A Wall Street Genius’s Final Investment Playbook

Chapter 351 : The Goose That Lays Golden Eggs (9)

My goal is simple.

To slowly light a fire under this race.

Right now, there are three runners on the CRISPR race track.

First is the “hare” that puts speed above everything else, Editors.

And then there are the two “turtles” that use caution as their weapon, CRISPR Medical and Intelligencia.

Of those, the one I had to make run was the most carefree turtle, CRISPR Medical.

How?

The method I chose was simple.

I just had to light a fire under the turtle’s feet.

If I kept throwing sparks at them, they’d have to start running sooner or later.

I’d already prepared several sparks and even made a dice to choose which one to use.

Unfortunately, when it came to the very first spark, I didn’t need any dice.

It had already been decided.

The announcement of the veterinary hospital partnership with Intelligencia.

All the paperwork was done; all that was left was to ignite it.

We broke the news, and the media reacted immediately.

<“What ripple effect will seizing animal clinical trials first have... Could it move up the CRISPR commercialization timeline?”>

If the rival turtle that had been crawling along beside them suddenly started to pick up speed?

CRISPR Medical’s feet would start to feel at least a little hot too.

But.

This level of stimulus won’t be nearly enough.

There was no way that slowpoke turtle would move just because of this.

More than anything...

There are people who will soon throw cold water on this spark.

And their identity was—

—Animals are not tools for human experiments!

—Applying unproven, dangerous technologies to innocent living beings is clearly abuse!

—No one knows what kind of pain and side effects this process will cause.

—We demand an immediate halt to these unethical experiments!

—Humans are trespassing into the Creator’s domain!

—No one can predict what kind of mutations gene editing will create or what ripple effects it will have on the ecosystem.

This is opening Pandora’s box!

They were animal-rights groups and religious organizations.

As always, they raised their voices loudly.

Some of them took to the streets holding placards that read, “Stop animal testing!” and “Don’t go against the laws of nature!”

The interesting part was where they chose to protest.

The sites they picked weren’t in front of Marquis, Intelligencia, or Pareto headquarters.

It was in front of the main FDA building and the government complex in Washington.

—The FDA must not approve this!

—Don’t create animal suffering with taxpayers’ money!

—The government should stand with the people, not with companies that trade in life!

With an ordinary business, you can ignore public opinion to a reasonable extent and push through.

But with CRISPR, the story is different.

Bringing this technology to market absolutely requires government approval and the scrutiny of regulators.

In particular, the key was the decision of the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM).

So what are they going to do...?

From here, the regulators have two options.

They can drag things out by saying something like, “We need careful review and additional studies.”

Or they can introduce an expedited review process despite the controversy.

But in making that decision, they obviously can’t help but be conscious of public opinion.

Regulatory agencies usually watch the public mood to avoid being blamed later.

So normally, the outcome of that choice would be decided by whoever was shouting the loudest.

But this time, it was different.

Because there was a variable that changed the whole landscape.

Talia.

For the record, the name of the joint venture we created is Talia Genetics.

We chose that name to signal that we were carrying on her will.

Of course, for the people raising their voices against us, that very name became a target too.

—Talia sees even life as nothing but a way to make money!

—Unethical companies like Talia Genetics should be driven out of society!

—Would you still approve if it were your own family up on Talia Genetics’ lab table?

However.

At that point, people started to push back immediately.

They were the fans who had been cheering for Talia.

—Okay, now you’re really crossing the line.

—Look at you judging her when you don’t even know what Talia stands for.

—Have you been living in a bunker?

—You don’t know Talia’s bucket list?

In truth, most of Talia’s supporters had been quietly rooting for this experiment.

They just didn’t want her death to be in vain; they weren’t the type to take to the streets.

But once Talia’s name started getting attacked in broad daylight, the situation changed completely.

—You’re saying we’re doing things to animals we wouldn’t do to humans?

—Do you even know who this Talia you’re trash-talking is and what she accomplished before you start yelling?

—You think just shouting “protect the animals” automatically makes you righteous?

—Do you know how cruel it is to tell desperate patients to just wait in the name of “safety”?

—Was CRISPR developed by the devil or something?

—This could just as well be a gift from God, couldn’t it?

—This reminds me of that flood parable—God sends a boat and a helicopter, but the guy keeps insisting, “God will save me,” and ends up drowning.

Normally, pushing ahead with this experiment would’ve been written off as nothing more than corporate “greed.”

But Talia gave us a cause.

Because she had shown the public, in the rawest way possible, how desperate patients are and why someone has to walk down a dangerous path.

But even so…

It still wasn’t enough.

In any battle for public opinion, the loudest side wins.

Right now, the only people openly on Talia’s side were the hardcore fans.

If we really wanted to flip the board, the silent middle had to start moving.

