TL;DR

The landscape of oral peptides is rapidly evolving, driven by advancements in delivery systems and a deeper understanding of bioavailability. This discussion highlights that the ‘solution’ for successful oral peptide products is multifaceted, involving not just the peptide itself, but also sophisticated engineering of particles tailored to specific market segments and desired outcomes. For businesses, this means a strategic choice: either leverage enhanced bioavailability to create a premium, highly efficacious product, or optimize for a lower input cost to achieve competitive pricing. The ability to significantly improve a peptide’s absorption—potentially by factors of 30 or more—opens up opportunities for both superior efficacy and cost-effectiveness, even allowing for a desirable blend of both. A critical takeaway for any buyer or partner in this space is the absolute necessity of rigorous lab testing to verify product legitimacy, potency, and integrity of raw materials and the final product. The best providers will offer verifiable lab tests and support in navigating the complexities of quality management and technology validation, ensuring that the consumer receives precisely what is promised, without making any medical claims.

Engineering Solutions for Enhanced Peptide Delivery

Will: Well, let me let me start with the short answer and then back up and give you some context, which I think the context is important because it’ll help identify who we should be talking to in that conversation. Well, the short answer may be there is no short answer, but I would say the short answer is it’s really about the solution, because there’s a lot that goes into the solution, as we discussed, over the course of the last hour or so. It’s not just the peptide, it’s, what do you want the peptide to do? Is the peptide in an oral form? Is that oral form a gummy? Would you rather have it in a stick pack, mixed into a drink? Is there some other delivery system? We have multiple companies in the Tesseract Life Sciences ecosystem.

Will: And we engineer particles and are very specific about how we do that based on the market segment, based on the intended audience, based on what we want that particle to do. What does it need to do once it’s deployed? Are we engineering it for solubility, dispersion, shelf life, something else?, what is what does our partner need from that pattern? And then how are they going to use it? How does it fit into their business?, what is their business? What is their competition? How are they trying to grow their business? Is this the first of a portfolio of products? And that brings me, so the answer there is that it’s it’s a really multi-dimensional, multifaceted discussion. Because I think, unlike other businesses, we put ourselves in our partners’ shoes and we really preferred to help them think through their own business challenges.

Will: Which brings me to the second point of the, point of the answer. We started off years ago when I founded this company with Al Zap, who was the founder of Thorn.

And we thought we were a supplement company. That’s the business we went into. And Al, for those of you who have met him, he is absolutely a genius. A wild, crazy, sometimes uncontrollable genius. I absolutely love him. And I think most people who know him have very strong visceral reaction to him. He’s just a fantastic person in a lot of ways. And he focuses exclusively on innovation around formulations and molecules and what we can do with them. And we have some great patents as a result of his work. But I think we realized over a little time that We could and should be doing a lot more than putting capsules out in a bottle under our practitioner label.

Will: And we acquired what is now advanced powder dynamics. And with that, we acquired a tremendous capability with our drawing technology. And that opened up a new door for us. It opened up the ability to really be creative and innovative. In the types of technologies we worked with in powder engineering. And since then, I think my view of what we are has completely evolved. And it seems that we are as much an innovation company as anything else. And right now and at any one time, Uli and Hendrik can tell you, we are now working on a ton of ideas, not because we’ll Being asked to work on them by the market or customers, but because we have ideas. We’re working on a number of new pieces of equipment. We’re working on a number of new products.

Will: We’re working on a number of really interesting concepts that may or may not lead to different types of patents. But we’re working on them just because they occur to us in all the things that we’re seeing. And we share those ideas with clients all the time.

And it leads to new product ideas for them, revenue. For them, great partnerships for us over time. And that’s how we’re building our ecosystem. And that’s precisely the higher value conversation that every potential customer or partner should be having with us. It’s not about a powder, it’s where are they trying to take their business?

Ulli: And maybe they should be taking their business somewhere even greater than they’ve imagined. But that comes out of the conversation with us. I want to give you an example that is maybe specific to peptides. For example, if you assume that the let’s say you have a peptide that, and this is a financial, I’m having a financial conversation, which I know marketing is famous for having financial conversations. Enjoy. Sometimes in a positive way. Yes. If you have a peptide that is 10% bioavailable. The way it’s usually administered. Okay. And then you keep in mind that maybe one gram of that peptide costs $45,000. Okay. Peptides, as we’ve spoken about before, are measured in microgram, not in milligrams, but in micrograms.

Ulli: And so even if it’s only two or three micrograms of that peptide in the formulation, let’s say a gummy or a capsule. Or whatever, it’s still extremely expensive., there are many different price points available in the marketplace. However, as an example, maybe on average a supplement ingredient costs a hundred dollars a kilo. A kilo are a thousand grams. If this is if this is forty-five thousand dollars a gram, it’s Got a lot more zeros and it’s a lot more expensive. No matter if you go down to the micrograms, it doesn’t matter, it’s expensive. Yeah, our technology is able to what we see with one of our flagship products is a tripeptide, it’s acetyl glutathione.

The Bioavailability Equation: Efficacy vs. Cost

Ulli: We can increase glutathione blood levels from two percent, and keep in mind glutathione. Is a peptide from two percent without any technology to on average 67% with our delivery technology. Good. If you usually use three micrograms of a peptide at 10% bioavailability, and you can improve that by factor 30, then you have two options. Either price that product at a massive premium because it delivers so much more efficacy, or you price it, but your input price has to can be much lower because you can create the same effect with a much smaller dose. That’s where when we talk about value, we talk about quality and safety and efficacy and in business, it’s about the money, right?

