Translational Development in University Settings: Moving University Innovation Towards the Development and Commercialization of Biomedical Products

Abstract

University‐ and research institute‐based discoveries and innovation in the biomedical arena ultimately have to reach the commercial marketplace if they are to benefit mankind and if they are to further justify the substantial taxpayer investment in capitalizing fundamental basic biomedical research. This session will address new, university‐ and research institute‐based approaches that facilitate the movement of exciting biomedical innovation and intellectual property (IP) towards the commercial marketplace. The challenges facing commercialization enablement immediately post‐basic research are extensive and expensive, and they can only be met with investment of capital at the early and highly risk‐prone stage, a stage that the investment community refers to as the “Valley of Death”, a region that the investment community and companies scrupulously avoid due to the considerable uncertainty of success surrounding raw and unimproved early stage IP. New models of commercialization enablement in university and research institute settings are appearing, falling into the category of “translational research” and, more importantly, the newly identified category of “translational development”, an area that is outside of the traditional university and research institute technology transfer process and experience. This session will deal particularly with the challenges that academic scientists face in commercializing their ideas. The speakers will address the newly‐developed, applied research and development endeavors and novel solutions that are now being deployed inside entrepreneurial universities and research institutes to reduce the hurdles facing the ultimate commercialization of their biomedical IP, innovative solutions that improve that IP and move it up the value chain to the point where the further risk of development is substantially reduced and where the net valuation is substantially increased…and thus made far more attractive to investors and commercial licensees due to the increased valuation and the substantially reduced front‐end risk. The net effect on the academic scientist inventors and the universities or research institutes (i.e., the licensors) is that potential financial returns and royalty rates can be greatly increased. The speakers will address not only the essential actors and events involved in moving molecular life science innovation towards the marketplace, but will also provide needed glimpses for basic research‐focused faculty, post‐docs and students into the reality of the industrial biomedical therapeutic and product development and specification world, a funnel through which all biomedical innovation must flow if that innovation is to achieve social and financial success.