Reinventing Cell Therapy with Acoustics, Microfluidics & High-Throughput Engineering In this episode, hosts Na-Ri Oh and Ian Wendt sit down with Dr. Andrew Gray — immune cell engineer, biotech founder, venture capitalist, and CEO of CellEcho — to explore how a new acoustic-powered gene-delivery platform may redefine the boundaries of cell therapy. The conversation spans the current state of the cell therapy landscape, the persistent barriers to scalability, and why CellEcho’s ASOP platform (Acoustically Stabilized Oscillatory Pockets) could unlock a new era of faster, cheaper, and more effective cell engineering. 🔬 Episode Highlights 1. The State of Cell Therapy: Breakthroughs & Bottlenecks Despite scientific success, many pharma companies are exiting cell therapy due to cost, complexity, and manufacturing burdens. Conversely, major players like BMS continue doubling down, acquiring companies such as Orbital Therapeutics. Autologous therapies remain logistically overwhelming and expensive—often ~$400k per dose. 2. Why Cell Therapy Is So Hard to Scale “Vein-to-vein” timelines are still measured in weeks, not days. Manufacturing is bespoke: each patient’s cells must be extracted, engineered, expanded, frozen, shipped, and reinfused. Viral vectors and current non-viral delivery methods introduce cost, complexity, and biological limits. 3. The Next Frontier: In Vivo, Allogeneic & Beyond Allogeneic CAR-Ts remain challenging due to immune rejection and complex engineering. In vivo CAR-T offers promise but is limited by the small genetic “payload capacity” of lipid nanoparticles. Solid tumors remain particularly difficult: only ~9% response rates in some indications. 4. Introducing CellEcho & the ASOP Platform CellEcho’s technology emerged from UC Irvine’s microfluidics program. By applying precision acoustic energy, the platform can: Hold cells in place using thousands of stable micro-eddies Open controlled, programmable “portals” in cell membranes Sequentially deliver multiple genetic payloads with high efficiency Achieve 1 billion cells/hour processing rates Reduce dose production costs by ~100× Enable high-throughput engineering, not just manufacturing This unlocks the ability to test dozens to hundreds of engineered CAR-T variants in days—rather than the years needed today. One academic lab spent 6 years evaluating 11 CAR-T variants.CellEcho tested 8 variants in under 48 hours — and aims for 100+ per week. 5. From Better Manufacturing to Better Medicines While CellEcho originally targeted faster manufacturing, Andrew shares that the bigger opportunity is designing entirely better therapies, not simply making today’s ones faster. This includes: Engineering CAR-Ts with multiple CAR constructs Arming cells with resistance to tumor suppression signals Precise control over expression levels (avoiding under- or over-expression) Unlocking new indications: autoimmunity, neurodegeneration, regenerative medicine 6. Personal Motivation & Mission Andrew shares how his mother's struggle with myasthenia gravis sparked his lifelong journey in immunology. His 20-year career investigating immune evasion, Tregs, and tumor microenvironments culminated in his conviction that next-generation cell engineering is essential. 7. What’s Next for CellEcho Currently initiating pre-seed fundraising Supported by multiple federal grants (including NSF SBIR) Expanding early partnerships with Stanford, Mass General Brigham, and industry collaborators Building a fully automated, AI-augmented cell therapy design platform Dual strategy: Cell-therapy-development-as-a-service Proprietary therapeutic pipeline in select indications 💡 Key Takeaways Cell therapy works — but not broadly or efficiently enough. Engineering complexity, not biology alone, is the rate-limiting step. Acoustic microfluidics enables a scalable, programmable, non-viral way to engineer livin