INDIANAPOLIS, Oct. 10, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- BioCrossroads today announced the formation of its $9 million Indiana Seed Fund III at its Indiana Life Sciences Summit. 

The Indiana Seed Fund III is an early-stage fund focused on identifying, creating and developing the next generation of leading Indiana-based life sciences, health IT, and agbiosciences companies and follow-on fund to the $8.25 million Indiana Seed Fund II. 

BioCrossroads has raised nearly $25 million in seed funding since 2005, resulting in investments in 24 start-up companies. Those companies have gone on to raise more than $400 million, including companies like:

U.S. healthcare companies have collected $23.4 billion in venture capital funding this year — already surpassing the amount the sector obtained in all of 2017, according to a recent report from Pitchbook, which tracks VC investments.

For the healthcare sector, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology amassed the most cash, raking in more than $14 billion in 548 deals through the third quarter of 2018. This is more than they've collected in any previous year. Healthcare services and systems raised about $4.3 billion in 376 deals, and healthcare devices and supplies raised about $4.6 billion in 433 deals.

Organizations need to invest in the cultivation of capacity for innovation and recognize innovators with varying talent and strengths.

Innovation is about the future, without it, you lose sight of tomorrow. Innovation is an exceptional, exclusive, and realistic idea that separates you from others without a second thought. Innovation can happen anywhere in the organization and its ecosystem.

To help the former mobile giant find a radically new strategic direction, Nokia’s board assumed a unique role.

Nokia’s mobile-phone downfall – from a 40 percent market share to near bankruptcy in just a few years – has become a familiar cautionary parable on the perils of industry disruption. Less well-known is the equally instructive tale of how Nokia clawed its way back from the edge of destruction. Indeed, since touching bottom in 2012, its market capitalisation, while not at the level of its pre-smartphone heyday, has increased more than five-fold.

The number of open innovation challenges in pharma grows by the day. But what’s driving them? That’s what Luminary Labs wanted to know. So the consultancy, which works with pharma and other industries to design and execute those kind of challenges, surveyed the executives at companies that run the contests and asked why and how they do it.

Image: Looking for innovation, pharma and other industries are turning to crowdsourced challenges as a way to bring in outside solutions, partners and thinking. (Pixabay)

One of the most frequent questions I get as a mentor to entrepreneurs is “How do I find the money to start my business?” I always answer that there isn’t any magic, and contrary to the popular myth, nobody is waiting in the wings to throw money at you, just because you have a new and exciting business idea.

Biopharma venture capital activity maintained its red-hot pace during the third quarter of 2018, driven by a handful of deals exceeding $200 million, according to a report released this week.

Investors raised $4.002 billion in 130 biopharma VC deals during Q3 2018, according to the most recent quarterly PwC/CB Insights MoneyTree™ Report. That’s 51% above the $2.643 billion in 122 deals recorded for July–September 2017.

Those figures do not include “stealth mode” investments also recorded in the “healthcare” sector, for which details are unavailable. The value of those deals declined year over year, to $14.01 million in Q3 2018 from $49.08 million a year earlier, though the number of stealth deals remained consistent at four.

A rut is never a fun place to be in, but it happens to nearly all of us at some point in our careers. Perhaps you’ve been working in a job for a while, doing the same tasks, working with the same people in the same office every day. Suddenly you wake up one morning and realize you’re no longer inspired by your job. You wonder if it’s time to move on, or if you should stick with it and hope things get better.

Throughout the country, innovation districts have become hubs for education, research and partnerships with a focus on activities that create economic prosperity over the long term. Now, Kansas City is working to build one of its own.

Europe’s biotech industry recently celebrated its growth and progress with more than 120 events taking place across 18 European countries September 24 –30, in what organizers call “European Biotech Week.”

But during a roundtable discussion held in Brussels, the planned discussion topic, biotech’s contribution toward the United Nations’ third Sustainable Development Goal, “Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages,” was overshadowed, according to European news website Euractiv, by worries expressed by stakeholders that the continent’s biopharma industry is less attractive to investors than the world’s largest biopharma industry in the United States, and the fast-growing biopharma industry that has taken shape in China.

Image: https://www.genengnews.com

Californian-based Kinestral Technologies has commenced mass manufacturing its patented smart-tinting glass at its newly-opened factory in Miaoli, Taiwan.