Ulli: It’s the ability and the propensity of people to pay for someone you’re doing. And so there’s this value equation where depending on what the company we’re working with is looking to do, you can either have the most efficacious, most super premium, like most sought-after, like the bomb peptide, or you can be as efficacious as everybody else, but you be much more competitive and pressing.

And that difference between the profit margin for that company that is selling that peptide is bigger than it is today. That’s the value we add.

Will: Yeah even somewhere in that equation I’m sure even lies the ability to have something that is almost both, that is both more effective as well As more competitive in price because you’re able to create such a gap there. No, it’s that’s such a cool way of thinking about it. I totally get what you mean from the marketing perspective. Like it is a very it is a very from the marketing perspective and from the financial side.

Ulli: Yeah, marketing is usually not famous for considering profit. The marketing discipline is very famous to always want to spend money. But I do think that marketing really is about creating. Creating value for customers or consumers. And so that’s what we do.

Critical Questions for Oral Peptide Buyers

Will: I think a good marketing director considers cogs, but I love that. So we only really have one question left, and I it’s it’s it’s a question about a question, but what questions should a serious buyer ask before trusting an oral peptide? Or a peptide gummy ingredient platform.

Ulli: Yeah, that’s a great question., the first and most important consideration is has this product undergoing lab testing so they know that they’re getting a legitimate product? We’re still at the stage where the infrastructure the industry is not in place, products are still questionable. There’s a few coming from the US, but the vast majority are coming from outside the US, principally Asia. And they are not to be trusted. For the time being, there is no trust., trust but verify maybe is the rule. And the best providers are going to have links to Recent verifiable lab test to prove that the consumer, the patient, is getting what they believe they’re getting. Check the labs, check the dates, make sure it matches on lot number.

The Future of Peptide Formulations: Beyond Capsules

Ulli: That’s the number one thing. Second thing is check return policies, etc. You want to make sure that if there is a problem, you can go back to the source. Beyond that, I would say make sure. Sure, that it matches your needs and your plans. We’ve said before in one of our conversations that people get carried away. There’s a lot of enthusiasm right now. These are very powerful ingredients, very powerful products, the peptides. And so there is too much of a good thing. Make sure what you’re doing. Follow the instructions. Don’t overdose just because you think that more is better, more is not better. Make sure that you have all the information on what you are supposed to be doing in terms of dosage, which really means make sure you’re doing this under doctor supervision.

Ulli: And that’s that’s very important because health is health is at stake. And beyond that, of course, we would encourage people to find and seek out Tesseract for partnership. We continue to believe that we have the most advanced systems. To help brands, doctors, clinics, and the value chain create the best alternatives for the market, which is the long-term goal, I think, for us and the market, to serve the needs of patients. And ultimately, serious buyers, if they’re buying from a business perspective, should look for the best technology systems. And we’re here for those conversations.

Ulli: Yeah. I really have only one thing to add, especially from a consumer perspective. If it’s if it’s seems to be too good to be true, it probably isn’t. It probably is too good to be true.

And so, there’s a hyperb hyperbole in the market right now. It’s not a good thing to believe that, it’s not a good thing to trust that with your body, you only have one. Keep it keep it a little bit on keep it smart. Yeah. Hendrik, you were gonna add something as well?

Hendrik: Yeah, I agree with Will. This is a this is critically important question to ask. And experience has taught us that most customers do not know what questions to ask. And it’s it’s part of our company policy is to help customers, with product Innovation to expand their products, expand their skills and the product lines. And part of the process is helping them asking the correct questions, because that is how you build trust. Trust, absolutely agree with well, absolutely critically important. How do you build trust? You have to ask the right questions. And it starts with your quality management system. Do you have the right certifications? Do you have the cleaning and the sanitation procedures?

Hendrik: Processes in place? Do you have batch control? Do you have deviation procedures? How often does your facility get audited, by a third party? The quality side is critically important. Secondly, is from a technology perspective, Will mentioned that, the best technology. And customers need to understand how do you determine what is the best technology? And these aspects that we just mentioned previously,. Control over moisture content and water activity, exposure or minimum exposure to heat and a control time exposure over heat. You should you the customer should know how to ask those questions. They should know what is expected from the final product with regards to moisture content, particle size, water activity, potency levels.

Hendrik: What are the potency levels?

What are the potency levels that you expect? What are the potency levels during the process maybe., you want to see integrity in the in the materials, the raw materials, and you want to see integrity in the final product. And we support customers during the process and help them to ask the right questions specifically related to the quality side of the process, the quality management systems, the correct certifications And then with related to the technology, why is your technology the best? What is the expectations and can you achieve that?

Will: Very true. Well, guys, we covered a lot of ground today. Overall, that’s that’s all of my questions. We put a lot of very helpful information out for both consumers as well as brands looking to get into the peptide space today. Is there anything else that you guys want to add after having gone through all that?

Ulli: The only thing on my mind is I’m gonna go in the other room and get some of our prototype gummies because this has made me hungry.

Will: All right. Well, thank you guys so much for this. This is really a solid, solid one today. We’ll be back again soon, but for now, I think that we’re We’re signing off for the day. All right. Thank you.

Ulli: Thanks everybody.

Hendrik: Thank you very much.

Ulli: Thank you. Great day.

Hendrik: Thank you. Bye.