Bio-Industrial Innovation with Sophia Xu, Co-Founder & CSO @ Carbon Bridge

Oh, our guest today is Sophia Shu. Sophia is chief scientific officer at Carbon Bridge. Carbon Bridge is producing, we'll hear more about it uh during the episode. They are producing the world's thinnest bioreactors, making uh microbes 500% more productive at eating carbon dioxide and turning it into useful materials.

In the conversation, we talk a lot about Sophia's personal journey, going from uh being a biologist at school, uh to jumping head first into the the startup space, how her company started literally from uh kind of back at the navin coffee shop to $100 a month DIY bolab in New York. Um uh I think it's

important to tell those stories. You know, a lot of times very flashy, well-funded stories get um uh get put into the spotlight, but there's a very real experience that Sophia had uh going from DIY to wellunded startups. So, uh that's important. She also talks a lot about her own experience with imposter syndrome uh being second generation uh

immigrant and navigating uh and a woman navigating uh the hard space of startups. Thank you as always to our partners, Clean Tech Growth Lab. If you're looking to do any type of growing uh in the clean tech space, these are the experts. And not only that, but they're wonderful people to work with.

And if you're looking to grow in any other industry, looking to do any other growth activities, you're looking for Craze and Friends, uh the producers of this podcast. Uh so, thank you to them. And now for Sophia. Sophia, welcome.

Thank you. Thank you. Thanks so much for having me. Yeah, this is so cool. What I want to say before we get into the technicalities is I already thanked you for making such an awesome product video on your homepage, but for anyone that's listening, they need to go to your website and um I just appreciate the the

the music choice. I won't I won't spoil it, but it definitely is not conventional. And uh I was in it the whole time. So before I get into uh any other questions about potentially how that video came about or anything else in the company, if you could give a introduction of yourself and what you're

building. Yeah. So um yeah, thank you again for having me. I'm I'm Sophia Shu. I'm the co-founder and chief scientific officer of Carbon Bridge. And we're revolutionizing the bioindustrial economy. And what we mean by that is not necessarily pharma and and medicine, but you know, the idea of using microbes to make everyday products from fuels and

chemicals. And we do it with a twist. Um we're taking gases from waste um as the input. We've got these microbes that, you know, have been evolved since nature, so they're incredibly efficient. Um and we have built the most kind of productive environment for them to to operate in. So for anyone in biotech,

we're just building a novel bioreactor from the from from scratch. Um and our microbes are very happy and they can make you know renewable fuels and chemicals at fossil parody uh without any subsidies and without any credits. So, [snorts] so before we get into your uh more about your personal journey, I just want to um

get a little bit more explanation because though I was taken by the production of the video, you know, with my background, I didn't understand 100% what the product is and what you guys are doing. So, um, can you just describe, I don't know, one use case of where because I understand that they're

the thinnest ever and they're flat and, uh, you know, they're bioreactors like you're saying, but if you could just explain in context what they do. Yeah. So, let me take you back a little bit um, a couple steps. So, fermentation, you know, has been around for for thousands of years, right? And it's like the way that we make wine and

beer, right? So, we know that it works very well. Um, but essentially what you have is you have this like massive tank and you've got microbes that are swimming around in solution, right? So, for example, you have yeast, you feed them sugar, and then they make alcohol for you. Um, what we've done is we're

working in the realm of gas fermentation. So, it's no longer sugar that's the food for these microbes. It's gases. Think like methane, CO2, hydrogen, the gases that are really important for climate change. Um, and traditionally what they've done for gas fermentation is they've taken the exact same tank, um, but they're trying to mix

gases and liquids. I don't know if you've ever like, you know, opened a can of Coke and it like overflow, right, and it spilled over, but it's because Definitely. Yeah. Absolutely. Right. So, it's because, you know, gas gases don't like to stay in liquid, right? Like unless you like bubble it or do all these

different things, like mixing gas and liquid is actually really hard. And that's just a physics challenge. Um, that's just, you know, gas solubility and that type of thing. So, you end up with microbes that have been starving. And I think the industry has long blamed these microbes for not being performant, but if you really look at what's going

on, it's just they don't have access to the gases they need um to do the conversion. So the product that we're building isn't just the flattest, isn't just the thinnest, but it's essentially putting these microbes in this environment where they have access to all the gases they can eat. So instead of going from like starvation, they went

to an all you can eat buffet, right? And they they can eat all the gases and then now they can perform at margins that are actually economical for for competition. So we haven't changed anything about the microbe. These microbes are amazing.

