For the second time, Umeå Biotech Incubator (UBI) has been granted funding from the Family Erling-Persson Foundation, this time the sum is 17 million SEK.
Results from previous allocations are positive, the incubator’s external capital to start-up companies has increased with over 200 percent between 2014 and 2015. The collaboration is now prolonged for another three years.
Thanks to the grant UBI has been able to offer researchers and entrepreneurs applied research grants for verification and development of medical innovations.
“This is one of our strengths, that our incubator projects are able to focus on testing and confirming ideas, and not worry about practical issues,” says the CEO of UBI, Jennie Ekbeck.
The incubator evaluates between 25-30 ideas every year, but only a few is accepted. The ideas may come from different places in Sweden but focus lies on the Northern parts, from Sundvall and futher up north. The purpose with the UBI is to breed medical discoveries with development potential so that they may create benefit and contribute to better health. This is in line with the Family Erling-Persson Foundation.
“The Foundation has followed UBI’s operations during the last couple of years and seen how academic discoveries succesfully have been piloted from the idea stage and further on to be able to for example offer patients better diagnostics, more effective rehabilitation or new pharmaceuticals,” says Ylva Linderson, Secretary of Research at the Family Erling-Persson Foundation.
UBI received 15 million SEK the first three years, which have been used to finance research activities in projects accepted into the incubator. Together with UBI’s experts within different areas and through their extensive networks the incubator’s start-ups succeeded to collect 26 million SEK in other external capital between 2014 and 2015.
“Our goal is that the applied research fundings will serve as a lever and quintuple the capital for our future companies,” says Ekbeck.
Photo: Johan Gunséus
