Sanjiv Lal is a former Eli Lilly drug rep who went on to own labs, hotels, and the Beverly Hills Rejuvenation Center, and Stu introduces him as a nine-figure founder. He co-founded Regen Therapy and the Motive family office, and he lives in West Hollywood after growing up in Parma, Ohio, to Punjabi parents. In this conversation he and Stu talk about fear, building a team that turns down LabCorp, a hospital stay that changed his mission, and how his family office buys businesses only if it can run them.

What he covers:

→ Generating about $15M in revenue for a California startup and getting paid a small piece of it

→ Being offended when people called his territory a "great job": "Bro, this is my business"

→ Buying a failing genetic lab in Covington, Kentucky, on a handshake over dinner in Cincinnati, with a full business plan handed to his partner Nigel and a 50% stake of his own

→ Growing up Punjabi in Parma, Ohio, where the plan was doctor, lawyer, or pharmacist and the line was "you don't own a hotel" (he owns hotels now)

→ Stu's text to a young man deciding whether to take a big risk, built around a sentence that starts "I'm afraid that" and 2 Timothy 1:7

→ Sanjiv's claim that only two fears are born into us, loud noises and falling, and everything else is learned

→ Why he calls people "wage slaves" to a $60-70K salary they're afraid to lose

→ Competing with LabCorp for hires with mission, mutual interviews, and stay-at-home moms who took "a flier" on a startup

→ Renting a semi-pro baseball field so his employees' families could have a picnic with bounce houses and free concessions

→ Four days in the ICU, then stage 3 kidney disease, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease, and the overseas regenerative medicine he says changed his life

→ Realizing he'd made money on the billing side of sickness: ICD-10 codes, revenue cycle management, and being "worth something" to everyone when he was a patient

→ Why his family office only buys what it can operate: Beverly Hills Rejuvenation Center in March 2025, partner Sam Brooks running it day to day, and hotels where average daily rate is the lever

🔗 CONNECT WITH STU

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Website: https://startupswithstu.com

📌 CHAPTERS

00:00 – Intro: third recording of the day, West Hollywood, and Parma roots

03:00 – Lilly drug rep, then $15M in revenue for a startup and a small cut

07:00 – "People kept calling it a job": the decision to own

09:00 – The handshake deal for a failing genetic lab in Covington, Kentucky

13:00 – Growing up Punjabi: doctor, lawyer, pharmacist, and "you don't own a hotel"

15:00 – Fear: Stu's text message and 2 Timothy 1:7

19:00 – Two innate fears, wage slaves, and being happy but unhappy

24:00 – Wanting the ball: ego, humble pie, and 180 people counting on him

27:00 – Beating LabCorp for hires with mission and mutual interviews

30:00 – The baseball field picnic for employees' families

31:00 – The ICU stay and the mission change

35:00 – Regen Therapy: bringing regenerative medicine to every state

38:00 – Aging, "find out who you are first," and Sanjiv's mantra

42:00 – Joy span: Stu's dad hiking and why run clubs work

45:00 – The Motive family office: owner-operators, Beverly Hills Rejuvenation Center, and hotels

50:00 – Where to follow Sanjiv and closing

⚠️ Note: Timestamps are estimated from transcript flow. Swap to actual timecodes before publishing.

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