Hope all is going well. December is one of my favorite months of the year. It is a time when people seem to have a little more good cheer due to the holiday season. It is also a time when you get to see more family and friends and reflect on the year gone by. It is a time when all around you, the lights, singing, and festivities make your heart feel a little lighter. Typically, because people around the world are also celebrating the holidays, work tends to slow down a little, and projects begin to slowly wind down.
2024 has been anything but following this trend, at least from the work perspective. 2024 has stressed Tina and me more than at any other time in the company’s history. Being a small business owner is always stressful. It is hard to explain all the stresses you feel, from having a team whose livelihood depends on you and making sure you are generating enough revenue to cover all the costs to questioning your business vision and trying to find investors that can see and believe in your vision. It can be frustrating at times when you see companies raising all kinds of crazy money on science that isn’t sound, only to see them fold up in a few years. While our technology is not the “winning the lottery” type of business, I know that our Bio-Spun™ technology is sound. Too many outside companies and research groups confirming what we already know. I also strongly believe that we will be successful and bring a significant return to our investors and our team, who truly deserve to realize this.
2024 started VERY SLOWLY. Crickets! When I say slow, this is not just lip service. It was likely one of the slowest starts in our almost 22-year history (next April). It is funny how many people will not really take my word when I say something like this, almost like it cannot be true because they rationalize that we’re still in business, so how bad could it have been? Maybe they think I am being dramatic or exaggerating something bad and that in reality, it is really not that bad. One thing that Tina and I have always believed is being straightforward with anyone that asks us a question (within reason). I have always tried to be honest about how things are going at the company. I remember the beginning of this year not having a single customer reach out to us for almost 3 months. Needless to say, we were a “little” concerned. There was no rhyme or reason. The technology was still the technology, and nothing we were doing was showing anything bad with it. On the contrary, the data that continued to come in from our grants (we were fortunate to have these to keep the company functioning and moving us forward) continued to be promising. Many of the discussions with other companies we started in 2023 (and even some going back to 2022) were quiet. This was not just us. In the biotech space, “Stay alive until 2025” was the predominant expression. For a small business, most of which do not have a lot of spare funds laying around, these types of lags can be a death sentence. We have had companies say to us that timing is not good, let’s reconnect in a year. A year? It is assumed that we will be here at that point—a large company type of mentality. Through these early months, we were fortunate to have several new investors invest in the company. We kept moving through the mud.
In late spring/early summer, some of the discussions that had been quiet for some time began to kick in again. We started receiving inquiries about possible orders (nothing that would set the world on fire but 100% better than 0) and then receiving some orders for our IVRT and scaffold products. Mid-summer began to slow again (as it typically does), but several discussions around our products and technology continued to progress, including a new discussion that emerged with the Gates Foundation. While we could see some progress being made on several fronts, it was still fairly slow but inching forward.
When we hit October and November, things finally began to pick up. We began to get more orders in for our IVRT products, discussions around potential partners in the IVRT space began to gain some traction (some of which had been in the works for over 2 years), interest in our cell therapy delivery device area began to advance, with some new players emerging including an award by the Gates Foundation. We were even seeing interest in our technology by companies in various medical device areas. Which leads me to December. This has been the craziest month in terms of setting up and reviewing potential agreements, sending out quotes to customers and expanding partnering discussions that we’ve ever had. It seems that we will be busy right up until we close next week. This gives our team a well-deserved break before the madness begins in January. I am not complaining. It is a good problem to have for sure.
Unlike 2024, 2025 is setting up to be one of the busiest times ever at BioSurfaces. I would like to say that it will be all roses and rainbows, but that wouldn’t be reality. While we are extremely excited about the ongoing opportunities, there are challenges that lie ahead in bringing our business to the next level. Who would have thought I would be saying that after the first half of the year that we had in 2024. Like we’ve done throughout our existence, we will meet them head on with the best team (which may end up needing to grow this year – stay tuned). We hope to have more announcements in the coming months and, as always, will give you honest insights.
Thanks again to all of you who continue to follow our journey. Your kind words and thoughts mean more to us than you can imagine. From Tina, the entire BioSurfaces team, and me, we would like to wish you and yours a safe, happy, and healthy holiday season!
Matt
Comentarios