The National Foundation for Cancer Research’s (NFCR) AIM-HI Accelerator Fund will be hosting the final round of its Women’s Venture Competition on September 24, 2020. The winner will receive an equity investment of $300,000, which will serve as early seed money for proof of concept and proof of value on the path to clinical trials, and eventually, to therapeutics that could save patients’ lives.
The Women’s Venture Competition is one of the first venture-backed competitions focusing on women in the life sciences, specifically, female-created and female-managed oncology start-ups. It’s no secret that the life sciences industry suffers from a lack of gender diversity at all levels and at all stages of developing new therapeutics and technologies. The Women’s Venture Competition aims to start changing this gender imbalance and to give women the boost they need.
From among 47 applications, semi-finalists were determined by a highly-qualified selection committee co-chaired by Calibr at Scripps Research’s chief medical officer, Dr. Pamela Garzone, formerly Pfizer’s early-stage oncology group vice president, and a Ludwig Cancer Institute strategic alliances director, Dr. Webster Cavenee, a former American Association for Cancer Research president. These semi-finalists will compete via a series of private pitches delivered virtually on September 24 to a world-class judging committee co-chaired by Tango Therapeutics’ chief executive officer, Dr. Pamela Weber, a Third Rock Ventures partner, Harvard Medical School professor of genetics, Dr. Raju Kucherlapati, co-founder of Millennium Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Takeda for $9 billion) and Abgenix (acquired by Amgen for $2 billion).
At an impactful and well-designed virtual ceremony that evening, two finalists will be named. Subject to due diligence and negotiation, the winner from among them will receive $300,000 in investment from AIM-HI, which was established in 2019 by the National Foundation for Cancer Research. Sponsors and judging committee affiliations include Microsoft, Scripps Research, Dorsey & Whitney, Incubate Coalition, New Enterprise Associates, GoMo Health, the National Cancer Institute’s Small Business Innovation Research Center, Ludwig Cancer Institute, Tango Therapeutics, Third Rock Ventures, GreyBird Ventures and the Harvard School of Medicine.
The talented eight semi-finalists are: Stacy Blain, Ph.D., Founder & CSO, Concarlo Holdings, Maryam Ziaei, Ph.D., CEO, iSono Health, Yue Meng, Ph.D., Co-Founder, Kancure Therapeutics, María José Alonso, Ph.D., Founder & CSO, Libera Bio, Laura Towart, Founder & CEO, My Personal Therapeutics, Margaret Offermann, M.D., Ph.D., CEO, OncoSpherix, Manijeh Goldberg, Ph.D., CEO, Privo Technologies, Cindy Clark, J.D., CEO and President, Recurx Bio.
NFCR invites you to join – virtually, of course – the first annual Awards Ceremony for the Women’s Venture Competition on Thursday, September 24th, and also, to cast your Vote for the People’s Choice Award. You can register to vote and to watch the ceremony here: https://aim-hiaccelerator.org/meet-the-semi-finalists/