I used to work at a private investment fund as a data engineer for building in house models to evaluate drug programs and biotech companies. We took a pretty varied approach with catalysts, investment data, people data, trial data, but also analyses on the molecule and drug itself. It was a lot of work and I really don't think we made a dent into understanding what succeeds and what doesnt. Also investors in biotech are really underwriting the biology. Its why they mostly invest in fast follow or me toos rather than new technology or new therapies. The work was a bit sad and less exciting than I thought.
That's interesting. I am curious, what kind of analyses did you work with on the molecule and drug itself? Was it like mostly reading papers/patents or did your team do anything experimental?