Shwen, you have an impressive resume in digital health and corporate innovation. What is it about these areas that you love? 

Before I started my pharma career, I trained as a neuroscientist so perhaps that’s why I’ve always loved solving problems, testing hypotheses and exploring novel solutions. Even as a child, I was always curious about the crossover of science, medicine and emerging technologies — ever since I got my first Apple II computer in the late 80s and taught myself how to program in BASIC. 

Fast-forward through my 20-year pharma career and I found myself spending most of it leading digital strategy and innovation across different functions like commercial, communications, clinical and enterprise-wide.

Can you talk a bit about your work in supporting healthtech startups? 

In most of my biopharma roles, I first worked with internal teams to understand and define the business challenge; then I tried to figure out how to strategically solve them through novel technologies, partnerships, etc. This is why I ended up working with startups, tech companies and the broader digital ecosystem. 

Even though I have worked with startups for most of my career, my focus in the last five years at big pharma companies was to lead enterprise-wise innovation (i.e. across R&D, Clinical, Commercial, Manufacturing, etc.). Hence, I was responsible for sourcing and evaluating novel startups, establishing partnerships with the external digital ecosystem and helping to ensure the success of those partnerships. 

Over the last two or more years, as an independent consultant, I have also taken on more responsibilities as an investor, advisor and mentor to startups globally, including my role as an Mentor-Advisor to PharmStars — a pharma-focused digital health accelerator — and as an Executive-in-Residence at Springboard Enterprises, a nonprofit organization that helps women-led startup leaders grow by providing access to resources, investors and advisors.

You are the founder of GenAI4Pharma. Can you give us an overview of what this is and what it aims to achieve?

#GenAI4Pharma is a series of global events that showcase the application of generative AI and LLM-based technologies for the biopharma industry, across the lifecycle, including R&D, Clinical, Commercial and Medical. 

Each event typically starts with several keynotes delivered by experienced leaders in the field, followed by a series of pitches from startups that are developing GenAI-based solutions for the biopharma industry. 

To date, we have run four events in Boston, Basel, London and NYC, and our audience tends to be a mix of biopharma executives, investors, startups, tech companies and consultants/service providers.

We have featured well-respected pioneers in the field, like Alex Zhavoronkov, CEO of Insilico Medicine, Mike Nally, CEO at Generate Biomedicines or Jared Saul, CMO at AWS, and showcased over 20 startups who pitched their pharma-focused GenAI solutions.

What attracted you to becoming a representative of Business Location Switzerland and the Basel Area?

I was familiar with the DayOne accelerator through my work with startups and was a member of the selection committee as well as a startup mentor in 2023. I spoke at the recent Boom Summit in 2024, so when I was offered the role with Basel Area, I was excited at the opportunity to help spread the word about the region to my network and beyond. 

Your home patch — the Boston area in the US — is a world-class hub for life science. How do you think the Basel Area compares as a place to set up a startup in healthtech?

I was so impressed that the two regions are so similar! I visited Basel several times during my two-year tenure at Novartis and it reminded me a lot of the Boston ecosystem, with its pharma presence, great schools and vibrant startup community. In fact, I only recently found out that the Canton of Basel-Stadt and the state of Massachusetts have been sister-states since 2002. In addition, the Basel Area has a great talent pool, low tax rates, etc. 

Obviously, what the Basel Area brings to the table that Boston can’t is easy access to continental Europe. It’s multilingual culture — with many people speaking German, French and English — helps make interactions and deal-making with people and organizations across Europe super easy.

Who should reach out to you in your new role and how will you be able to help them?

Leaders of established healthtech, digital health and techbio startups who are thinking about expanding to the European market should get in touch with me. I would also love to hear from VCs, as well as anyone managing an incubator or accelerator, who has portfolio companies that might fall into this category. 

I can explain why Switzerland is a great location in which to expand either R&D or commercialization activities (or both!) and discuss the various ways that Basel Area Business & Innovation can help to support that expansion. One of the major ways being the premier DayOne accelerator, our launchpad for healthtech ventures at the interface with pharma and medtech. 

For leaders of pharma or biotech companies looking to settle in Switzerland, I encourage them to reach out to my counterpart Kirsten Detrick, who is specialized in this area.

Follow Shwen on LinkedIn or contact him via email. 

Roche announced its plans for the further modernization of the infrastructure at its Basel site. To this end, the pharmaceutical firm will be investing 1.2 billion Swiss francs to upgrade the northern part of the site. Since 2014, the company has already invested a sum of 3 billion Swiss francs in its Basel location.

