Lucas Vining: From Student to CEO

CEO. International nonprofit founder. College student.

All three can be used to describe 20-year-old Lucas Vining.

At the age of 17, Vining began research on how to use genetic engineering to grow red blood cells from stem cells. Three years later, this research is now being developed into a marketable product through Ichosia Biotechnology. Vining’s goal is to eventually provide this method to medical professionals as an efficient, life-saving alternative to blood donors.

Throughout his week, the hours not spent overseeing the work Ichosia is devoted to a new project that the George Washington University student launched in June— amid the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s called Sa’akom Farms, centered around a mission of driving “economic development in Cambodia by providing impoverished farmers with a living-wage and education, enabled through innovative agricultural technologies.”

Since its inception, Vining has added four fellow GW students to the Sa’akom team, along with an entrepreneurship advisor from the university. Sa’akom plans to offer hydroponic farming as a means to produce higher yields for Cambodian farmers.

And the work at Sa’akom is particularly personal for Vining; he was adopted from Cambodia at less than 1 year old. His American dads raised him in Worcester, Massachusetts, where he has been quarantining since GW moved to online classes in the spring.

While Vining says Sa’akom initially seemed like a project to be started later on in life, he decided that he didn’t want to delay giving back to his home country.

“I think for a long time I felt like I had to wait until I had some success somewhere else that had resources and had the capital I needed to start this,” Vining explained in an interview via Zoom. “But, I think the work at Ichosia kind of proved to me that it is hard, but you can start from scratch with very limited resources and still build a functioning organization.”

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The following interview was edited for clarity and brevity.

Celine Castronuovo: “Could you tell me more about yourself, your interests and how you got started working on your projects?”

Lucas Vining: “I'm a biology student and I'm thinking about doing an entrepreneurship minor. My first exposure to starting new ventures was not with Sa'akom, it was with my other company Ichosia Biotechnology. That company is working on a method of growing red blood cells from stem cells using genetic engineering. The idea is that if we can grow clinically significant quantities of blood cells with red blood cells, we wouldn't need to derive transfusion products from donors anymore. And if we take out donors from the equation, we can also take out all the donor-related risks so we can eliminate the risk of contamination, we can take out the risk of shortages and all of those sorts of things.

“So, that company and that work is based on research that I actually started as my senior thesis in high school. And that's not directly related to Sa'akom, but that's sort of where I got my start in entrepreneurship. The company was formed in September 2019, although we've been working as a commercial venture since May 2019 and I've been working on the research for three years or so now. And since then, we’ve certainly worked more on the research, but also a lot in fundraising. We did a series of business competitions, including George Washington University’s New Venture Competition, we did a couple of other DMV competitions, some national competitions, some international competitions, some government grants and all that. So, that's a bit of where my experience in creative ventures comes from, and I suppose that gave me the feeling that I have the ability to work on a nonprofit startup as well.

“And so, in late June of this year, my chief of staff at Ichosia, Carter Pew, and I wanted to create a new nonprofit venture to give back to Cambodia. What we realized is that one sector in Cambodia that has seen very little development is agriculture. As is the case in a lot of developing nations, there is not a centralized agricultural supply chain the way we have in the U.S. So, the majority of farms are small landholders and I think the average farm size is only one or two hectares. And so food is moved in from rural areas by, again, decentralized collectors into urban areas. A lot of people in those rural areas live on subsistence farming, and, you know, they don't use the modern technologies that we have in America, even things like tractors. It's all done manually. So, we realized that it's just a problem of productivity and a problem of efficiency. So, if we want to deliver value to the people in Cambodia, that has to start with money and delivering a higher wage, and the way to do that was to increase efficiency in their work. So that's how we got into hydroponics and vertical agriculture. At Ichosia it was a bit backwards; we had the technology first and then we found a market for it, whereas here, we identified a problem first and found a solution to it, which I think is arguably the better way to go in most endeavors. And so the idea with hydroponics is that a farmer working the same amount can produce double the crops and sell the cost for the same rate, but end up paying a farmer double their wage.”

CC: “Could you tell me more about why you chose Cambodia for the center of this project, the connection you felt there and why it was important for you to start this nonprofit?”

LV: “There's a lot of international development and many NGOs doing all sorts of things around the world— and don't get me wrong, a lot of them are doing really amazing work all over the world— but I think there's also a controversy about how productive they are. I think a lot of people believe that poverty hasn't gotten much better, which is not true, poverty rates have actually declined considerably. But, we wanted to innovate in a business model, because I think a lot of these NGOs take very similar approaches. We wanted to make a radical change that could be self-sustaining and that Carter and I felt our skill sets would be applicable. Carter and I are both bio majors and Carter is also a business student, but that's pretty far removed from international development. So, that was not our area of expertise, but what we felt was our area of expertise is making efficient systems, building business models, fundraising and sort of looking at the picture holistically: how can you build a sustainable business model while also making sure that we're delivering social value?

