Inspired with Alexa von Tobel
00:33:49 · Alexa von Tobel, Ben Lamm, Alexa von Tobel
[00:33:49] S1: I mean, Ben, do you even, like, especially since you're only genetically, like, 35 years old, do you pinch yourself and you're like, literally, what am I doing with my life? Like, I mean, if you... It is it is genuinely mind blowing that you are bringing back extinct animals. You're de extincting them, but someone did ask me. They're like, is that a word? And was like, I think Ben made it a word. De extincting. [00:34:12] S2: I think we added, like, the e d and the I n g, but, like, Jurassic Park, like, you know, de extinct... Yeah. De extinction is kind of a thing, I guess. So... [00:34:19] S1: Yes. There you go. [00:34:21] S0: If you are on a startup or you're doing things like managing investors, issuing equity or getting valuations, then we suggest taking a look at Carta. Carta has built an entire connected suite of tools that's designed to help you manage equity, stay compliant with the IRS, and provide unprecedented transparency to your investors. Whether you're hashing out early ownership with your co founders or getting ready to exit, Carta speaks startup. There's a reason they're the industry standard for cap tables, four ninety eight's, and stock comp expense accounting. So if you're not managing equity on Carta already, we recommend you check them out. To learn more or get started, visit carta.com. [00:34:56] S1: So when these three direwolves, Romulus, Remus, and Khaleesi, like, what happens next? I know that you, like, let them grow. I think they were safely being... Like, letting them, you know, actually get big. What happens now?
00:35:13 · Ben Lamm
[00:35:13] S2: We have them on a secure expansive ecological reserve, that's certified by American Humane Society. So going back to, like, the earlier parts of the conversation, it's like, oh, yeah. We need land for these animals. Oh, yeah. We need secure facilities for these animals. Oh, we should probably work with, like, top animal care people. Right? So there's... There are a lot of these things. We... Right before we launched the business, I was... Our chief animal chief animal officer, Matt James, had not joined the company. And I called George. I got an introduction to this guy. They're like, no. He's your guy. He is literally the guy you should have. And and I called George Church. He's like, do you think we should hire someone that's, like, taking care of an elephant before? And and like going back to the naiveness, right, at the early stages. Right? And so it's like, yeah. We should hire someone that's that's actually like birthed elephants, taking care of them, understand herd dynamics and socialization of elephants. Right? So so these are all these things that we've learned along the way. Right? But those... The the the two boys are on the preserve. Khaleesi is about to get integrated into that pack. We will be engineering probably on the low side three, on the high side five, just get the right pack like size. But they live an incredible life. Right? They have 10 full time care professionals there. They also have a... And and we've, like, taken them from, like, bottle feeding to feedings, and now they're doing carcass feeding and then and then probably some predation and some hunting. But it will probably be all some level of managed care for a long time. It's not available to the public or anything. And then our goal is to study them, learn from them, and then also we have built a very long term rewilding plan. But the the rewilding of any species, you have to take indigenous people groups, federal agencies, the public at large. Right? Like, there's some misconceptions about wolves out there in in general. Right? They kinda get a bad rap, but they're incredibly important for the ecosystem. And so they will live out their natural lives on this large ecological preserve, and then potentially future generations could be rewilded if that's what other people want. So we don't push the rewilding agenda. It's that's...
00:37:23 · Ben Lamm, Alexa von Tobel
If if that's something that that that is wanted, like in the case of the dire wolf, one of our... We had several different indigenous partners and one of them being MHA nation, which is three nations that came together. It's actually in their oral traditions in in in their culture. They think that it may have been the gray wolf or... Sorry. The the the great wolf in their in their cultures. So they're very, very... They're excited about eventually, could they have them on a secure ecological reserve back on their sovereign land? And so for us, we just wanna collaborate in any way that people want to. [00:37:57] S1: Okay. Ben, I'm gonna ask, like, super to your point of, like, you're comfortable asking really dumb questions. I'm gonna ask mine. Now that you're observing them, what's, like, the thing that you're observing that you could be most excited about? And what are the... What's... What are you observing that you're worried about?
