• The event will bring together some 15,000 professionals from 65 countries from 15 to 18 June
• The Catalan delegation, coordinated by Biocat, will feature 29 companies and 8 institutions
Barcelona, 8th June 2015.- A total of 29 companies and 8 institutions from Catalonia will participate in BIO Convention 2015, the most important biotechnology convention in the world held this year in Philadelphia (United States) from 15 to 18 June. The Catalan delegation, coordinated by Biocat, includes pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, consultancies and service firms, and research organizations.
The BIO Convention is held each year in a different US city. This year it will be in Philadelphia, the capital of the state of Pennsylvania, which along with neighboring New Jersey and Delaware is home to 80% of the pharmaceutical industry in the United States.
The BioRegion of Catalonia at BIO 2015
The BioRegion of Catalonia will have a booth at BIO 2015, in the Spanish pavilion alongside the bioregions of Andalusia and the Basque Country. Seven Catalan companies and organizations will have their own booth: Bcn Peptides, Bioibérica, Laboratorios Salvat, Barcelona Science Park, Som Biotech, Specific Pig and Trifermed.
The Catalan delegation will be made up of a total of 29 companies, including biotechnology firms AB-Biotics, Ability Pharmaceuticals, Bcn Peptides, Bioingenium, Biokit, Bionure, GP Pharm, Intelligent Pharma, Molomics, Oryzon Genomics, Plasma Biotech, Proteodesign, Som Biotech, Specific Pig, Spherium Biomed and Thrombotargets; pharmaceutical companies Almirall, Bioibérica, Esteve, Ferrer Internacional, Gebro Pharma, Grifols Internacional, Laboratorios Salvat, Lacer and Mitelos Bioscience; and service and consultancy companies Grifols Engineering, Insights in Life Sciences, Oficina Ponti and Trifermed.
There will also be 8 institutions: ACCIÓ, the Government of Catalonia business competitiveness agency; Barcelona Clinical Trials Platform (BCTP), an initiative promoted by the Catalan Ministry of Health and Biocat to position Catalonia among the top five European regions to conduct clinical trials; the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC) Biomedical Engineering Research Center; Center for Genomic Regulation (CRG); Institute for Research in Biomedicine of Barcelona (IRB); Barcelona Science Park (PCB); Vall d’Hebron Research Institute (VHIR) and Biocat, which is coordinating the Catalan delegation to BIO for the ninth consecutive year.
Catalan molecules seeking international buyers
Last year, BIO hosted nearly 30,000 partnering meetings: a privileged international showcase for Catalan companies, some of which will be scouting for licensing deals for their latest developments at the fair.
This is the case of Oryzon Genomics: after closing the biggest deal of any Spanish biotech firm last year in signing a collaboration agreement with Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche, in Philadelphia the Cornellà de Llobregat-based company will explore potential paths for research collaboration or licensing for its development Ory 2001, for neurodegenerative diseases, which is starting phase I later this year. “We want to keep the top decision-makers at the fair up to date,” highlights Emili Torrell, Oryzon head of Business Development.
Another company seeking licensing opportunities is SOM Biotech, which specializes in drug repositioning (identifying drugs with the potential to be used for other indications) and has reincorporated a compound for glioma with potential for other types of cancer into its pipeline. “It is a highly promising compound that is about to start animal testing,” says Santiago Esteva, SOM Biotech head of Business Development.
At the fair’s Business Forum, Bcn Peptides will present PARENTIDE, one of the products it is currently developing to treat neuropathic pain. “We’re looking for companies interested in the peptides we are developing to explore the possibility of licensing or collaboration agreements for clinical development,” says Lluís Riera, product manager at Bcn Peptides. Catalan company Mitelos Bioscience, which closed a deal with a company from San Francisco a few months ago to provide business-development services in the United States, will present two new dietary supplements in Philadelphia: SNF671, to prevent osteoporosis, and WASHDENT, for oral hygiene. Another Catalan firm that is gaining presence in the United States is consultancy Trifermed, promoting the new offices they have opened in Boston, which along with the two offices they already have in Canada will help them consolidate their position in North America.
BIO Philadelphia is also a great marketplace for Catalan companies looking to acquire new products. This is the case of Gebro Pharma, which is seeking out products in advanced stages of development to expand its pipeline in pain management, rheumatology, urology, respiratory and other areas; and GP Pharm and Spherium Biomed, which are looking for business opportunities through purchasing licenses.
The BioRegion of Catalonia in numbers
The BioRegion, the life sciences cluster in Catalonia, is made up of 560 companies, 56 research centers active in the life sciences, 17 university hospitals, 12 technology centers and 16 science parks, in addition to two large-scale research facilities: the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC-CNS) and the ALBA-CELLS Synchrotron. Biocat is the organization in charge of dynamizing and promoting the BioRegion of Catalonia.
Help employers find you! Check out all the jobs and post your resume.
