Academic Discovery Workshop

Overview

The drug discovery landscape is facing many challenges and changes fueled in part with the ongoing de-risking efforts by the Pharma industry; seemingly downsizing their footprint or exiting the space all together. The emerging new paradigm seems to be revolving around academic and non-for-profit institutions to carry out the discovery part of the process across a multitude of therapeutic areas. What has started as a successful interactive workshop for academic screening for the past three years, has now evolved to encompass all discovery aspects from technology development, hit identification, to licensing deals.

This new format will continue to provide delegates the opportunity to learn as well as share experiences about enabling technologies, hit to lead generation, dealing with academic tech transfer offices, identifying and working with CROs, and interrogating the value proposition of functional genomics in translational research. Organised by Dr Hakim Djaballah, Director of the HTS Core Facility at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, our 4th Annual Academic Discovery Workshop will take place at the Sheraton Baltimore North in Baltimore from September 23rd-25th. Whether delegates are looking to expand their knowledge, engage in discussions with thought leaders during the afternoon panel discussion sessions, or simply requiring more of an insight to aid and foster future collaborations, this workshop, together with the newly established short courses is highly recommended to anyone working or has an interest in drug discovery from academia, research institutes, biotech, and Pharma companies.

The workshop also aims to help energize the discovery paradigm through open panel discussions on highly provocative topics such as “Target-based versus phenotypic-based drug discovery”, “Functional genomics technologies and their impact of target identification”, or "private-public partnerships". It is hoped that through these kind of open discussions, delegates will have the opportunity to build their own consensus and bring their points of view across. We are always seeking new ideas and inputs to help discover novel or repurpose known drugs to fight disease whether in a pharmaceutical or academic setting.

We look forward to welcoming you to our 4th Annual Academic Discovery Workshop in Baltimore and we hope the three days will be both enjoyable and informative.