Stories
Beyond Success: A Fireside Chat on Failure, Trust, and Resilience
More than 150 participants gathered at GoCo Health Innovation City for Blue Day for Men’s Health to talk about the stories behind success. Welcoming Mikael Kubista, Erik Gatenholm and Hector Martinez, who shared personal insights shaped by years of building companies, facing setbacks and leading through change.
This Fireside Chat, presented in two parts at GoCo House, opened with a clear sense of anticipation among participants. Sessions like these are designed to create genuine opportunities for people to meet, exchange experiences and learn from one another across roles and backgrounds. As part of Blue Days, GoCo’s initiative to highlight International Men’s Day, the session addressed themes closely tied to men’s health: experiences of leadership, pressure, and the realities behind building a company. What happens when a business developed over decades is suddenly placed in legal and structural jeopardy? How do founders respond when an industry shifts from rapid expansion to immediate contraction?
Mikael Kubista: When You Lose What You Built
Mikael Kubista is a well-known profile in Swedish life sciences, with long experience in molecular diagnostics and close ties to Chalmers University of Technology. As co-founder of TATAA Biocenter, he was central in setting up some of the earliest COVID-19 testing operations in the country. His account revealed how a restructure requested by U.S. investor Care Equity triggered a series of legal steps that ultimately forfeited the founders ownership of the company. A merger, recommended by their lawyers, later discovered to have been executed in the wrong direction, dissolved the ownership entity they relied on. A mistake that went unnoticed for several months.
“You’re Fired”: The Sunday Evening Call
He recalled the Sunday evening Teams meeting where he was informed of his dismissal. There was no buildup, no explanation. “They said, ‘Let’s skip the small talk. You’re fired.’ And then my computer was wiped clean remotely, right in front of my eyes.” Within minutes, his access to the phone was revoked. He was cut off from every system holding the evidence, message histories, and working documents required to address what followed. And what followed came quickly. Legal demands continuously arrived in rapid succession, each requiring documentation he no longer had access to. “These were not ordinary disputes,” he said. “It was a strategy to overwhelm.”