Medical Innovations Incubator
Home of 4C - Enabling Life Science Innovations
4C Panels: How does the new enter medicine?
Many interesting ideas are born in the laboratories and in the daily work of patient care that can improve diagnostics and therapy or help patients cope with health problems. However, young people interested in founding a healthcare company have a particularly difficult time in the medical field. Medical devices, including medical apps, require special testing, and approval of even simple technical products usually requires clinical trials. It is a long and expensive road until the costs for a new product are reimbursed by health insurance companies. To increase the chances of success for start-ups, the many stumbling blocks from medical product development must be brought into focus at an early stage.
Together with its parent organization, the Stiftung für Medizininnovationen (Foundation for Medical Innovation), funded by the non-profit Hertie Foundation, the MII has therefore launched the event series “How does the new get into medicine?” (starting Dec. 3, 2020), which is intended to shed light on the challenges for new ideas in the healthcare industry and discuss improving opportunities for those interested in founding a company. At the end, the most important basic rules for successful market access should be worked out.
Recap: The premiere event, Dec. 3, 2020
In the first three-hour event, the challenges were first discussed in keynote speeches by Dr. Nicole Hoffmeister-Kraut MdL (Minister of Economics, Labor and Tourism of the State of Baden-Württemberg), Dr. Ingmar Hoerr (founder of CureVac AG) and Prof. Ralf Kindervater (Managing Director of BIOPRO Baden-Württemberg GmbH).
After the presentations, the speakers then debated with Prof. Katja Schenke-Layland from the Natural and Medical Sciences Institute at the University of Tübingen (NMI), Dr. Matthias Perleth from the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA), Dr. Diedrich Bühler from the National Association of Health Insurance Funds (GKV-SV), Mr. Tobias Brode from the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation (IPA) and Prof. Eberhart Zrenner from the non-profit Foundation for Medical Innovation in a roundtable format.
Finally, additional individual consultation sessions with sector and industry experts were offered for specific questions regarding market access in the healthcare sector, approval of medical products, clinical trials and intellectual property rights in separate online sessions.
Recap: The second lecture evening, Feb. 2, 2021
After a very successful first event in December 2020 with more than 200 participants, the challenges of startups in the medical life sciences were discussed in three short keynote speeches by Prof. Thomas Gottwald (startup founder & CEO Ovesco Endoscopy AG), Prof. Thomas Bauernhansl (Institute Director Fraunhofer IPA as well as IFF of the University of Stuttgart) and Günther Steffen (Fund Manager at Zukunftsfonds Heilbronn as well as supervisor of biotech and medtec companies) in a second evening on February 4, 2021.
After the presentations, the speakers then debated with Winfried Plötze (State Manager Baden-Württemberg, BARMER), Prof. Stefan Laufer (Startup Founder, Head of Chair Pharm./Med. Chemistry, Tübingen Center for Academic Drug Discovery, Department of Pharmacy & Biochemistry, EKUT), Dr. Timo Schmelzpfenning (Authorized Representative and Head of Research & Development, SPORLASTIC GmbH), Prof. Ralf Kindervater (Managing Director, BIOPRO Baden-Württemberg GmbH) and Prof. Eberhart Zrenner (Charitable Foundation for Medical Innovation) in a round table format.
Finally, additional individual consultation sessions with industry experts were held for specific questions regarding the 4Cs ffered in separate online sessions.