News Archive

Over the past two weeks, in their respective FY 2016 Labor, Health and Human Services, and Related Agencies appropriations bills (known as Labor-H), House and Senate appropriators have shown support for biomedical research funding by recommending NIH budget levels higher than even the Administration had requested. But controversy still reigns over other parts of the bill, particularly patient-centered outcomes research associated with the Affordable Care Act.

REDI…SET…WATCH…5 Questions with Michael Stiefvater, Business Development Manager at Rockville REDI

While we’ve seen how 3D printing has dramatically revolutionized the medical industry by allowing surgeons to print replicas of organs and their surrounding areas in order to better understand them before an actual surgical procedure, the next evolutionary step is to look into 3D printing the organs themselves to replace a patient’s existing failing organ.

The University of Maryland’s Startup Shell incubator is a conspicuous experiment in student-run startup incubation. Founded in 2012, the incubator has grown to include several dozen startups in its portfolio—and recently, Uber became interested enough in what might come out of the incubator to set aside $25,000 for it as part of a larger collaboration with UMd, including investor grants for student-built businesses. Notably, many of the startups focus on the issues that concern students or directly impact the field students are studying. We’ve picked out eight of the most intriguing and exciting startups to highlight here so that you can check out the types of innovation that UMd is fostering.

Chancellor of the University System of Maryland William “Brit” E. Kirwan is serving his last day of his 13-year tenure Tuesday before Robert L. Caret takes over on July 1.

Caret is returning to Maryland after serving as president of the University of Massachusetts system. He was president of Towson Univeristy from 2003 to 2011.

Montgomery County Department of Economic Development offers a program that provides free one-on-one business assistance to entrepreneurs, business owners, and start-ups.

A business development specialist will be available at locations throughout Montgomery County to meet directly with business owners.  Experts will provide information about county financial initiatives and other programs, make introductions and identify the connections your business needs. 

This program is open to any entrepreneur and/or business located within Montgomery County. Montgomery County works hard to support local businesses and has a variety of resources including industry sector experts in IT, cybersecurity, life sciences, green, international, government contracting, and more. Support is also available for navigating the county procurement and Local Small Business Reserve Program.

eHealth Initiatives’s iTHRIVE Innovation Challenge, August 12-13 in Washington DC, is a competition and event that convenes business leaders, government officials, innovators, investors and promising entrepreneurs looking to shape how health technology can improve the quality, safety, and efficiency of healthcare. The Challenge invites startups from around the world to submit proposals that tackle healthcare system problems head-on, focusing on three critical areas of the eHealth Initiative 2020 Roadmap: consumer-oriented health IT; population health management; and interoperability between providers, payers and across the delivery system.

If you have an idea about how health technology can improve the quality, safety and efficiency of healthcare, notice gaps in the system that offer easy fixes, or wish to share your vision for better healthcare delivery, join the competition and the conversation. 

External models of R&D innovation are the rage in Pharma today, as they should be – the future of our industry depends on a great deal more rather than less collaboration.

In a very healthy way, lots of experiments are being done across the ecosystem and the final scorecard for what worked and what didn’t is years from being tallied up; however, the early biomarkers are positive and it’s a widely-held belief that a critical element of exceptional R&D organizations in the future will be creative BD engagement. In short, great BD and R&D are becoming synonymous with each other.

AstraZeneca has joined forces with the University of Cambridge for three more joint schemes designed to develop the next generation of world-class scientists.

The schemes will support more than 80 PhD scholarships and eight clinical lectureships over the next five years spanning translational science, basic and clinical research.