Victoria Costa Paz spent much of her early career building digital products for fintech companies. Her job involved translating business needs into technical requirements, whether that meant developing software features or automating compliance processes. When she later encountered a scientific team in Uruguay working on biological production of psilocybin, she saw a similar challenge in a very different industry.

Today, as co-founder and CEO of Eywa Biotech, Costa Paz is working to turn that research into a commercially viable manufacturing process. The company uses engineered microorganisms to produce psilocybin and is developing software to support psychedelic-assisted therapy. Both efforts depend on solving practical problems that laboratory breakthroughs alone cannot address.

A Scientific Breakthrough Still Needs a Business Model

Eywa’s manufacturing approach uses engineered E. coli bacteria as biological production machinery. Instead of relying on conventional chemical synthesis or extracting psilocybin from mushrooms, the company uses fermentation to produce the compound.

Costa Paz explains that the underlying science is only one part of the challenge. A microorganism might successfully produce psilocybin in a laboratory, but that achievement has limited commercial value if the resulting process costs more than existing production methods.

The critical question is whether Eywa can maintain productive yields as manufacturing volumes increase. A process that works in a small, two-liter bioreactor may behave differently when transferred to equipment holding hundreds or thousands of liters.

Eywa’s team must also purify the material produced during fermentation. Costa Paz describes transforming a mixture containing bacteria and fermentation byproducts into purified psilocybin, reporting that the company has achieved 99.8% purity. The company has an exclusive global license through a collaboration with Miami University to scale the laboratory technology.

For Costa Paz, commercial success depends on getting the manufacturing economics right. Higher yields, consistent quality, and manageable production costs must eventually work together.

Scaling Production Means Finding the Right Partners

Manufacturing pharmaceutical ingredients introduces requirements that extend beyond scientific performance. Eywa needs facilities with suitable fermentation equipment, appropriate authorization to handle controlled substances, and the ability to operate under Good Manufacturing Practice standards when producing material for human use.

Finding a partner that satisfies all three requirements is difficult. The facility must also have available capacity and commercial terms that make sense for a startup.

Costa Paz says the difference between startup timelines and those of established pharmaceutical manufacturers creates additional pressure. A large contract manufacturer may consider a month between responses routine, while a young company continues spending money throughout that delay.

Her approach relies heavily on experienced specialists who understand pharmaceutical manufacturing and facility qualification. Much of Eywa’s international due diligence can now happen remotely, with technical experts reviewing documentation and inspecting facilities through video calls.

This allows the team to evaluate potential manufacturing partners in Australia without making every assessment an expensive international trip. It also makes the quality of the questions and the experience of the people asking them especially important.

Why the Team Sometimes Stops Running Experiments

Costa Paz sees data analysis as an essential part of improving fermentation. Each batch generates information about the conditions under which microorganisms grow and produce the desired compound.

Temperature, movement inside the bioreactor, and other operating variables can affect the results. Recording those conditions allows Eywa’s scientists to compare experiments and identify adjustments worth testing.

The company incorporates data analytics and AI models into this work, combining experimental results with scientific literature. Costa Paz recalls a period when the team had been running fermentation batches continuously before deciding to stop laboratory work for a week and concentrate on analyzing the accumulated data.

That decision reflects the practical demands of scaling biotechnology. Running more experiments is useful only when the team understands what earlier experiments revealed.

The goal is to return to the laboratory with better-informed procedures, improving the likelihood that subsequent batches will deliver stronger and more consistent results.

Connecting Manufacturing With Patient Care

Eywa is also developing WALO, a digital platform intended to support therapists and patients during psychedelic-assisted treatment.

Costa Paz explains that such treatment typically includes several preparation sessions, the supervised dosing experience, and further sessions to integrate what the patient experienced. Those appointments can make treatment expensive and difficult to access, particularly when patients must travel to a clinic.

WALO is designed to support the periods between appointments. Patients can record their sleep, emotions, daily activities, and journal entries, giving therapists more information about changes occurring between sessions. Costa Paz says the platform encrypts its data and uses AI to help therapists interpret patient information.

The company is exploring opportunities in Australia, where certain authorized psychiatrists can prescribe psilocybin under specific legal conditions. Costa Paz also sees potential applications for WALO in conventional therapy, although Eywa is still identifying the appropriate audience for that use.

Her broader ambition is to connect more parts of the psychedelic treatment industry. That includes manufacturers, clinics, educators, and healthcare professionals who currently operate in relatively separate areas.

Costa Paz believes future progress will depend on cooperation as well as technical advances. Eywa’s work illustrates why: producing a pharmaceutical ingredient, qualifying a manufacturing partner, and helping patients access appropriate care are different challenges, but each affects whether the technology can ultimately be useful.

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