Explore the Agenda

8:20 am Chair’s Opening Remarks

Principal Manager, CIRCA-PhD

Networking Session: Navigating Investor Expectations

Moderated by:

Principal, Dolby Venture Fund

8:30 am Grant Organisation & Investor Icebreaker: When Being Selective, Where Will Investors Invest?

Director of Research Alliances, The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research
Executive Director, Mission Related Investments & Finance, Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation
Partner, SV Dementia Discovery Fund
Managing Director, Chugai Ventures
Director, Research & Grants, Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration
Partner, Longwood Funds
  • Are there business models for non-dilutive funding?
  • How have changes to the barrier to entry for new innovations fed through into investment?
  • How to progress discussions with investors. What is expected and helpful to understand from biotech, from the investor perspective?
  • How to navigate the grant process?

9:00 am Investors Icebreaker Speed Networking

What is this session?

Following the investor panel, where the audience will understand investor interests, this formal networking ensures that each biotech can introduce itself to each investor

How will this session run?

Join high tables in small groups with an investor at each table. For rounds of five minutes, biotech stays at tables and investors move around. Rapidly gauge alignment between portfolios and the stage of the company, share business cards, or ask a follow-up question from the panel before the investors rotate, and a new round begins

8:30 am Individual Meetings: One-on-One Partnering

To maximize your opportunity to secure key connections before the conference ends, you can choose to exchange business cards with investors evaluating investments across neuroscience, or continue to meet with pharma and biotech connections in one-to-one meetings arranged pre-event or from connections made on day one.

9:30 am Morning Break & Networking Opportunity

10:00 am One-on-One Partnering Private Meetings Paused as Presentations Start

10:00 am Showcase Your Science: Pipeline Innovation Partner Presentations

Co-Founder, President & Chief Executive Officer, Equulus Thrapeutics
Co-Founder & Chief Scientific Officer, Kinoxis Therapeutics
Project Manager, TreeFrog Therapeutics
Commercial Manager, Beacon Neuroscience
Chief Business Officer, Crownlands
Chief Scientific Officer, Marvel Biosciences

10.00EQL-988: Expanding Rapid Treatment for Suicidality Beyond Ketamine by EQUULUS Therapeutics

10.15 Building a Best-in-class Cell Therapy for Parkinson’s Disease by Treefrog Therapeutics

10.30Presentation by Kinoxis Therapeutics

10.45 Presentation by Beacon Neuroscience

11.00 Olfactory Neurons as a Longitudinal, Molecular Window into Patient Brain Biology by Crownlands

11.15 MB-204: A Novel A2a Receptor Antagonist to the Restore Social Reward Signal in Autism, Depression & Alzheimer’s Disease by Marvel Biotechnology

11:30 am One-on-One Partnering Meetings

12:00 pm Lunch Break & Networking Opportunity

12:00 pm One-on-One Partnering Private Meetings Scheduled

With over 100 attendees, and opportunities for meetings a key KPI for this event, lunch on day two will be extended to accommodate more 1:1 meetings and networking conversations. If you connect for the first time on day one and need time to sit down before the conference ends, this extended break allows that to happen.

Redefining Target Discovery: Science, Strategy & Smart Partnerships

1:30 pm What is the Direction of New Targets? Different Target Identification Strategies

Chief Executive Officer & Co-founder, Verge Genomics
Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Aperture Therapeutics
Chief Business Officer, Crownlands
Co-Founder, Chief Scientific Officer, Assemblify
  • Reviewing the state of play of target identification and validation, and business rationale to explore newly discovered targets
  • Leveraging human genetic data to understand the efficacy of new drugs
  • Discussing the optimal moment for a biotech to partner a novel target identified through an innovative platform and whether the current deal-making landscape is favouring first-in-class or best-in-class

Structuring Partnerships: From Proof of Concept to Creative Deal Structures

2:00 pm Effectively & Efficiently Structuring Deals as Small Neuroscience Companies

Co-founder & Senior Director Corporate Development, Aliada Therapeutics
Business Development Advisor, Phrenix Therapeutics
Principal, Company Creation, Frazier Life Sciences
Head of BD&L Transactions Neuroscience, Novartis
President & Chief Financial Officer, Neurogene Inc.
  • Discussing the panel’s experience executing and performing due diligence across neuroscience deals – what are the learnings from having partnerships with pharma?
  • Discussing how to get proof of concept earlier to secure additional investment or partnership
  • Outlining opportunities for creative deal structures, and when and where they would be appropriate

2:30 pm Chair’s Closing Remarks & End of Conference

Principal Manager, CIRCA-PhD