they've been framed this entire time. We've just given them the resources they need to perform. Amazing. Thank you so much for that. Obviously, uh, a trillion more questions, but I I I do want to get into um, so how long have you personally been with the company unofficially?

Officially, how did it uh, let's start with this. Is this your first company? This is the first company that I'm a founder of. Yes. Would you say this is your first experience with startup space or entrepreneurship? Definitely not. Um I you know in college was really interested in entrepreneurship but I didn't go to one

of the not like Stanford Berkeley where it's like startups were a norm. So I had no idea that you know a founder of my age could be a deep tech founder but I still had like my baby of a project that I you know got grants for did pitches for. I just never took it to that next

step. Um but then coming out of college I had graduated a year early so I had some time to explore and then I was at an early stage act biotech startup and it was just me and the CEO. So that was like a real taste of of early stage biotech and then I came to carbon

bridge. So um had some had some early experiences uh which I think are so critical if you're looking to be in the startup space especially early stage like sub 10 people really really important. So how did your So the the the two experiences that you referenced were um doing the research and then also

experiencing like hey we need funding in order to do this. So having that be a piece of it not just doing the research um part and then also an extremely early stage um a tech startup between those two experiences let's just say well to frame it how many years now has it been

with Carbon Bridge? Uh so about two and a half years. So it started in March 2023. All right. Great. Yeah. Yeah. So so if you could just let let's just say um between the research and between uh the early stage a tech, what are the the the two experiences that stand out to you

that have impacted the way that you've uh navigated building carbon bridge? Yeah, I think one thing that was really important to me and I also have another team member who really contributed to this thesis. I'm going to shout her out in a little bit, but the idea of being able to do biology cheaply.

I think in pharma it makes a lot of sense. You need certain sterilities, certain controls, things like that. You're making very high margin like molecules, right, that you sell for a lot of money. But in the kind of bioindustrial economy, um being able to for example to work at a lab, build a

product and do it with not that much capex investment, not that much opex investment, right? Um is really important because especially in in today's world like investors, especially when they're looking at another AI startup for example, they want to make sure that they're getting their their money's worth. So, um, the very first

atte biotech that early stage startup that I was at, like we were ordering things off of Amazon, you know, consumables and and pipets and and doing things like that. And I just I had no idea that you could do biology like so cheaply. And I think that was a huge part of, you know, when I got started in

Carbon Bridge, I moved to New York. I found this DIY community bolab for $100 a month. It's called Biotech Without Borders. It was this insane experience, but we didn't have enough like family, friends, funding to really be able to go into this nice spiffy lab. And so, we got started in much of the same way. So,

I think um being extremely resourceful like I think I found that lab off of Reddit and actually the founder of that lab is now our VP of biotech. So, she's done a very great job. She's on a journey. Ellen Jorgensson, she's on a journey to democratize biology. Um, and you know, we would not have been able to

get started any other way. Gotcha. So, so when for for you personally, did you ever see like when you were younger, did you say, um, you know, I want to grow up and start my own company. I want to be in biology. Like, how at what point did you think that this uh type of lifestyle is something

that called you? I think I was always fascinated by entrepreneurship but again kind of had like a limiting belief that I was like you absolutely need a PhD to get involved and then you need to have these results first and then raise funding and do all these different things. So um I didn't have uh the traditional I think

Silicon Valley type of risk appetite or understanding of how startup ecosystems could actually function. I didn't have that kind of mentorship until I went to that first startup. Um, so I think that spirit was always in me. Um, and that's also why I was formerly premed but uh ended up deciding to go with Carbon

