very interactive, moderated the Chair of the session, which can rotate between steering committee members.

Each member will have observer status for at least 1 full round of events (attended two study sessions, one company pitch and one external event) before being granted full member status. The conversion is reviewed by the steering committee, primarily by the membership officer with approval by the Chair. The steering committee must convene to review any cases where a current member objects to the conversion of an ‘observer status’ member.

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5.2 Application

Application process: Construct a portfolio from the list of 10 names. Identify four companies from the list. Stipulate 3 as longs and 1 as a short. For each, write a few sentences identifying the key insights you think the market is missing as well as the key risks to your thesis. Feel free to use AI tools while doing your research, but recognize that AI-written responses are generally lacking in sophistication.

Example: JBIO (long): In IgAN, both sibeprenlimab and povetacicept have reported lower than expected UPCR numbers (~50%) due to ADAs (sibe) and dose limiting toxicity (pove), leaving an opportunity open for a more efficacious drug. We expect that JADE101 can deliver a >60% reduction in UPCR because (1) in NHPs, JADE101 drives 70% suppression of IgA vs sibe’s 50%; (2) JADE101 has differentiated PK that allows for durable IgA suppression; and (3) is a fully human Ab and targets a novel epitope to avoid the formation of high MW complexes, both of which make it likely that JADE101 will avoid the ADAs seen by sibe. If JADE101 observes a non-differentiated UPCR number (i.e. due to an efficacy ceiling in IgAN or ADAs that affect PK), it will be late-to-market with a profile that is not obviously superior.

List of companies:

SLDB

AVTX

LRMR

SION

ERAS

VIR

CAPR

EWTX

TENX

TNGX

Please apply via this form: https://forms.gle/ncbynUp4um78FZir8 . Please apply by midday BST 6^th July. Interviews will be conducted on a rolling basis.

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6. Long-term Strategy

Stage 1

Informal interest group��Build a highly committed core around biotech trading, investment, and discussion.

June 2026 – June 2027

Stage 2

Organised interest group��Widen participation and expand the offering once momentum is established.

June 2027 – June 2028

Stage 3

Investment fund��Raise a student-led public-market life sciences fund to support the club and OUBT.

June 2028 -

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7. Investment Club Chair Intro

Yushi holds a Double First in Biochemistry from the University of Oxford and is a Senior Scholar at New College. He is an E.P. Abraham Scholar, currently completing his DPhil in Molecular Cell Biology in Health and Disease, focusing on developing novel anti-inflammatory approaches. Alongside his research, he served as a Venture Fellow at Ahren Innovation Capital, a leading UK-based venture capital fund. He currently sits on the management board of Oxford Edge, the University of Oxford’s entrepreneurship centre, and is a core member of an Innovator Circle funded by the UK’s Advanced Research & Innovation Agency (ARIA).

Yushi previously led the Oxford University Biotech Society (OUBT) as President, during which the society’s membership grew by 25% and its consulting arm, OUBT Consulting, was established. Before that, Yushi served as President of the Oxford Finance Society (OFS), and earlier as Vice President and President-elect of the Oxford University Scientific Society (OUSS). Yushi had also sat on the organising committee for iGEM Oxford 2022–2023 and was the youngest founder in the IMAGINE IF! Global Life Sciences Accelerator cohort in 2021.

In his free time, Yushi enjoys rowing, tennis, and hiking, and loves meeting entrepreneurial people who share his passion for new adventures.

Yushi Li

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Looking forward to hearing from you!

Holywell Street

Oxford OX1 3BN

Address

Yushi.li@new.ox.ac.uk

2025-2026