Translating The Genomics Revolution For Patient Benefit

In October 2018, 40 participants came together for our second Commercialising Genomic Research workshop. Here’s a summary of what the workshop set out to achieve, why it is necessary, and what we’re doing to grow this new community post-event.

The Genomics Revolution

The new ‘Genomics Revolution’ is promising to transform healthcare delivery and outcomes, yet the right culture to support the development of these pioneering technologies, therapies and ideas is still in its infancy.

Building effective relationships between entrepreneurs, business development professionals and researchers is new territory for everyone involved. Many of the traditional business models have yet to be tailored to the challenges of this complex and evolving field; leaving many unanswered questions around IP, licensing, contracts, regulation, open source software and emerging technologies.

This provides both a need and opportunity to develop an ecosystem of dedicated researchers and business professionals, to bring pioneering research with huge healthcare impact to the marketplace, and more fundamentally the patient’s bedside.

Next Steps – Building An Entrepreneurial Network

Ultimately, for the right kind of commercial opportunities to present and be successful it’s important to devise a network where effective public-private partnerships can form, and continue to nurture support for each other as projects evolve and bring with them new challenges to work through.

For genomics to reach its full potential, particularly within the realms of drug discovery and revolutionising how medicine is practised, creating a community to help and learn from one another is vital. It’s about cultivating the right culture for pioneering scientific research to be effectively translated into commercial goals, and flourish strategically.

Researchers need more straightforward access to developing strategic collaborations with companies and entrepreneurs willing to invest. In turn the expertise, knowledge and capabilities involved in these professional relationships need to balance each other if they are to nurture commercial advancement.

Developing an engaged community committed to the progression of translation, commercialisation and precision medicine is also pivotal to delivering on the promise of impact to patient healthcare.

Why A Commercialisation Workshop?

Finding opportunities to meet with potential strategic collaborators, or industry professionals with knowledge to share, or the time and willingness to have development discussions isn’t easy. It’s especially difficult when the major players come from different professional spheres, and don’t tend to meet on a regular basis, if at all.

This course was initiated, funded and organised by Advanced Courses and Scientific Conferences. It was developed with a programme committee comprising – Emmanuelle Astoul (from Wellcome Sanger Institute), Ross Rounsevell (Repositive), Jo Mills (Wellcome Genome Campus) and James Peach (Medicines Discovery Catapult) – in response to these challenges and to bring a like-minded community of professionals together to grow as a collaborative and authoritative resource. We wanted to create an environment to draw together business development managers, technology transfer professionals, investment analysts, innovation funders, entrepreneurs and researchers, to provide a platform for promoting discussion, developing partnerships and evolving projects.

The workshop had three main objectives:

1. Inspire business development professionals to look for commercialisation opportunities in the academic genomic research field.

2. Equip these professionals, giving them the tools and knowledge needed to take the commercialisation of those technologies forward.

3. Develop a fully engaged community where researchers and business developers can freely discuss their challenges and come up with solutions.

The workshop was however just the start of a much wider ambition to encourage newly formed relationships to stay engaged and continue discussions as the field evolves.

Join our community on LinkedIn

The workshop marked the launch of the ACSC Commercialising Genomic Research dedicated LinkedIn group, but it’s certainly not exclusive to those participants. The aim is to extend this platform out to all entrepreneurial academics, business development managers, technology transfer professionals, IP and legal experts interested in the translation of genomic research to enable drug discovery and precision medicine.

What are the benefits to our group members?

Joining our dedicated group will give members access to a host of benefits to further their professional reach, including:

• A place where both business and research-led opportunity will grow
• Free and direct access to like-minded professionals who share similar commercialising challenges
• A platform for valuable problem solving – pick the brains of fellow professionals looking to exchange knowledge and share ideas
• Gain immediate feedback related to problems, ideas, challenges and opportunities
• Access to exclusive content including; discussions, slides and industry videos
• Gain the valuable tools needed to progress ideas
• Widen your network of influence
• Become a member of a thought-leader group pushing the boundaries of a burgeoning field.

This is a unique space that currently isn’t offered anywhere else, to gain access to materials from the workshop, as well as an opportunity to secure further collaborations and support and guidance.

If you would like an invitation for access to the group to join our burgeoning community please email Catherine Holmes (Marketing and Communications Manager) Catherine.holmes@wellcomegenomecampus.org

If you’d like to participate in the next course, email Scientific Conferences for more details.

This short film provides an insight into the workshop’s discussions, with interviews with members of the programme committee and event speakers looking at questions such as the legal and regulatory challenges faced by those producing genomic healthcare products.