Bridge because I was just so interested in in the startup ecosystem. But I think what confirmed it later on for me was we were we were part of this program called Indie Bio. It's essentially like an accelerator program kind of akin to like YC but for the biotech space. um really really involved and they do these things

called journey talks um every Friday where you know founder comes in they just talk about their journey so Shan O Sullivan he's the founder of the venture firm SOSB and he came in and gave his journey talk and it was so interesting and I was like this is obviously there were some you know he went through a lot

um but I think that kind of solidified that I was like on the right path like I I wanted to do something nontraditional I wanted to build impact. I didn't want to just be in a lab. I wanted to see it translate into kind of real world solutions. Um and I wanted it to be very

interesting and hectic um to put it that way. So I think um you know I I had that confirmation of it later on. Uh how has the experience then since uh since you since you saw that talk? How's the experience been relative to any expectations you had if you had expectations?

You know, I had expectations. Um, you know, I had a plan. Uh, nothing goes to plan. Been crazy. Like past two years have hopped from like a friend's couch to like random sublets, you know, still don't have a lease to my name. Um, kind of ordeal. Um, but it's it's high highs, low lows, you know, but that's kind of

what I at the fundamental basis what I was going for. Well, I I I really appreciate what you said about um there's a there's a common uh at least I think it's common and you did note it that people think they need uh a certain level of u accreditation to begin something or get involved with something

that's in in in a meaningful way. And I'm glad that you pointed out that that's uh not necessarily the case. So I think that's important. Uh yeah. So back to then um the questions that I had about what you guys are doing. So um and if I understand it correctly about the whole process

between uh the microbes, digesting the gases, the buffet, all of these things. How is it that the gases can act like sugar? And also how is it that this hasn't been uh uh developed before? Yeah. So I would say that's nature's innovation. These microbes literally like the ones that were working, they like to eat methane like the same, you

know, cow farts essentially, right? And then they can make um fuel out of that and that's just part of their metabolic process. There are microbes that will take CO2 and hydrogen, right? These are not necessarily microbes that we've genetically engineered to be able to do this. Although there are certain microbes that are, but nature has kind

of already evolved these mechanisms to take gases. Um, but again, the reason why we haven't seen them before is not because those microbes didn't exist, but because we didn't have the right infrastructure to be able to harness those capabilities and harness them in an economical manner. So there are loads of companies gas fermentation

um that have been you know tweaking microbes and these gas eating microbes and doing different things but they use the same kind of fermenttor same kind of bioreactor vat as the ones used in wine and beer and they just couldn't make the economics work. So that's why we focused on infrastructure and not the micro.

Got it. And so and so let's let's take it as uh like your little uh journey uh uh discussion. So at at the start around two and a half years ago, how would you describe where the company was at and uh what your involvement was? We we frequently say that um you know

everything that we've done today spun out of a coffee shop because it was me meeting the CEO um at South by Southwest in a coffee shop and just kind of laying out the groundwork for for the future of the company. Um I will note that Covenbridge was actually founded in 2021 not 2023 but um the you know my

co-founders Manu and Bill they they looked at everything you know their engineers everything from kind of like soil carbon to sin gas to all these different things. Um, and they spent a lot of good work learning what not to do and what didn't make sense before they landed on, okay, it has to be biology

and then it has to be liquid fuels like methanol, for example, um, for the maritime shipping industry. So, uh, that's kind of the the basis and they were like, okay, this is what it has to do. And then Manu, my co-founder, he approached me and was like, hey, you're a biologist. Would love to know your

thoughts on this. And then we came together and so it was essentially like a complete rebirth in 2023. Um, and we started from literature review like started from absolutely like I had no fermentation background. I knew microbes. I've been working with microbes for a while but fermentation wasn't my expertise. So I went straight

to the literature. Um, and then we discovered the bottleneck, you know, being the gases, right? How how can these microbes eat? And then we kind of built and built and built from there. So um a very exciting journey um and it definitely had some ups and downs but yeah so so if the uh the beginning so

let's just say it's the beginning because you said it was a rebirth. It it is it's the beginning it's where carbon bridge uh happened. So if you can just if you describe the first uh phase of it as uh the the dive into the the literature then what what would be like the next milestone that you would say