“In terms of why Cambodia, I think we're of the opinion that you have to start somewhere, you can't tackle the entire globe at once. And to a degree, it seems like as good a place as any. But on the other hand, for many years I have wanted to work to help build the economy in Cambodia. I decided that we didn't necessarily need to wait until we had all of this capital or prior experience. We could just get started.”

CC: “Can you tell me more about what you've been able to accomplish so far? And what are your goals for Sa’akom moving forward?”

LV: “So, we are not even two months old yet, and as you can imagine, working, trying to build a physical structure overseas, there's a lot that goes into it. So, what we are working to do now is looking to put ourselves in a position to bring on capital, whether that is from federal grants, if it's from philanthropy, solicitations for donation, whatever it happens to be, before we head off into Cambodia and start employing farmers and trying to sell crops, we want to make sure that we have a very good plan in place, make sure we have the contingencies in place to make sure to whatever degree is possible everything will flow smoothly, which I don't expect it to flow smoothly, but we're gonna do our best to make it work that way. And that includes a whole bunch of things. So, certainly logistics on the ground, you know, how big is the farm? What's going to grow? How many people are employed? Where do the water and electricity come from? All of that has to be figured out. That's not so much the fun part. We are also talking to people on the ground, talking to the farmers there, seeing what they want to see, how they feel that their lives can be made better. Talking to the food suppliers there, does anyone want to buy our crops? Do people care if it's organic? Do people care if it's grown in Cambodia versus imported? Is that something consumers think about?

“I think something that I've learned, and probably the most important thing for a new venture, is that even if the tech isn't great, the market isn't great, maybe it's not even a great idea, all of that can change if you have a really great team. So, that means making sure that we have that team dynamic and support in place for when things don't go smoothly, even though we planned it. And we've certainly started that plan. We've certainly started talking with people on the ground. We've just bought a small-scale farm hydroponic vertical farm. It only grows about 100 plants or so and it's been made of PVC pipes, so we've shipped that out to Carter in Oregon. Carter is going to run it for a few months so that we can understand the technical challenges of vertical hydroponic farming. I don't know exactly what the problems will be, but I'm sure there will be problems. So, we want to make sure that that the system works, so we have an estimated timeline, how long will the crops grow? How often does water need to be changed? We test that so if something goes wrong in Cambodia, at least we'll have some sort of idea how to fix it. And then, over the next few months, we're going to try to grow different crops trying to optimize those processes.”

CC: “Can you tell me more about what it's been like making connections in Cambodia and getting people there on the ground interested and invested in this technology?

LV: “I think Cambodia is a country that has been let down many times, certainly by the United States, by its government, other governments, you name it. So, I would say the reason that new farming technologies haven't been implemented yet is not for lack of trying. There's a lot of government oversight. It's also not a great place to grow anything really. For example, rice is the primary agricultural product in Cambodia, and it's my understanding that in the best cases, you can do two harvests in a year, versus in some parts of China, you can do three or four. So, it's not a great place for agriculture, which unfortunately, you have to deal with along with the effects of climate change and floods. But what we've found is that people, because of all that, are very skeptical of new technologies, and that's certainly not limited to agriculture, but also just broadly new technologies foreign intervention in general. I think, to a degree, to somebody in Cambodia, the idea that this project is going to work, that this American company is going to come and they're actually going to do good things and in a year we'll have a functioning system is sort of unfathomable.

“So, what we've been trying to do is build a business model that makes it such that farmers don't need to have incredible faith in what we're doing at first, and instead make something that people can do part time so that they're not dependent on us. Even if it doesn't work, we want to make sure that people won't lose their livelihoods. We're also certainly working to build relationships with other NGOs in the region, and a lot of those are American, so they have offices in the United States. So, we’re working with them, building those connections, seeing if they can help us make the connections to Cambodia. And there's a lot of challenges, not everyone has a cell phone in Cambodia, so we can't just call people up and ask them how they feel. It's certainly a challenge that we are working on very continuously and probably will be working on for quite a while, specifically how we can maintain those physical connections as well as interpersonal connections.”

CC: “What are some of the lessons you learned from starting your biotech startup and how did you use what you learned while starting Sa’akom?”

