Wyss Diagnostics Accelerator’s Industrial Participant Program goes official
The Wyss Diagnostics Accelerator’s industry-facing Industrial Participant Program has put a framework in place for delivering solutions for high-value diagnostic problems.
By Benjamin Boettner
(BOSTON) — The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University’s Diagnostics Accelerator(Wyss DxA) formed its Industrial Participant Program (IPP) in 2021 as its industry-facing arm to complement the expertise of its clinical collaborators at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (Brigham), and the Wyss Institute’s multidisciplinary bioengineering community. The IPP is contributing essential market, manufacturing, as well as user-focused and regulatory experience to the Wyss DxA’s newly conceptualized process of creating urgently needed disruptive diagnostic technologies for patients in areas of unmet medical needs.
Originally launched as a pilot program, the IPP serves as a platform to explore collaborations across the diagnostic development pipeline, from early stage discovery through delivery of new diagnostics. Additionally, the IPP allows for member companies to connect with subject matter experts and key opinion leaders within the Harvard ecosystem, as well as through the Wyss DxA’s external network to key stakeholders, including investors, regulators, payors, and other important entities. Now, with many promising collaborations in biomarker discovery, technology developments and clinical validations underway, the IPP has transitioned out of its pilot phase to an official program within the Harvard system, and consolidated its base of industrial partners.
“The IPP is a critical component of the Diagnostics Accelerator, as it provides Wyss researchers with access and insight to the diagnostics commercial sector, while providing our industrial colleagues a window into both clinical needs and novel technologies,” said Wyss Core Faculty member David Walt, Ph.D., a founder and faculty lead of the Wyss DxA. He is also a Professor of Pathology at the Brigham, the Hansjörg Wyss Professor of Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard Medical School (HMS), a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professor, and the scientific founder of Illumina, Inc. and Quanterix Corp, as well as co-founder of multiple other life sciences companies.
The IPP’s operational framework facilitates regular and highly productive interactions between the Wyss DxA and its IPP members, including discussions of urgent diagnostic challenges and commercial opportunities that could arise from them. It also ensures the participation of medical and other key opinion leaders, and the coordination of challenge-focused sponsored research agreements.
Building out an effective member base
After an initial consolidation period, 18 diagnostics companies joined the IPP on a steady basis, and another six were recruited during its follow-up period.
Industrial partipants:
ACESO-HJF Fluxergy Inc. LifeSpin
BioDot Folia Health Primary.Health
bioMérieux Foothold Labs Sigenex
Camtech Innovations Ltd. GLX Analytix Singular Computing
Charm Sciences HP Inc. Siphox
DaVinci Wearables IDEXX Laboratories Inc. Unilab
DxLab Inc. Kephera Diagnostics West Pharmaceutical Services
Ethos Labs Labrador Health Zoetis
Presently, these 24 IPP members bring deep understanding and insight to the development of market solutions for patients with sepsis and infectious diseases; cancer; neurological and psychological disorders; chronic pain and metabolic diseases, including diabetes and cardiovascular disease; and other health problems. In addition, IPP members also address diagnostic problems related to food safety and veterinary diseases. Their approaches span a wide spectrum of diagnostically relevant disciplines, ranging from assay and device development and manufacturing, to precision medicine, digital health, wearable diagnostics, to automation, high-throughput, and computational (AI and machine learning-driven) strategies. The IPP also provides its members with a forum for discussing mutual needs and issues confronting the entire industry.
“The concerted, focused and actionable approach adopted and espoused by the leadership team at DxA is sorely lacking in the diagnostic space. From the get-go, the leadership team made their goals crystal-clear: fast development and deployment of diagnostic tools to solve unmet medical needs,” said Brian Della Valle, CEO of GLX Analytix. “We are thrilled to partner with this laser-focused and passionate team and are fully aligned with their mission to accelerate transformative technologies and save lives.” GLX Analytix is pursuing a new avenue of diagnostic biomarker discovery for a variety of chronic diseases by focusing on sugar-specific cell signatures of injured tissues.
But the relationship between the Wyss DxA and its IPP members is a two-way street. On one hand, passionately pursued diagnostic projects can be advanced more rapidly towards patients in need because of critically important input provided by one or more members of the IPP. On the other hand, IPP members can get access to technologies developed by the Wyss Institute’s engineering community and its collaborators on the basis of clearly identified clinical needs and market value.
