"I was fortunate that my parents pretty much allowed for a more experimental, open approach to education being important, but do what you want to do, right? Try different things, take healthy risks." We’re revisiting some of our previous episodes over the holidays this year. Our first rerelease is part 1 of this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast with Parag Shah, where we explore his remarkable journey from molecular biologist to CEO and Founding Managing Director of K2 Health Ventures. Parag shares how his upbringing in New York City with immigrant parents who encouraged experimentation shaped his entrepreneurial mindset, and describes the pivotal moment when he realized bench science wasn't his calling while researching at MIT's Whitehead Institute.​​ The conversation reveals how Parag boldly proposed building Imperial Bank's life sciences lending practice from scratch, despite being young and relatively inexperienced. He discusses lessons learned from MIT about persistence through failure, translating traditional credit frameworks to venture-backed biotech companies, and the complementary role of debt capital alongside equity financing in life sciences.