like this is the end and the beginning of the next phase. Yeah. So you know we did our background research right I was in coffee shops looking at the literature um you know my co-founders engineers they were also taking kind of an engineering perspective and then we had to build a like a spreadsheet like a technoeconomic

analysis a tea to be able to convince ourselves that this would be economical right and are these values reasonable right do we think that the microbes can operate at this productivity stuff like that and then we had a decent amount of conviction and then Um I would say a strong amount of conviction obviously

and at the time I was working a corporate job actually. Um I was like the phone I was the phone booth of this life sciences protein company. And so I [laughter] you know I finished my first you know my work in the first hour and the last hour and the rest of the day

was spent on like carbon bridge. And so when we had gone to that point of conviction and we raised you know a small pool of kind of like family and friends amount of money um we were like okay let's get the first proof point which is are we the team that can execute and actually make these microbes

you know take gas and convert into product right that was my first step so how long then between uh you know whatever you guys met in the coffee shop and when you got had that would you say a tea yes a tea yeah so when you had that documentation and then you you raised family and friends

money uh you know about how long in between those two I don't know to the point where we roughly day but I know we had enough conviction to the point where I moved from Texas to to New York and that was in July so basically March to July was the whole background research raised

some funds you know manuf funded my trip to you know to New York with some um and then got started at a lab. So that was when we actually started doing some real experiments. Okay. So roughly six months, five, six months.

Yeah. March to March to July for that. Four months. [laughter] Okay, cool. Okay, great. Well, this All right, so this is awesome. Okay, so we're so we're doing it. You know, you flew across. You guys had conviction. You said we're going to be the ones that do this. We have an idea. This is going

to be revolutionary. This is great. Uh let's just so before we talk about the next phase like what would you say uh is the next milestone you know like are you still in that next phase now or was there another milestone that you reached?

No abs. So we got our first you know indication like first proof of concept that we could make methanol which is right out of methane gas which is really cool and then um from there we got into we got our first VC investor um for carbon bridge at least the bio portion and that was SOSV indo so we got into

that accelerator um but I would say the next major proof point was building our reactor and then showing that so we showed that the biology worked guess confirm that these microbes can make fuel from gas. And then the second part was can we improve upon it with this novel infrastructure that we're building. So we built the next reactor

and then we had to show that the microbes would operate better like would have a higher productivity. And so that I think was the the next major proof point. So right now our microbes are about 500% better. Um I don't think we've hit their limit but that's kind of where we're at with that proof point. Um

the next phase of the company is um we've got uh a proof of concept going with New York City um the waste treatment facility there. Awesome. And so essentially we you know how long ago was that? Uh that was I think we got that like maybe a month or two ago.

Congrats. Yeah, thank you. And then we have to pass the reviews, but then we would be allowed to deploy a a pilot project on New York City's wastewater facility. So that will be very awesome. Well, thank you so much. That was that that that's very clear. This is this is awesome. Okay. So then so then

again, just to review. So coffee shop four because I can do math now. Four runs five, you know, five months between. Now you have the uh you've convinced yourselves that this is worth jumping into and then uh between the the proof of con between you moving and the proof of concept was also a few months

of work uh before your first investment. And so was that at the beginning of last year, beginning of 2024? No, that was uh July 2023. I moved to New York and we got our first kind of uh bit of methanol in I want to say August.

Um July, August around that area. And then we got our first SOSB came in as an investor um September October. Amazing. So then it's been pretty much 12 months since that that point. 2023 to now. Um Oh, 2023. Sorry. So it's almost two years.