“Our goal has been to bring together key stakeholders involved in the discovery, development and delivery of diagnostics for unmet clinical needs. The IPP plays a central role within the Wyss DxA and in carrying forward our vision, and we view it as an open community welcoming new members that can contribute critical expertise to our cause, ” said Rushdy Ahmad, Ph.D., Head of the Wyss DxA, who coordinates the IPP program together with Trey Toombs, Ph.D., the IPP’s Head of Operations.
“By putting an operational framework into place, the Wyss DxA’s IPP has taken a first pivotal step. Together with the flurry of activities that we see emerging from this new type of academic-industrial initiative, this gives us ample hope that the Wyss DxA soon will have impact on the development of urgently needed diagnostics,” said Angelika Fretzen,Ph.D., M.B.A., the Wyss Institute’s Technology Translation Director & Chief Operating Officer.
IPP member testimonials:
“Being part of the Wyss IPP provides for Lifespin an excellent anchor point in the US and the global hub for health innovation, the larger Boston area.” – Ali Tinazli, Ph.D., CEO of German IPP member Lifespin
“As a founding member of the Wyss DxA IPP, Ethos Laboratories can attest firsthand to the impact this program can have on biotechnology companies looking to build collaborative networks. During our first 18 months as members of the Wyss DxA IPP, we have successfully collaborated with other members of the IPP.” – Brian Kincaid, CEO of Ethos Labs
“The Wyss DxA IPP was a great fit for Foothold Labs at an essential time in our product development. Access to subject matter experts, government regulations officials, and strategic partners is exactly what we needed when we started the program. The Wyss DxA program’s focus on long-term partnerships and participation will provide a tremendous value to us over the next five years.” – Sean McIntosh, CEO of Foothold Labs
"As an inaugural member of the Wyss DxA IPP, Fluxergy is proud to collaborate with scientific and commercial heavyweights that can enact change, especially in matching unmet diagnostic needs with novel technologies. We look forward to continuing our work with this impressive group of passionate experts from diverse backgrounds in human health, veterinary medicine, and food safety who are present in global markets and in platform technologies that cover telehealth, diagnostics, drug discovery, and digital health.” – Tej Patel, CEO of Fluxergy
“[Motivated by our work with the Wyss DxA IPP,] we welcomed Dr. Jason Yong, Chief of Pain Medicine at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, to our medical advisory board. Dr. Yong joins a team of other distinguished clinicians tasked with assisting us on our mission to help more providers and patients manage chronic pain. Through our novel diagnostic technologies and complex care management tools, we are committed to reversing a system-wide dependency on opioids for the treatment of chronic pain.” – Brian Kincaid, CEO of Ethos Labs
“By becoming inaugural and active members of the Wyss DxA IPP, we made a significant step towards making a positive impact on the world of healthcare. Together with all IPP members and the dedicated team at the Wyss, we at Sigenex and our development partners in Malaysia have made a commitment to making advanced medical diagnostics accessible to everyone everywhere. As Helen Keller said, ‘Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.’” – Tan Rasab, CEO of Sigenex Inc.
PRESS CONTACT
Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University
Benjamin Boettner, benjamin.boettner@wyss.harvard.edu, +1 617-432-8232
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The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University
(http://wyss.harvard.edu) is a research and development engine for disruptive innovation powered by biologically-inspired engineering with visionary people at its heart. Our mission is to transform healthcare and the environment by developing ground-breaking technologies that emulate the way Nature builds and accelerate their translation into commercial products through the formation of startups and corporate partnerships to bring about positive near-term impact in the world. We accomplish this by breaking down the traditional silos of academia and barriers with industry, enabling our world-leading faculty to collaborate creatively across our focus areas of diagnostics, therapeutics, medtech, and sustainability. Our consortium partners encompass the leading academic institutions and hospitals in the Boston area and throughout the world, including Harvard’s Schools of Medicine, Engineering, Arts & Sciences, and Design, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston Children’s Hospital, Dana–Farber Cancer Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital, the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, Boston University, Tufts University, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, University of Zürich, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.