At the recent annual BIO International Convention, more than 18,000 attendees converged on Boston to chart the biotech industry’s future and hold nearly 47,000 partnering meetings, a certified world record. The Innovation Institute was on hand to showcase its portfolio of life science discoveries available for licensing and to seek potential partnerships with industry, entrepreneurs and investors. Once again, the red hot field of cancer immunotherapy was front and center in a lot of the discussions. While in Boston, we took the opportunity to visit Pitt spinout, Oncorus, which is developing therapies in the emerging oncolytic virus domain of immunotherapy, to get an update on the company’s progress.
Next month, the SBIR Road Tour will be making a stop in Pittsburgh for a day-long event to promote the $2.5 billion in funding available from a dozen federal government agencies to help small businesses bring innovative new products and technologies to market.
Social entrepreneurship doesn’t necessarily mean an enterprise that does not make a profit. In the case of a Pitt student startup dedicated to unlocking solar power’s potential in the developing world, organizing as a Public Benefit Corporation is designed to help do well by doing good. We welcome Jay Murray, CEO of Solinius, to our blog to introduce his company and the Kickstarter campaign he and his colleagues have launched around the cellular IoT development board they created to drive their system.
Innovation Institute Entrepreneur in Residence Michael Hufford recently signed on as CEO of Pitt Spinout LyGenesis Inc. In this blog post he takes a tongue-in-cheek approach to give advice to investigators who are considering whether to leave academia to join a startup built around their discoveries.