Yeah, almost two years. Okay. Okay. Awesome. So, and and you know, thank you again for clarifying all this because what what I I know what what what I really what I really wanted to to get at is post that initial investment for you personally for your journey in the company as as cso, you

know, doing the research uh leading these experiments and things like this. What has been the experience since getting that funding? What is it like? What are you doing? Is it more so dayto day? You're in there every, you know, doing research, all this stuff. How often is it different things other than research? what un what was unlocked for

you once you got that first round of uh funding those types of things. Yeah. Um so we expanded the team a little bit so I wouldn't have to be in the lab all the time. So at the I was mostly in the lab you know doing everything from like ordering lab managing you know analysis everything

was more on me for the bio side. Um so I got you know two team members essentially and they've been a huge help. So now I'm a little bit out of the lab and I'm back to um looking more for innovations and also helping fund raise and do all these other different things

for the company. Um I think the major also unlock with the capital was um access to equipment. Um like things like being able to measure methanol requires $100,000 equipment that we weren't just going to buy ourselves. and Indie Bio and SOSV, they kind of have this amazing program where they give you a lab um and you're

able to operate in that lab and they have some really high quality equipment available. So that was also a major unlock. And then SSV has a really great reputation and obviously their team is amazing. So beyond kind of the personal development um having access to their network is is huge. So it kind of paved

the way for future conversations of next round of funding, right? And things like that. So you know, I huge huge respect to to Indie Bio and Hacks, these programs um from SOSB that have, you know, really propelled us forward.

Huge respect. Thank you. Thank you all so much. Well, that well that's that that's super cool. Okay. So then um okay so so so we ran through operationally what your what your um what your role has been how how it's evolved for you things like this. So for you personally so going back um we did say that you

know ups and downs like it's been all over the place like did not meet expectations whatsoever. I mean what you know what's even the point? So from like from where you're at now looking back um on you know the last uh two two and a half years you know what like what is

what is the journey been for you um you know growing as a cso to whatever capacity you understand a cso to be I would say it was massive massive character development. um you know when I when we first started the company I was like 21 um I'm like 24 now and everything from like imposttor syndrome

right kind of dealing with the fact that you know am I the right person to to be able to do this that's part of the reason why I wanted to do the proof of concept and see like can I build a team that can actually make this happen um to being able to to talk to investors and

improve on science communication right you can't go investors come from a bunch of different backgrounds, some operators, some more technical, right? So, how do you communicate the technology correctly? Um, even to like sales, right? How how do you sell a product, you know, whether it's you're selling stock to investor or selling a

product, you need to sell um as you know, helping more and more in the fundraising process. So I think the more and more you kind of touch the different parts in the company um the more you the more is required of your your personal growth your maturity your responsibility I'm very lucky to have my co-founder CEO

Manu he's he's a mentor to me um for sure and he is quite a bit older than I am so he has a lot of different experiences um and yet he also makes me feel very seen and heard right so our voices are are almost equal And I think being in that kind of environment, being

surrounded by a lot of really incredible people, um, sometimes being the youngest in the room, I've learned a lot. [laughter] So I I think like that's the one thing I love so much about startups. It's like you've never accelerated your growth so much until you've been at an early stage startup.

So then so I guess I I have two follow-up questions then based on what what you just said. The first one is like you um you mentioned sometimes being the youngest in the room. has your experience been uh you know being um you know trying to grow this company and showing up to these different spaces as

often the youngest in the room. Yeah, it can be tough. I think at first like it's a little more terrifying. It's a little more like imposter syndrome and it's you know I'm I'm the type of person who does definitely prefers to listen first than to talk. Um and a lot of that is also because like the the people

around me have so much more experience. But as you build your own confidence um you realize you have a seat in the room for a reason and you're invited into these things for a reason. So there's still a huge amount of learning. Um obviously I think uh a lot of learnings I haven't like also fully realized as

well and captured into you know fully formed a syllabus or something right. Um but it's it's uh it it's I think it's overall a great thing um to to be in rooms with like these incredible people. Yeah. So then so then similar question and uh what would you say to your experience in the space as a a woman

founder? Yeah. Yeah. I I would say I'm very fortunate that I'm surrounded I haven't necessarily seen um aposity in and woman founders or like woman you know leadership. Um I think New York City is such a diverse city as well and you know the companies that are formed um aren't necessarily so dominated in one specific

sector or area. Um so I I think I'm very lucky. Um but I I do recognize that it is a bit harder. Um I think one of the challenges that we face as a founding team is you know both me and Manu different ages don't have you know PhDs so different educational backgrounds

