When I was first introduced by a former Roche Executive to Catenion, I was a bit skeptical of retaining a London-based firm to tackle for Tel Aviv University two fundamental questions:

1. Why despite great science published in top peer reviewed journals, TAU doesn’t have a molecule?
2. What is required to drive this great science into the translational phase?

After short due diligence we retained Catenion to leverage the firm’s deep understanding of biopharma R&D and on-going changes in the academic environment.

Following extensive study and conducting over 100 interviews with top Israeli researchers both in TAU and other academic institutions, Catenion identified that multi-disciplinarity within the university was not enough: For significant translational research, TAU would need to involve the clinical researchers in the hospitals associated with the university. Catenion came up with a proposal that leveraged insights from the SPARK Stanford model and adapted them to the TAU ecosystem; we have now kicked off our initiative with a symposium, a first call for translational projects to be supported by the initiative will be out in a couple of months and we look forward to developing this further in the next few years with on-going support by Catenion

I would wholeheartedly recommend Catenion to academic and governmental decision-makers wishing to get their universities and hospitals on the global map of biomedical innovation