Investment engine will support academic discoveries showing commercial promise.

A translational medicine investment company, BioMotiv, has been established as part of the $250 million Harrington Project for Discovery and Development initiative announced by University Hospitals in February. BioMotiv aims to raise initial capital of $100 million as it builds a portfolio of technologies in-licensed from academic medical centers associated with The Harrington Project and other sources.

Operating as the development arm of the Harrington Project, BioMotiv was created to address the difficulties in commercializing new drug discoveries, and will work downstream of the recently created UH Case Medical Center’s Harrington Discovery Institute. The company will provide strategic guidance to physician-scientists working with the Harrington Discovery Institute, and license in projects that meet certain scientific and business hurdles. Priority will be given to projects that are in advanced discovery, preclinical development, or ready to start in initial clinical trials. More than 20 potential projects are already being screened from a range of sources, including UH Case Medical Center, other academic medical centers, and biopharmaceutical companies. BioMotiv will act to lead selected projects, provide initial investment, and be responsible for orchestrating exit through future outlicensing.

While BioMotiv acts as the commercial arm for the Harrington Project, its nonprofit component is the UH Harrington Discovery Institute (HDI), which has been established as a national model dedicated to supporting innovation by physician-scientists. Based at UH CaseMedicalCenter, the HDI will work to allow collaboration with major academic medical centers and nonprofit foundations across the country, leading to the creation of support centers for physician-scientists in areas such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, neuroscience, infectious disease, and inflammation.

Through its Scholar-Innovator Grants program, HDI provides financial support and professional mentoring to physician-scientists with breakthrough clinical research projects. Up to ten $200,000 two-year grants are available to U.S. based physician-scientists to support clinically oriented projects. Grant recipients will also be supported through structured mentoring and assistance with applying for additional grants, business plan writing, general guidance on intellectual property, and drug development support and consulting. 

Previous articlenanoMR, Stratos Partner on Pathogen Detection
Next articleKineMed Wins $1.2M from MJFF for Parkinson Disease Biomarker Program