Past Events

$100K Biomedical Business Plan Challenge Final Pitch Day

Thursday, June 1, 2023 - 5:30pm to 8:30pm
Location: Uris Auditorium, 1300 York Ave., New York NY 10065

Join the Weill Cornell Medicine community for a night of cocktails and networking to celebrate the successful completion of the Business Plan Challenge program by our ambitious newcos.

In this highly selective program, faculty-led newcos complete 12 weeks of seminars led by subject matter experts in market concepts, intellectual property, R&D planning, licensing/partnering, budgeting/fundraising and others. Industry mentors are matched to the teams to support development of their business plans and finalization of their investor pitches.

A panel of VC judges will choose winners for the $100K prize at the end of a pitch competition.

Event banner with a summary and headshots of the six judges for the competition

OUP Webinar: The Art of Communicating Your Science and Startup

Wednesday, May 24, 2023 - 12:00pm to 1:00pm

Osage University Partners (OUP) is pleased to invite you to a webinar on the Art of Communicating Your Science and Startup. Join panelists Otto Pohl of Core Communications and Lori Lennon of Thinkubator Media as they share their expertise. Otto will discuss how to think about PR for your startup, from its strategy and purpose to creating a customer conversion funnel optimized to extract the maximum benefit of your media efforts. Lori will share the essential communication pieces needed for a successful company launch. This includes how to build a message (and what that means exactly), storytelling and preparing for your big media opportunity. Register here.

Banner image in light yellow background with the event title, date and time, and the two speakers' headshots.

BioEntrepreneurship Initiative

Friday, April 7, 2023 - 5:00pm

Interested in the cross-section of entrepreneurship, biotechnology and health care? Want to explore starting a company around your research but looking for a program and team to help you along the way?  

The BioEntrepreneurship Initiative provides Ph.D., M.D., and D.V.M. candidates, as well as post-docs from across Cornell’s campuses and Tri-Institutional partners, with the opportunity to immerse themselves in real-world startup creation. Participants will be matched with a dedicated MBA student to design their own life science startup. Along the way, participants will gain the tools, training and connections they need through a certificate program offered by the SC Johnson Graduate School of Management.   

Up to 30 applicants will be selected to start the program in the Spring of 2023 – half of the selected Fellows will be MBA students, and half will be researchers, innovators, and clinicians in the life sciences.   

Apply for the program. The deadline for researchers, innovators and clinicians to apply is April 7. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. For more information, contact bioentrepreneurship@cornell.edu

Flyer with two researchers in a lab and the application QR code

2023 AIM-HI Women’s Venture Competition

Wednesday, March 15, 2023 - 5:00pm

The 2023 AIM-HI Women’s Venture Competition is now open to women-led oncology companies! Women-led oncology companies seeking pre-seed, seed and Series A investments are eligible to apply. The company must have a woman in senior leadership, who has an equity stake – could be Founder or C-level executive. The applying company must have technology ownership in place. Application is due Wednesday, March 15, 2023. Apply here

Logo with white background and words AIM HI Accelerator Fund in blue and green

BenDaniel Venture Challenge

Friday, March 10, 2023 - 5:00pm

The BenDaniel Venture Challenge (BVC) is Big Red Venture’s Annual Pitch Competition. Five finalists will be selected to pitch their business ideas to a panel of investors during Entrepreneurship at Cornell Celebration on April 13. Winners of the competition will earn a cash prize totaling $25,000 with an additional $25,000 match if the company’s technology is licensed through Cornell.

Companies based in New York state or with a Cornell affiliation are eligible to apply. Applications are open through March 10, 2023. Apply here

Flyer with students sitting in a classroom and the application QR code

Empower Conference 2023 Pitch Competition

Monday, March 6, 2023 - 5:00pm

The Empower Conference 2023 Pitch Competition celebrates women academic entrepreneurship and all founders and researchers who have or are planning to commercialize university-developed intellectual property across all disciplines including technology, physical sciences, life sciences and social sciences.

Applicants will compete for over $150K of cash and in-kind prizes, including a first-place cash prize of $100K and a $10K bundle of in-kind legal and advisory services. The semi-finalists and finalists in the selection process will also receive expert mentoring advice and the opportunity to meet with several VC firms. Application is due Monday, March 6, 2023. Apply here.

Banner image from Empower Pitch website with the words and application due date

Request for Therapeutic Biologics Projects Proposals

Friday, March 3, 2023 - 5:00pm

This program is designed to generate therapeutic antibodies or proteins against validated drug targets, with the goal of advancing these to pre-clinical development. Leveraging support from our industry partner, Takeda Pharmaceuticals Co., Tri-I TDI will provide resources to discovery and engineer therapeutic antibodies and proteins that will be used for in vitro and in vivo proof-of-concept studies in the laboratory of the principal investigator (PI). Outcomes can include monospecific or bispecific antibodies, antibody-drug conjugates, and protein therapeutics.

Principal Investigators, who are full-time employees of Weill Cornell Medicine, are eligible to apply. Letters of Intent due March 3, 2023.

Log into your VPN to access the application page for more details and application process: https://intranet.tritdi.org/applications/therapeutic-antibodies/.  

Biologics drug discovery request for proposal flyer with TDI logo, deadline and application QR code

Health Hackathon 2023

Friday, February 17, 2023 - 4:00pm to Sunday, February 19, 2023 - 3:15pm
Location: 512 W 22nd St, New York, NY 10011

The 2023 Health Hackathon is an in-person interdisciplinary event bringing together students from across degrees, majors, and schools! On Friday evening, teams comprised of medical, business, engineering, and design students, form and begin to create solutions to needs in human health & wellness. On Saturday, mentors provide feedback and guidance to teams. On Sunday, the hackathon culminates in a project showcase to an audience of peers, mentors, and sponsors.

A panel of judges select winners and award $5,000 to winning teams.

Point-of-care devices, medical devices, health-tech, hardware, software the choice is yours on the types of challenges to tackle.

image with codes and an eye on blue background

Funding and Equity for University Startups: Valuation and Term Sheets

Wednesday, February 15, 2023 - 12:00pm to 1:00pm

This is the third installment in Osage University Partners’ series on Funding and Equity for University Startups. Marc Singer and Matt Cohen of OUP will review Valuation and Term Sheets:

  1. How valuation works
  2. Valuation scenarios
  3. How OUP does comp analyses for companies
  4. Basics of a startup investment term sheet
  5. How term sheet negotiations work
  6. Finalizing the term sheet and the financing of the company

The intended audience for this webinar is university startup founders, including future founders and academic technology commercialization groups. You may submit your questions ahead of time on the registration page or by emailing kmangels@oup.vc.

webinar banner with speakers' headshots

Request for Therapeutic Small Molecule Proposals - Letters of Intent due February 17, 2023

Monday, February 13, 2023 - 9:00am to Friday, February 17, 2023 - 5:00pm

This exciting program is for Principal Investigators who are employed full-time by Weill Cornell Medicine. Tri-I TDI partners with Takeda Pharmaceuticals to advance early-stage projects, that have the potential to benefit patients, to proof-of-concept studies.

The program’s objective is to develop novel compounds that elucidate fundamental physiologic and pathological processes, improve efficiency in drug development, create intellectual property that can be further developed by industry collaborators, and translate basic research into clinical application.

Only small molecule chemical compounds will be considered, which excludes antibody, protein and any other biologic therapeutics.

Log into your VPN to access the application page for more details and application process: https://intranet.tritdi.org/applications/small-molecules/.  

Small molecule request for proposal flyer with TDI logo, deadline and application QR code