right we don't look like your typical founding team um so maybe less so on like the fact that I'm a woman but you know our our makeup um I think required a few key believers to to get us forward but it's that's always the case you have the believers you you know you gain more

traction and then you get more and more believers right so then so then with those with those two things in mind uh and I wrote it down so I wouldn't forget is uh you know whether someone's uh considering being a founder and they're young whether someone's considering being a founder and they're a woman whether they're both

or neither uh what advice uh any types of things that you wish you knew or that somebody had told you uh when you had started this journey I would say if you're considering to be a founder. Um, definitely work at an early stage startup first. Like again, sub 10 people um is where you really get

the sense of what that entire life looks like. Especially if you're in the DACA space, I think it's a little bit more challenging. Um, so so getting those key experiences, you might find that you you don't like it as much, right? Or um that it this is exactly where you want to be.

I think that's incredibly important. And then the other thing is, you know, even though you're young, I think there's a lot of expertise that you can fill by building out a team, right? So, you're not going to have every single bit of experience, but if you can build a well-rounded team, I think that's that's

equally important, right? So, imposter syndrome is very real. Um, but I would very much encourage more like I love to see people take um more risks. Um especially in kind of the the second genen immigrant community, I feel like um a lot of us are are pushed more towards paths of assimilation, whether

it's like medicine, law, you know, these types of like very grounded roles. And there's so many smart people out there. I I would love to see um more more youth in deep tech and pair pair with a great co-founder like my co-founder is amazing. So we make a very very great team. We cover different aspects. Um, so

I think it's it's a very wonderful experience, but be strategic. [laughter] Well, I I appreciate you sharing that. I think just just in the sense just along the theme of taking your experience and and helping other people feel inspired um to do the same then you mentioned that you're uh second gen um immigrant.

Is there anything specific to your experience as a founder in that way? Uh different barriers that present themselves like you just said? Yeah, I would say, you know, I I had a very strong path forward to medicine. Uh I still am very interested in in kind of medicine and everything, learning about the human body. I think it's incredibly

fascinating. Um but uh my parents were definitely not super enthused when I veered away from that path and I think that also caused quite a bit of trouble at the end or at sorry at the start where I was making decisions. Um, I know a lot of a lot of my friends are

in in finance and like these more established roles and they're doing it also for stability and for for their families, right? That and of course everyone has different obligations. They come from different backgrounds. But I also know a lot of them wish they were in maybe a little bit more impactful and exciting careers. So, um, yeah, I would

just say take a risk, you know, take a bet on yourself. Um and and also really try and kind of learn as much as you can about about startups and and you know being at that early stage uh before you take a full jump. I think that's totally valid um and it was really important for

me as well um in my journey. Got it. Well, bonus question. You're just a fountain of knowledge right now. So I have three more for you other than the normal two that I do and it's because you mentioned about uh building a team how impactful that can be uh how underutilized that type of uh how much

expertise you could fill by doing that. So is there anything that you would speak to as far as uh building a team from your experience doing it whether things you've done well or or mistakes you've made? Yeah, I think teamwise your first 10 employees are so so critical. like they basically form kind

of the genetic makeup of your of your company culture and the future of which you're headed, right? So, you want to be very selective not in terms of just the expertise they bring, right? But also the personality and the character that they bring. So, um I think we've been fortunate to have an such an amazing

team that has really gone through some very tough hardships, but are also so believing in the the future and kind of the the impact of the company that they've stuck it through, right? And we work very very well together. Um, so my my advice I would say is um, you know, think about how each person would

contribute to the company culture and what kind of company culture you want to create. Um, and make sure that the people you bring on, no matter how smart they are, they have to align with that culture because that can really make or break a company at some point.

