News

 New Members Continue BHI’s Commitment and Mission in the BioHealth Capital Region

ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND, October 20, 2020 – The Board of Directors of BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI) unanimously approved the appointments of three new board members, Sally Allain, Head of JLABS @ Washington, DC, Joseph F. Sanchez, PhD,  Director, Science Engagement, R&D North America, AstraZeneca, and Robert Silverman, Chief Business Officer, Alloy Therapeutics, Inc. BHI’s leadership also thanked outgoing Board of Director member Tracey Vetterick, formally of AstraZeneca for her contributions to the organization and support of many years.

The U.S. government is providing roughly $486 million to AstraZeneca to accelerate the Big Pharma company’s experimental Covid-19 therapy.

The funds will be used to advance AstraZeneca’s antibody combination, AZD7442, into two phase-III clinical trials. The last-stage studies, expected to begin later this month or early next month, will involve more than 6,000 study participants at sites in and outside the United States. (Phase-III clinical trials are typically the last hurdle a pharmaceutical company must successfully clear before seeking approval for a new drug candidate.)

Thank you for your interest in the 6th Annual BioHealth Capital Region Forum on Monday, October 19, 2020 that will highlight the accomplishments of today and chart our successes of tomorrow.

We are thrilled to welcome executive-level biohealth industry leaders from across the country and overseas. To make the best use of your time and enable you to network with our 1000+ registrants and learn from the 58+ industry speakers, please use the instructions below to join our virtual event platform, https://eventmobi.com/biohealth2020

October 14, 2020 – Johnson & Johnson Innovation announced today at the virtual 2020 HLTH conference the awardees for the JLABS @ Washington, DC Children’s, Maternal Health, and Diversity in Innovation QuickFire Challenges, which respectively aimed to catalyze pediatric innovation, improve maternal health in the United States, and support diverse innovators. These challenges embody Johnson & Johnson Innovation’s commitment to catalyzing potential solutions to today’s greatest healthcare challenges.

At BioBuzz, we’re dedicated to bringing you interesting and important stories that emerge from the thriving life sciences ecosystem that is the BioHealth Capital Region (BHCR). 

The heart of the BHCR biohealth cluster is Maryland, with its vast network of government research agencies, the strong university system, and a deep network of established, emerging, and startup life science companies across a wide range of fields, including cell and gene therapy, advanced biomanufacturing, phage therapy, medical devices and more traditional biotech and pharma organizations. That’s not even to mention the remarkable efforts of myriad Maryland vaccine companies to develop the first approved, safe, and efficacious SARS-CoV-2 vaccine.

Emmes today announced that it was selected as one of the best places to work in the greater Washington area. The Washington Post’s 2020 Top Workplaces list ranked private, public, nonprofit and government agencies based on the highest engagement ratings from their employees. The Washington Post partnered with employee research and consulting firm Energage, and the process is based on a scientific survey of employees who rate their workplace culture.

The Post’s annual survey honored 200 organizations as Top Workplaces. Emmes was selected in the large company category, which included organizations with between 500 and 999 employees. More than 3,600 area companies were invited to have their employees take the survey.

If you’re located in New York City or the Silicon Valley, venture capital firms are abundant and well covered by the media — you can’t escape them. But entrepreneurs in the Baltimore-D.C. region don’t need to go so far to find a firm that could propel their startup to growth.

The local venture capital community is robust, with dozens of firms that invest in all sorts of industries, from healthcare to fintech to cybersecurity. And it’s part of the reason that in 2016, approximately $1.09 billion was invested in local high-tech startups by VC firms, placing the region in the top 10 funded clusters in the U.S.