From Startup to Successful Exit: Lessons from a Healthcare Entrepreneur | Jan Heybroek, Ep 03
Episode Summary
Jan Heybroek shares his 17-year journey building and selling a medical market research company to a medical education firm in 2021. He discusses the M&A process, post-acquisition integration challenges, healthcare industry trends including personalized medicine and AI diagnostics, and lessons learned about transparency, perseverance, and the value of fractional executive talent for scaling startups.
Pull Quotes
“Until the deal is signed and the money is wired, the deal is not done. Not done till it's done.”
On post-acquisition integration
“I think you will always have hiccups and if there's good transparency and good communication, then you should be able to work through it.”
On the challenge of decompressing after an exit
“You really need a break. You need a clean break from that whole process, from the company, and that I'm not talking about a week off or two weeks off. I think you need a longer break than that. But how can you manage that correctly with the right messaging to your people, to the new company, to your customers?”
On healthcare disruption
“Has something meaningful truly kind of upsetting the industry happened yet, like Uber to taxis or Airbnb to hotel reservations? Not yet, I don't think it's there yet.”
“Your mindset is really focused on your success and you have a team of people that work with you, but they're not incented in the same way. Their vision is not going to be as long as yours.”
Transcript
Hi welcome to Tales From The Sky Lounge, a podcast about consulting, management and venture investing. We get out there in the world and we talk to people who are making it happen, traveling, seeing the customers and having experience in the market. So today we have Yan Heybrook in the Sky Lounge. Welcome Yan.
Hey Todd, good to see you again.
Good to see you. So Yan, you are in the exec ops practice at TechCXO. Why don't you tell us a little bit about your background?
Sure, thank you for having me. It's good to do this, not in the Sky Lounge but in the comfort of our own home offices. I'm a partner with exec ops for TechCXO and help scaling companies do a better job at scaling up than what I experienced myself being an entrepreneur, working as a CEO or chief revenue officer, to really bring best practices to these companies and help them accelerate more quickly.
So one of the really significant things that formed your experience in your career is you had a company that you started and ran. You want to tell us a little bit about that?
Want to go deeper?
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