UNeMed hears about opportunities to expand its reach

After 50 meetings with various representatives of a wide range of international biotech and pharmaceutical companies, UNeMed learned their key areas of interest could benefit from more UNMC research.

“We have no shortage of intriguing innovations, but I think there might be some major opportunities for us if we could further expand our reach into particular areas,” said Matt Boehm, PhD, UNeMed’s director of licensing.

The key areas of interest that pharma and biotech companies identified to UNeMed:

• New immuno-oncology-based therapeutics
• Cell therapies (CAR-T, TCR-T, technologies to boost CAR-T activity/longevity, novel CARs, NK-based therapies and macrophage-based therapies)
• Gene therapies (novel gene therapies, technologies for enhancing gene therapies, novel vectors and novel non-viral delivery systems)
• New therapeutics for autoimmune diseases
• mRNA-based therapeutics
• Therapeutic antibodies (humanized antibodies, antibody fragments, bi-specific antibodies and antibody drug conjugates)
• Rare diseases
• Novel small molecules (preferably against novel targets, orally available molecules and low nanomolar IC50s)

“There weren’t too many surprises, as some key areas of development have been a key focus for most pharmaceutical and biotech companies for a number of years now,” Dr. Boehm said. “We want to make sure UNMC researchers are aware of these key areas of interest, as it could lead to significant opportunities for industry research collaborations and the development of cutting-edge therapeutics. We really want to make a strong push to identify new inventions from UNMC that fit into these key areas of focus.”

UNeMed, the technology transfer and commercialization office for UNMC, secured the meetings earlier this month in Boston during BIO, the world’s largest international biomedical conference. The conference typically features more than 14,000 attendees from more than 4,000 companies around the world.

“Each year at BIO, we have the opportunity to meet and build new relationships with some of the top pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies in the world,” said UNeMed President and CEO Michael Dixon, PhD. “We also learn about industry trends and the types of innovations that pharmaceutical and biotech industries are interested in investing and developing.”

UNeMed works with researchers and innovators to protect their work and discoveries. Attracting potential partners and additional support are often critical components of furthering research and innovations into a product that can help people.

Often, innovative ideas and discoveries languish in journal articles and lab notebooks for lack of funding and resources. UNeMed strives to bridge that gap and give every Nebraska innovation a chance to reach its fullest potential.