Has it always been clear what you need to hire for or have you had to make a subjective call? I think this is something that I really believe in. Um, we started out with more generalist like again I said I don't have a fermentation background but I have more of like a first principles type of thinking. Um

and I would say a lot of our you know early team or a team of six right now is is similar fast learners very hard workers may not necessarily have the exact expertise that we were looking for but then again we're building something so new that we don't expect someone to have that background

but what we care about is you know how do you think so we started with generalist I think we're moving more towards a specialist nature um so recruiting some more specialists and I I think that's a really great way to go because when you start your company there's a lot of different hats that you

have to wear. You have to be extremely flexible. Um and you have to be able to to do all these different tasks that are not so you know one sector focused. Yeah. So um that's kind of how we built our company. But I think more and more it's very clear like we have this project in

mind. We need these type of engineers and these type of biologists on this and that's what we're recruiting for. So that becomes more and more specialized, right? Huge. All right. Well, we got two more. My first one is what is the biggest hurdle that uh you would say you're facing at the moment and how is it also

an opportunity? Yeah. Um I would say funding is is very difficult in the current environment, especially for things like climate tech. We've climate proofed our company quite a bit. Obviously the the mission the impact stays the same but we're um you know there there have been some headwinds uh you know kind of

geopolitically um and economically as well that uh were not necessarily our fault but it's just a function of of you know building in this current time. So funding has been really difficult. I know rounds are taking longer to close. I know a lot of companies have unfortunately shut down.

Um but I think we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. um we've gotten a lot of interest. I'm I'm very confident in that. Um and then I would say that's the the biggest challenge. Um but it's I think we've passed it and now it's just about building and it's about

building in time and moving as quickly as you can. Nice. Well, with all this uh left to do with all of these challenges, Sophia, I'm curious what inspires you? I love the solution that will work. Um I think that it almost reverses kind of a lot of the reputation that um biotech has accumulated which is like biotech

can only be used for pharma and expensive things. Um otherwise biotech fails and things don't scale up. I think it's just the kind of interdisciplinary approach of our solution that I really appreciate and I love that we're going to be able to work with different microbes um almost kind of in a a full circle

like we use this microbe to make this product like the the impact and kind of using bio in a very smart more nature inspired way is is something that I really enjoy. Um, you know, my vision, uh, my personal vision for the company is not that we grow to this insane massive headcount, but we still, you

know, we have a core R&D team. We're constantly, you know, evaluating microbes, taking new microbes pathways in, you know, it is it economic almost doing kind of the the background search that we did at the very start of the company back in March. evaluate these new microbes, do the initial tests, is this something that is, you know,

productive and should we kind of import that into our um into our uh pathways, right? So, we've got one to go from methane to methanol, you know, maybe another that will go from oils to biosinfactants, another one that will take CO2 and make vinegar, right? All these different microbes, but it keeps it very

uh exciting and it kind of maximizes the the impact. So, I'm very excited. I think a lot of the kind of bioindustrial side of biotech has not has been a little bit archaic um in terms of uh infrastructure and you know things like that and so I really love what we're doing for for kind of this next on the

frontier of innovation for for biotech. Awesome. Well, if anyone else was inspired to uh follow along or connect, what's the best way to do that? Yeah. Um, our website is great. Um, thank you for shing out our YouTube video. Um, we, you know, happy to get in touch and fill out a form there. Of

course, LinkedIn is also really great. So, um, Carbonbridge has a LinkedIn. Um, our website is www.carbonbridge.io. I'm always happy to personally connect on LinkedIn as well. Um, so these are great touch points for us. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Ry.

Good luck with the uh with the pilot. That's really awesome. Um, is there anything else you guys are looking forward to in next uh four, six months or is that the main focus? I think we we have some very exciting partnerships. We've sold our first couple reactors. Um, sold our first reactor. We've got some

some more lining up. Um, and we I think we'll have a very exciting announcement about our fund raise very soon. Awesome. And uh I do have a note to shout out one of your team members and that never happened. So, who was that?

Uh, Dr. Ellen Jorgensson. um she's like the founder, she made the very first community biolab in the world. Um so she's amazing. And then of course my CEO, Manu, he is so incredibly smart. Shout out. Yeah. Yeah. [laughter] Awesome. Sophia, thank you for your time. I'm looking forward to uh staying in touch, seeing where you guys uh go

and uh doing another one of these. Yeah. Thanks so much. Like this is my first podcast, so really super um Yeah. Thank you for introducing me to this world and thank you for the time. You got it.