The Innomed program , led and coordinated by the Germans Trias i Pujol Research Institute (IGTP), has today held a new edition of the Innomed Awards, an event aimed at promoting biomedical innovation projects and strengthening the connection between research, the healthcare system, entrepreneurship and investment.

The event highlighted the evolution of Innomed after three years of activity and its contribution to supporting innovative projects emerging from the Can Ruti innovation ecosystem.

Held in the auditorium of the Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute (IJC), the event also provided an opportunity to review the first three years of GrowInn, Innomed's project incubator. Since its launch, seven institutions have taken part, 45 innovative projects have been incubated and more than 150 professionals have been supported. The program  has organised 25 training sessions, with more than 100 hours of training delivered by experts from different fields, and has held three editions of the Innomed Awards to connect projects with the entrepreneurial and investment ecosystem. In addition, €85,000 in prizes and specialised services have been mobilised to contribute to the development and valorisation of the participating initiatives.

The initiative involves the Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute (IJC), the Consorci Sanitari del Maresme (CSdM), Germans Trias i Pujol University Hospital (HUGTiP), the Catalan Institute of Oncology (ICO), IrsiCaixa, the Guttmann Institute and IGTP itself.

The event opened with welcome remarks from Ari Melnick, Director General of the IJC, Oriol Estrada, Director of Healthcare Strategy and Innovation at HUGTiP, Jordi Barretina, Director General of IGTP, and Raül Zurita, Director of Innovation at IGTP. During their speeches, they reflected on Innomed's three-year journey and highlighted the programme's role in fostering innovation through collaboration between institutions across the Can Ruti and Maresme ecosystems.

The event then featured the session "How to prepare for early-stage investment", delivered by Francisco Badia, Partner at Grow Venture Partners, a venture capital fund specialising in science-based companies that has supported spin-offs such as Nimble Diagnostics and HealthTech Innovations. The session focused on the factors investors look for in early-stage projects, as well as the main challenges, common mistakes and recommendations for successfully approaching a first investment round.

One of the central moments of the event was the presentation of the 15 projects taking part in the new edition of GrowInn, Innomed's incubator for supporting initiatives with potential for transfer and impact in health. The teams presented their proposals to professionals from research, healthcare, business and the innovation ecosystem.

The event also included a networking space, designed to facilitate contact between entrepreneurs, sector professionals and key ecosystem stakeholders, and concluded with the presentation of the Innomed Awards, which recognise the projects with the greatest innovative potential and capacity for impact.

Participants of this year’s program.

"Innomed enables us to work on innovation from the earliest stages, helping teams to better structure their projects and prepare them to move towards transfer. After three years of activity, the program  continues to grow as a space for collaboration between institutions and for connection with the entrepreneurial and investment ecosystem in health," says Raül Zurita, Innovation Director at IGTP.

Award-winning projects

Of the 15 projects participating in the incubator, seven were recognised for their talent and determination. Each award includes services worth €5,000 provided by the sponsoring organisations. The winning projects were:

• PRE-T-CURE (Laura Mondragón, IJC) - award sponsored by ZBM Patents & Trademarks
• Non-invasive biomarker profile for the detection of oropharyngeal dysphagia (Jordi Sureda, CSdM) - award sponsored by Ingecal
• Blebmaker (Marta San Roque, IGTP) - award sponsored by GENESIS Biomed
• IDimmuno360 (Alba de la Puente, ICO) - award sponsored by ClarkeModet
• Ítaca (Àlex López, Institut Guttmann) - award sponsored by Inveniam Group
• HAREH (Eduard Badenas, HUGTiP) - award sponsored by Itua Health
• Schisto-Stop (Sara Cabrero, IrsiCaixa) - award sponsored by ITEMAS

With this new edition, the Innomed Awards reinforce their role as a meeting point and platform for recognising and supporting innovative initiatives emerging from the Can Ruti innovation ecosystem. The program  will continue working to foster knowledge transfer, collaboration between centres and connection with the entrepreneurial and investment ecosystem.

A photo gallery will be available soon.