LV: “I would say two things. First, as I mentioned briefly earlier, is to make sure you have the team in place, make sure you have the advisor and make sure you are really truly leaning on them to support the organization. If the farm falls apart because we didn't put the PVC pipes together or whatever, we have a really good team and will figure out how to make it better. The diversity of thought is critical to setting up a complex organization and those advisors who have been doing this for years or decades, undisputedly they know more than we do so it's very important to make sure we have those insights. And I think at some point, it feels like we have everything under control. And there might be things going on in the background that are out of your control that you don't know about that will surprise you one day, and they will just show up. And there is going to be problem solving and I think your advisors can help you not be surprised by those things. And then again, your team will help you solve those things when you're surprised by them anyway.

“The other thing is to take advantage of every opportunity that you get. So, as college students, we're very fortunate that there's a lot of free money out there that's exclusively for college students, and academic grants and business competitions. So, at Ichosia, we probably applied to a few dozen and we had success in probably 10 or so. But, you don't win 100% of the things that you don't send an application for, so it doesn't doesn't hurt to try. And I think that goes for both operating and fundraising, all that stuff, as well as just starting a new organization. Again, my expertise is not in international development or Cambodia even. But hydroponic farming and vertical farming, it's technology, but it's not super technical. It's not that complex to a degree, it's sort of just you have pipes and water running through it, and most people can figure that out. So, hydroponics is also not my area of expertise, but especially in college, the worst thing that happens is it doesn't work. But on the very small percent chance that it does work, we can make a really big impact for a lot of people. And so, there's really not a reason not to just try it.”

CC: “Has this pandemic brought any challenges for you while launching this project?”

LV: “Yes and no. I don't think I feel any more challenged doing this than I would have otherwise. I think starting a new organization, whether that's a for-profit company, nonprofit company, a club, it's really hard. And they're going to be a lot of challenges that come your way and it can be a lot of surprises. And I think, to a degree, the COVID pandemic is just another one of those.

It’s one of the things that we have to deal with and adapt to and figure out how to work around. It certainly ranked high on the list of surprises. But nonetheless, it's just one of those surprises. I think it has certainly made things different. But, I don't know that it made things more challenging. I think it's just that the set of challenges would have been different if I was in person. For example, I was supposed to be in DC for the summer and if you're working in international development, DC is probably one of the best places on Earth to be. So, with COVID, it turns out it wasn't, but at the same time, everyone switched to Zoom calls. So, you know, in a way it kind of opened up being able to make connections beyond just DC. And at Ichosia we were placed in the finals for three or four competitions. That didn't happen. But, on the other hand, the National Science Foundation added $10,000 to our grant that we weren't expecting. So, it is certainly a different time. But, I didn't see COVID and I don't think anyone else should see COVID as a barrier to starting new projects. It's just a different situation.”

CC: “So, I don't really know anyone else our age who has launched a tech startup and an international nonprofit. How have your friends and family reacted to these projects and how have they supported you?”

LV: “I think it's really interesting the way reactions go. When I started building just the tech, I thought, I thought that tech was going to be developed in academia. We applied for a GW undergraduate research award, and looking back on it now, it was only $5,000. I have no idea how I planned to do anything with that money. But you know, we didn't get it. So, that's why we decided to move into a commercial venture. But when we first started the tech I was 17, almost 18 and people were like, 'oh, cool. Lucas has an idea.' And then after a year, that kind of transitioned to, ‘okay, Lucas's ideas are a little bit more than ideas, it’s his blood project,’ and then my dads were telling me to become a doctor. And for a long time it existed and my dads were like, ‘okay, that's great, do your thing, it's probably not gonna work, just make sure your GPA isn't horrible.’ And then we got some money from major research universities, from the federal government and people were like, ‘oh, so this blood project might have some merit to it.’ And then we found a lot of backing from friends and family. Then there was a real transition from ‘Lucas's blood project’ to Ichosia Biotechnology.

“What I think is really interesting is that now that I've started Sa'akom, it's exactly the same. People are like, ‘oh yeah, Lucas, that's an idea.’ I think the first time, that response was completely reasonable. You know, the expectation shouldn't necessarily have been high. Second time, I think there's a little bit more basis for belief. But nonetheless, it's still a high risk endeavor. But, I think in general people have been very supportive. Even if they don't necessarily believe it's going to work, which is fair because the odds of a startup working are pretty low, even if they don't necessarily believe that it's going to be the next Amazon or the next Microsoft or Apple or whatever, people are still very willing to be supportive. But it's also great that people offer criticisms, especially when they ask, ‘where is your funding coming from? How are people going to react to genetic engineering? How are you going to get to Cambodia in COVID?’ I think it's very important that we're not taking those criticisms as being put down, but incorporating them into our thought processes as we're planning out.”

