Its objective is to “transfer knowledge to the market through the creation of or participation in startups to which it can add value from its R&D capabilities, clinical, scientific, technological and business experience”, as well as to “promote its development within the biosanitary sector”.
The University of Navarra has set up an incubator to continue promoting entrepreneurial projects related to the field of healthcare. The aim is to transfer knowledge to the market through the creation of or participation in startups to which it can add value from its R&D capabilities, clinical, scientific, technological and business experience, and to promote their development within the biohealth sector. At present, the incubator is already working on the viability and start-up of eight new projects.
To this end, the incubator relies on the participation of specialists from the Clínica Universidad de Navarra, researchers from Cima and the centers and institutes that make up its university community. “This allows it to offer additional services to healthcare projects such as strategic medical orientation, definition of the product or service or clinical validation,” the University of Navarra reported on Monday.
The initiative’s team is completed with a group of professionals with experience in incubation, business development, access to financing, transfer and management of research and a network of external collaborators. In total, it has 300 collaborators, crowdfunders and business angels.
This incubator, which will work with pre-seed and seed stage projects, will not require entrepreneurs to physically move to Pamplona. “The University of Navarra aims to improve society through research, teaching and assistance. The promotion of this initiative will allow the University to help different projects directly related to health,” said Belén Goñi, director of Innovation Factory, Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship of the University of Navarra.
Accompaniment
The incubator will accompany the projects in their different stages, put them in contact with experts and assist them in their search for funding. In this way, it will help the startups in their presentation to investors likely to participate in the early stages of development and will bring them closer to the sources of funding in the university’s ecosystem, including its network of business angels and other funds with which it has already co-invested.
In this new stage, the University of Navarra has taken a stake in the Innohealth fund, which specializes in healthcare and is managed by Clave Capital, with whom it will continue to collaborate. “The incubator specializing in healthcare is the continuation of the work that the university began eight years ago to intensify its knowledge transfer activity by generating startups based on its research results,” the university said.
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