00:38:10 · Ben Lamm
[00:38:10] S2: There was an inflection point that changed for me because right before launch, you know, we... In this world of, like, generative AI, we wanted people to see them, but we also didn't want there to be, like, a travel receipt to a certain location. Right? And so we actually moved them to another location to let a couple of key people see them like, you know, Time and and and Rolling Stone and New York and a few others. So we we felt like, hey, we got a lot of some people see them, so it's like, don't just take our word for it. Like, you come see them, spend a day with us and and and whatnot. And right after they got back, like, I was back where they were two and a half weeks after that. And I was I was in the preserve. Right? And some of my animal care teams were like, you know, I don't know, 50, 100 yards away. And I was and I was sitting in the in this... In the... In one of their play areas. And Remus came up to it, came up like kind of close to me and I bottle fed Romulus and Remus. And so like I reached out and I pet Remus, barely touched Remus because, you know, Remus came to me. And then and then Remus, like, kinda step... Took a few steps and then kinda like started acting like a wolf. Right? Like, kinda like jumped away, like, like a little... Like, like, moved a little bit and it was a little skittish. And so there was a moment, you know, like you you can never forget that these animals are still wild animals. Right? These are still wolves. These are not dogs. And so that was a moment for me where I was like, I'm never going to pet or touch or probably be this close to them again because they're now starting to behave more and more like wolves. Like when they're fluffy, you know, polar bear looking puppies, they're like... You're kinda like, oh, this is like... You you you... I think it it falsifies the relationship on some level. So I I think I was pleasantly surprised that... And that... And our behavioral team is pleasantly surprised how fast they are adapting to be nearly wild wolves. Only only one of our key caretakers, she... That... Who's with them literally every day, at least six days a week. There's... Like she's the only one that that has that level of a relationship still. And remember this this was only a few months ago, right? Like a few months before, like they were, like, falling in my lap. Right?
00:40:36 · Ben Lamm, Alexa von Tobel
And so and so so that was that that was the thing that, you know, I... You know, our animal care team told me that we would... If things were going healthily with their development, they would get to. But then there was that moment where I kind of experienced it firsthand. Was like, I don't think I'm ever gonna be in the preserve again. [00:40:57] S1: Yeah. You're like wild wolves, like, literally. [00:41:00] S2: Yeah. Like, this is this is a good... This has been great, and I love you guys, but I'm gonna I'm gonna respect you from my my distance. Right? And so, but that was something that that, you know, I I think that was both sides of of your question. [00:41:13] S1: When you think five to ten years out with what you're doing, what's the what's the end state? What's the end goal here? And, obviously, you've created an incredible AI infrastructure that cannot only code extinct animals, then create this bridge to the most, you know, similar living species. And then in it, I I heard you say, you know, synthetic wounds and all these incredible other things. But is... And so so what's the business model? And, like, what's the... What's your hope and dream been for what you're building five to ten years out?
00:41:47 · Ben Lamm
[00:41:47] S2: So I'll talk about the hope and dream and then we can talk business. But hope and dream, if we fast forward ten years out, I hope that we have a handful of species that we have brought back with enough engineered genetic diversity that they can successfully thrive and live and thrive on their own back in their natural habitat or something very close to it. Right? So so that that's data point one. The second thing that I think is equally important is I hope we we're seeing mass adoption much quicker than we thought with our technologies to conservation. But I hope that that a combination of those tools and technologies, including things like artificial wounds and bio banking all come together so that this de extinction toolkit that's super cool to bring back things like mammoths and thylacines, and hopefully even species like Steller's sea cow and others that we can't yet because we don't have waste ingesting them. I hope that same application is being applied in real time for endangered species. And, know, I don't... And once again, sometimes this is an unpopular opinion, I'm... I still am convicted about it regardless of whether it's it's it's popular or not. Like, while 99.9% of the world should be focusing on existing or slightly innovative new ways for conservation, there is 1%, which I think should be us, that is is developing some level of a fail safe. And if we can get to the point which we can take samples, engineering genetic diversity, and then use artificial wombs to grow a 100 Northern White Rhinos versus even having to use surrogates, right, from an animal welfare perspective, from a population growth perspective. You know, if we could help production... Use these tools to help productionize endangered species, well, then I think that we will get recovery of species much faster. And that's not to take away from the incredible work that current conservation has done for the last hundred years. It's just new tools to help augment the fight. Right? Because it is currently a losing fight. So a world where a little kid can see videos or go to, you know, Northern America or Alaska or wherever and see, you know, mammoths thriving back in their population and also see a... Those technologies being applied to create a more biodiverse world in Africa with Northern White Rhinos and those same technologies being applied to both.