CC: “Do you see yourself continuing the work on both of these projects after graduation?”

LV: “Yeah, certainly. I think that's supposed to be the best outcome. For Ichosia, we're dealing with FDA regulation, and you have to go through a full-scale clinical trial. So, that could be another many years. I don't expect to have a marketable product by graduation. And then with Sa'akom, I'm hoping that when I graduate we will have put together just enough to prove to someone with a lot of money that it will make sense on a large scale. Then after that, I think it's less of me doing everything and, instead, building a much bigger team from five people to 50 people, or whatever happens to make sense. But, I think it’s work that I really love doing at both organizations. And I love the dynamic aspect to what we do. Especially as a small organization, if we have an idea on Monday, we can have it implemented on Tuesday. You don't have to go through however many executives that you might have to go through at a really large corporation. I love that.

“We don't necessarily work on typical industry schedules. We do a lot of work outside of nine to five. Some people on my team at Ichosia who are not students have full time-jobs. But we are all really passionate about the work, and so we are all going to be really passionate about that work irrespective of what happens to be going on in our lives.”

CC: “What advice would you have for other young people who may want to start their own nonprofit or small business but don't know where to start or think they might be too young?”

LV: “So, I think in tech, certainly one of the biggest barriers I faced is that I'm 20 years old. I started working on the technology for Ichosia when I was 17 years old. And in academia, I think it's fair to say that you have to have a PhD or an MD for anybody to take you seriously. And I was not particularly keen on the idea of waiting another eight or 10 years, or however long it might happen to be for me to get my PhD to start doing this work that I truly believed that if it indeed worked, it could really have a world-changing impact. It could save lives. So, I didn't really want to wait.

“So, what you have to do is you just have to go prove that you can do it. And the thing is that you don't need everybody else telling you you can do it to go and prove that you can do it. And even in tech, if you prove you can do it, it doesn't matter if you have the degree anymore once we started making red blood cells. No one cared what letters came after my name. So, the most valuable thing that you can do if you're thinking about starting any kind of organization or any kind of project or research is to just go and start. There are probably better ways to do it than others. They're starting places, but the thing is, if you just start wherever you want to start, you will find better ways, you will find advisors and mentors to point you in the right direction. No matter where you start, you'll end up at the same place.

“I would recommend that you start with a human centered design, and the general idea of that is you want to make sure you're not doing something that nobody will care about. I think that's one of the biggest reasons startups fail, especially out of these great labs, these great research universities is that really brilliant scientists come up with these incredible technologies, but then it turns out that no one wants to buy them, so they never make it to the market. And it makes for a great research paper, but if all you want to do is make great research papers, I would recommend you go get your PhD, and what have you. But, something that you can do, really, no matter how old you are, as long as you have a cell phone or someone who has this already, is you can just start calling people. Open Google, open the phone book, talk to people, figure out what they want and that is progress and nonprofit or for profit investors will look at that. Grant decision makers will look at that if you can say, ‘we spoke to 10, 50 or a hundred people who might be potential customers, who might be potential beneficiaries, stakeholders, and they said they really want us to do this.’ That shows that you have initiative, that shows, that you have some degree of planning capabilities and that shows that you can, in fact, do something, which will make people believe in you. And it's just having conversations. Most people, no matter how old you are, can have conversations. So, that's an excellent place to start. And it doesn't sound like a lot, but when you go and talk to people who you want things from, they will see that and know that that has a lot of value.”

CC: “So, my last question is something I am asking everyone in this profile series. I wanted to put this project together to highlight young people who, during a really chaotic and uncertain time, are still creating really amazing projects. What do you think that says about this generation?”

LV: “I think one of the most important characteristics of an entrepreneur or a leader is that to a degree, they're a bit delusional; they believe beyond any doubt that whatever they're doing will work. Even if you might look at it objectively and there's a low probability statistically that it will work, they believe that it'll work. I think that's something that our generation is very good at, being delusional beyond any kind of doubt. In a lot of cases that isn't great, but I think in this case, it is great. If everyone looked at the statistical probability that a startup works, no one would start them. So, that level of belief is something really important. I think our generation has been inspired by a lot of people, even outside of startups, who have taken really small organizations to have really great long-lasting impacts, and we're able to take that as inspiration to prove that it can be done. Even if it's done once out of 100,000 times, it can be done. And I think a lot of people feel like if it can be done, then they can do it.”

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