And then, right around that time, Marquis dropped a new product at the perfect moment.

Product name: Orange Blast.

The ad was simple.

The orange wave from Talia’s funeral.

Someone pops an Orange Blast into their mouth, and white smoke pours out.

When that smoke clears, you see a banner stretching across the sky.

[BYE BITCHES]

Talia’s playful final goodbye.

The product was a massive hit.

Orange Blast kept selling out and went on to take over social media.

People filmed themselves eating Orange Blast and blowing out white smoke.

The moment the smoke vanished, they revealed a message or image they’d prepared in advance.

Some confessed their love, some revealed their resignation letters, others exposed their true feelings.

It was a challenge about revealing the “truth” you’d hidden behind the smoke.

Just like Talia had done—no hiding, no shrinking back.

The Orange Blast Challenge spread like wildfire.

With hashtags like these.

#forTalia #LiveOutLoud #DontFadeQuietly

Of course, most people joined in just for fun.

Not everyone who took part genuinely supported Talia or cared about the FDA approval drama.

But humans are funny creatures.

You could say we’re animals that find “cognitive dissonance” unbearably uncomfortable.

Even if they joined just because the videos looked cool, the act of participating itself became a public “I support Talia” declaration, and people naturally started to stand on her side and cheer for her.

And once they’d already said, out loud, “I support her,” doing something that didn’t match that stance would make them look bad.

So to justify their own choice, they gradually started to truly support Talia.

The 2014 Ice Bucket Challenge is a good example.

At first, the goal was to raise awareness about ALS.

But most people participated simply because dumping ice water over their heads looked fun.

Still, once they’d taken part, they felt pressured to donate, and in the end, donations shot up to dozens of times the previous year’s total.

Orange Blast worked on the same principle.

The moment over twenty million challenge videos had been uploaded worldwide…

We launched an online petition.

Which meant Talia’s visible support base could climb as high as twenty million.

That’s not a number you can just brush off.

“So, what do you think?”

I looked over at Gerard.

He was the one in charge of negotiating directly with the FDA.

His face had gotten noticeably gaunter, but his expression was bright.

“Did you hear the news that we just hit record-breaking sales this quarter?”

“I’m not talking about that, I mean the FDA talks.”

“Oh, that? It went better than I expected. They’re saying they’ll consider a special exemption.”

Maybe tossing them a little treat really did help.

Gerard had been running around pretty hard, and thanks to that, the outcome wasn’t bad at all.

“After reviewing the social and scientific significance of Talia Genetics’ CRISPR technology and the high level of public interest, the FDA has decided, under a special provision, to grant limited approval for pilot clinical trials. This is not a final approval, and any expansion of use will depend on additional safety data and further public discussion.”

In short: “We’re not going to let you use this on every disease, but we’ll let you try it on one and watch what happens.”

It wasn’t a perfect victory, but it was more than enough.

We’d gotten at least a toe in the door.

Once you start, scaling it up is only a matter of time.

More important, though, was the impact this news would have on CRISPR Medical.

Their rival turtle, Intelligencia, had just snagged the first clinical approval.

No matter how cautious a turtle they were, there was no way CRISPR Medical could just sit still now.

And yet CRISPR Medical’s response was…

—Large-scale clinical trials and commercial rollout are premature. CRISPR Medical will continue to prioritize bioethics and patient safety, and we will proceed with caution until sufficient research and broad social consensus have been achieved.

Translation: “You guys go ahead and run. We’ll stick to our own pace.”

They were still relaxed.

Their feet were warm, but not hot enough to make them run.

It was more like they’d just put their feet in a warm foot bath.

But I wasn’t disappointed.

If anything, I felt like humming.

All I had to do was turn the temperature up.

It was finally time to roll the dice I’d worked so hard to make.

This time, I’d gone all out on the craftsmanship.

The earlier ones were all about looks, but this one was all about function.

First off, the weight was perfect.

When I lifted the die up to eye level, its edges caught the light.

Each face was exactly the same size.

I’d shaved it with precision so that every number would have the same odds.

The production cost alone was eighty thousand dollars, so it wasn’t exactly cheap.

But for something that would help decide my next move, that was money well spent.

I gave my wrist a light flick.

Clatter.

The fifteen-sided die rolled erratically across the table, then came to a stop.

The number was… 11.

A pretty fitting result, actually.

The spark assigned to that number was—

“Make the hare run.”

In this case, the hare was Editors, the racer type.

They were chasing the “first-ever clinical trial” title, but even if it was just in animals, Intelligencia had beaten them off the line.

They had to be freaking out.

And all I had to do was pour fuel on that anxiety.

It wasn’t hard.

Editors had put all their golden eggs in one basket.

They had bet everything on a single project called “LCA10.”

So all I had to do was tip that basket over.