Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Novartis hosts eighth BioCamp for future biotech leaders

By Lori Valigra, Mass High Tech correspondent

Novartis, which has more than 2,300 employees in Cambridge, opened its eighth annual International Biotechnology Leadership Camp (BioCamp) in Basel, Switzerland.

The three-day seminar, which started in 2004 in Taiwan and was held in Cambridge in October 2009, brings together biotechnology and business experts with 60 selected students from universities in 24 countries and territories. This year, Novartis is highlighting the growing role of diversity in its group companies worldwide to drive innovation, including in scientific research and development.

The program is designed for postgraduate students from the faculty of medicine, pharmaceutical, and business schools. During the Cambridge program, students said in a YouTube video that they learned about raising money, intellectual property, how biotech research is run, and how to blend business with science. Speakers included experts outside Novartis as well, including venture capitalists from MPM Capital, Polaris Ventures, and Flagship Ventures, as well as Eric Lander, founding director of MIT’s Broad Institute.

This year, the event is focused on diversity. "Diversity and inclusion is a pivotal foundational stone of our core strategies. It is through diversity in people, cultures, thought, and approach that leads to breakthrough medicines," Joseph Jimenez, CEO of Novartis, said in a statement.

"Advances in drug discovery and biomedical research increasingly require diverse, multicultural, cross-disciplinary, and team-based approaches," noted Dhavalkumar D. Patel, MD, head of the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in Europe and Global Head of the Autoimmunity, Transplantation and Inflammation Disease Area.

BioCamp participants will interact with key Novartis scientists to learn about breakthrough new medicines to address unmet medical needs. The program is designed to help students understand trends and challenges in the biotechnology and life sciences sectors and receive first-hand experience about starting and running a biotech company, Novartis said. The event also lets the students explore career opportunities in the pharmaceutical and biotech industries and network with students from other countries.

On the final day of the program, BioCamp participants, working in groups, will present business cases to a jury of experts. The jury will select three individual winners and one winning team based on their contribution, performance, leadership, and teamwork.

The students will also visit some of the newest Novartis laboratory facilities. The campus in Basel includes 14 new research and office buildings that are already open. Plans are underway for four additional buildings. More than 7,000 people work there, but the site has the capacity for about 13,000.

Novartis has been located in Cambridge since May 2002. It has more than 2,300 workers in Cambridge and more than 1 million square feet of factory space. In October 2010, it announced a $600 million expansion that added 300 jobs and 400,000 square feet to its Cambridge research campus. The company has run its Institutes for Biomedical Research since 2004 in a Massachusetts Ave. plant formerly owned and operated by the New England Confectionary Co.

Cambridge is home to the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics, and Novartis Molecular Diagnostics business units, and is the U.S. site of Novartis Venture Funds. The company’s research and development includes vaccines, diagnostics tools, generic pharmaceuticals, and consumer health products.