The 10,000sq m facility, provided by the company's strategic partner G-Tech Optoelectronics, has been retrofit to produce up to 38,000sq m of glass per year using existing solar industry and flat panel production lines.

Congress recently passed the Department of Energy Research and Innovation Act (H.R.589) which essentially authorizes many existing Department of Energy activities. It also emphasizes efforts to ease and accelerate technology transfer to the private sector. The bill was first introduced back in January of 2017, quickly passed by the House but not passed by the Senate until this July, and just signed by President Trump on September 28, 2018. It has three main elements:

Venture capital firms are raising a record amount in 2018 and are on pace to top $100 billion for the year, according to the latest report by the National Venture Capital Association and PitchBook.

Firms have closed 6,583 deals worth $84.3 billion in the nine months ended Sept. 30, a record amount of capital for the first nine months of a calendar year, the report said. By comparison, in all of 2017, 9,253 deals worth $82 million were closed.

There is constant buzz about 'unicorns' and sky-high valuations, but raising venture capital is not the only funding option for entrepreneurs — or necessarily the best one. In exchange for funding, entrepreneurs lose some equity and decision-making power and there is an immense pressure to scale quickly and go public or sell.

Image: Evan Cohen and Lorine Pendleton at the When VCs Aren't the Right Option: 3 Viable Alternatives for Funding at the 2018 Forbes 30 Under 30 Summit.BEN ESAKOF

The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) projects a shortage of over 2,200 oncologists by 2025 amidst a 40 percent growth in the overall demand for oncologist services. Amidst this growing shortage, the most common cancer for American women – breast cancer – continues to rise. The National Cancer Institute estimates that there will be 266,120 new cases of breast cancer in 2018. This report examines the oncology workload distribution and retirement ages of oncologists across the largest 50 U.S. metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) by population, drawing on the Doximity profiles of more than 20,696 licensed oncologists. The report also explores the percentage of oncologists that were trained in their current metro area to assess how many younger oncologists stay versus leave their training communities, a factor that may contribute to regional oncology shortages.

The CEO of Deloitte, Cathy Engelbert, calls the massive changes that are happening in business and society the 3 D’s: Data, Digital, and Disruption. These changes are bringing about new strategies of leadership and hiring and are requiring new skill sets of inventiveness and creativity.

Thaddeus Arroyo, CEO of AT&T Business says that this disruption is the new normal and that this massively impacts hiring strategies: “The generation of employees that are entering now are coming from this connected generation and they think and work differently.”

Image: https://www.webpronews.com

More than 2,4 billion euros was invested in about 10 years by European Union through European Institute for Innovation and Technology so as to give the opportunity to new promising companies and SMEs to support their innovative ideas.

This year the InnovEIT 2018, which took place in the sunny and admirable Budapest, awarded four companies with prizes ranging from 20 to 50 thousand EUR. Ioannis Tamanas, President and CSO of Altoida, returned home with the first prize and some very attractive promises for VCs. Altoida's app gives a prediction for Alzheimer Disease with an accuracy of over 90%.

Image: The winners of InnovEIT 2018 on stageYIANIS MOURATIDIS

Novartis is set to open innovation labs around the world to connect with tech companies. The labs, the first of which has opened in San Francisco, will serve as a bridge between companies developing R&D-enhancing technologies and the broader Novartis business.

Switzerland’s Novartis hit upon the idea after identifying a gap in the technology development and adoption process. Tech companies, from Alphabet, Amazon and Apple down to startups, are working on products and services that could improve R&D and other parts of the biopharma industry. But these companies can be disconnected from organizations that will use their technologies, depriving them of input that could ensure they meet the needs of potential customers such as Novartis.

Image: https://www.fiercebiotech.com

Earlier this year, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative joined with the Rockefeller Foundation to offer $10 million in prize money for the winners of their Communities Thrive Challenge. The idea is for community groups to suggest scalable ways to build more economic opportunity for low-income and financially insecure people in the areas they serve.

When a loved one has a tough day, you probably give them a hug without a second thought. And a new study says that simple act may have a larger effect than you realize.

Hugs can have a measurable impact on mood and stress after social conflict, according to a paper published Wednesday in PLOS One. The gesture seemed to increase positive feelings and reduce negative ones on days when people experienced relationship problems, the study found.