Innovation in health care
New business center to move research into marketable products

Imagine Buffalo, Rochester and southern Ontario as an internationally recognized corridor for innovation in health care, with UB as a critical component.

That's the vision that led to the formation of the new Health Care Business Center (HCBC), a joint venture of UB and the Health Care Industries Association that will allow the region's health-care industry to capitalize on marketable products and processes that develop from research at UB, Roswell Park Cancer Institute, Kaleida Health and the Catholic Hospitals.

According to the Health Care Industries Association, a nonprofit organization designed to support and promote the regional health-care industry, this corridor represents the fourth-largest medical development market in North America, with more than 100 research institutions, 265 medical manufacturers and 95 hospitals.

Strategically located in Cary Hall in the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences on the South Campus, the HCBC serves as a focal point for fostering new opportunities between local companies and UB researchers-whether they are in the schools of medicine, dental medicine, pharmacy, engineering, management or arts and sciences.

"Locating the Health Care Business Center at the hub of medical research at UB is key," said Luke Rich, vice president/regional director for the Empire State Development Corp.

More than half of the inventions registered with the UB Office of Technology Transfer have been in the area of health care.

But, explained Rich, getting to the next step-where an invention is refined, adapted and marketed-is hardly automatic.

"Traditionally, the difficulty with academic research is in moving it from the paper or project stage to the product stage," he said.

That's a complicated process, he said, and that's where the Health Care Business Center can really help.

The HCBC will work closely with the UB Business Alliance's new marketing manager and with the UB Office of Technology Transfer.

With state funding, obtained through the efforts of Assemblyman Robin Schimminger, the HCBC also has been able to hire an experienced technology-transfer liaison.

"Hiring someone who understands the methods of transferring the research and knowledge gained by the research community at UB and Roswell to companies that can turn them into products, grow new jobs and expand is one of the most important functions of the Health Care Business Center," said Rich.

Together with Mary Ellen Rashman, executive director of the Health Care Industries Association, Rebecca Weimer, the HCBC technology-transfer liaison, will be working to maximize networking between and among UB health-care researchers and industry.

Weimer, who worked for 10 years at MDS Matrx, most recently as director of the international department-says that the key to a flourishing health-care sector in Western New York is networking.

"The whole foundation of the health-care industry is networking," she said. "People like to do business with people they know ."

To that end, the HCBC is putting out the welcome mat to both local and regional health-care companies and to UB researchers.

"The more we learn about how professors work and develop research, the better we will be at hooking them up with business people," she added. "This is a hotbed of opportunities for collaboration; we've got to make sure that starts happening with the goal of keeping business in Western New York."

For the first time, the HCBC will provide UB researchers with a direct connection to industry.

"Finding a company willing to take a discovery, test and refine it, manufacture it, get it approved by the FDA and market it, is 90 per- cent of the battle," said Bruce A. Holm, associate dean for research and graduate studies in the medical school. "This liaison service is not really within the repertoires of most scientists, isn't readily at their fingertips and has not ever been available at this institution."

The most pressing goal of the HCBC is to start to turn around the venture-capital climate in Buffalo, Weimer said.

To that end, the HCBC, in cooperation with Rand Capital Inc., will sponsor the "First Western New York Venture/Equity Forum" March 3-4 in the Hyatt Regency. Efforts are under way to bring in venture capitalists from outside Western New York to hear presentations on the strength of the local health-care market to convince them to invest in local companies and start-ups.

"We are putting together a program that will bring a focus to this area as a health-care mecca," Weimer said.

In addition to presentations by officials from major investment firms, a technology showcase will demonstrate the great variety of medical products being developed locally and at UB, some of which are available for licensing.

In recognition of the fact that most start-ups form with an emphasis on engineering expertise, as opposed to business skills, the HCBC is creating a Business Development Program that will provide new companies with assistance in marketing, financial planning, human resources and regulatory issues.

With the cooperation of all the major health-care institutions, as well as UB, HCBC also has developed an economic-development proposal and submitted it to the governor's office.

"There's a really exciting feeling about this," Weimer said. "Everybody has signed off on it, including UB, Roswell Park, Kaleida Health and the Catholic Hospitals. Everybody's on the same page."

For more information, contact the center at 829-3888 or fax at 829-3885.