The investment of 1.2 billion Swiss francs will be used to build another 72-meter-high, 13-story research and development building, among other things. The aim here is to provide attractive laboratory workstations for up to 450 researchers. Moreover, a new production building is to be built for the synthetic and chemical production of medicines. The existing building will also be refurbished and expanded, while the plans additionally include a new building for the Institute of Human Biology with space for up to 250 researchers. For this, an existing building will be converted and fully remodeled.

Big plans also for the southern part

“The new buildings will expand the infrastructure for future innovations along the entire pharmaceutical value chain, from research to production”, comments Jürg Erismann, Head of the Basel site, in the press release. He adds: “This is another clear commitment to the Basel research and production site and to Switzerland”. It is expected that the construction work on the research building and other building renovations will be completed by 2030.

As Roche explains in a video covering its site development plans in Basel, wide, generously proportioned green spaces will be created in the southern part of the area. To this end, the research and office buildings will be removed. According to a press release, the cantonal government of the canton of Basel-Stadt also approved a corresponding development plan on November 17. These plans also include a central building for visitors and employees in the park and a possible third high-rise building depending on Roche’s needs in the future.

Nouscom, a Basel-based clinical-stage immuno-oncology company, has raised 67.5 million euros in a Series C financing round. The round was led by Andera Partners, Bpifrance (through its InnoBio 2 fund) and M Ventures. Other new and existing investors also participated. As part of this financing, representatives of Andera Partners, Bpifrance and M Ventures were appointed to Nouscom’s Board of Directors, according to a statement.

The Basel-based biotech company is developing standardized and personalized cancer vaccines based on viral vectors targeting neoantigens. According to the statement, the fresh capital will be used to advance Nouscom’s clinical pipeline to the most important clinical endpoints. These include a Phase 2 trial for the treatment of colorectal cancer, an ongoing Phase 1b trial for cancer prophylaxis in Lynch Syndrome carriers, and the completion of a Phase 1b trial for personalized cancer immunotherapy in various indications.

Promising development

If positive, the Phase 2 data for the NOUS-209 vaccine, which simultaneously targets 209 neoantigens, “have the potential to position Nouscom’s neoantigen-based cancer vaccines amongst the most thrilling developments in the field,” commented Nouscom CEO Dr. Marina Udier in the statement. Dr. Sofia Ioannidou, Partner at Andera Partners, believes that the “robustness of the clinical results generated so far positions Nouscom as one of the leading biotech companies in the neoantigen cancer vaccine space”.

Published by Pharmaceutical Market Europe

Fortunately, digital healthcare technologies may hold the key to increasing pipeline efficiencies, and a new breed of startups looks set to revolutionise the sector, provided they can attract the attention of suitable investors. Healthtech hubs – such as the Novartis Campus in Basel, Switzerland – offer these fledgling companies an environment alongside pharmaceutical giants and other innovative corporations, providing a new collaborative culture to drive drug development deep into the 21st century.

The pharmaceutical industry is behind some of the greatest discoveries in the history of humanity, with distinguished medical minds and novel therapies prolonging lifespans and improving well-being. Vaccines have eradicated diseases and helped to fight global pandemics, while ‘miracle drugs’ such as penicillin and insulin have changed the face of clinical practice, saving millions of lives. However, even with the seemingly endless introduction of new medicines to the clinician’s armamentarium, certain disease areas still lack efficacious therapies, leaving unmet needs and opportunities for companies willing to adapt to enhance drug discovery.

Reinventing the pharmaceutical industry

Digital tools emerging from the booming healthtech sector are responding to the demands of the industry, helping it to evolve so that life-saving therapies can continue to solve the world’s health problems. The ever-increasing uptake of digital solutions is already enhancing patient engagement, increasing access to care, and lowering the cost of drug development.

The latter is especially pertinent for large corporations with multiple therapies in the pipeline, as improving process efficiencies could translate to huge savings. This is evident with the emergence of decentralised and hybrid clinical trials – enabled, in part, by digital tools such as wearable devices with remote monitoring – which offer patients far greater levels of comfort and convenience, while lowering overall costs by improving retention rates, reducing operational overheads and accelerating time to market.

With change comes opportunity

The inevitable shift to a more digitalised industry provides ample opportunities for healthtech startups to grow. Many of these companies have potentially game-changing technologies, but often struggle to find the means to get their ideas to fruition. Conversely, the pharmaceutical giants have ample resources and access to worldwide markets, representing the perfect vehicle for startups to scale, expand globally and get their solutions in front of patients.

The challenge, then, is to bridge the interface between two polar-opposite cultures – startup versus corporate – to enable them to establish successful and symbiotic partnerships.  Healthtech startups are often founded by a mingling of brilliant minds – including scientists, software engineers and health informaticians – but they can lack experience in developing clear, long-term business models, especially when collaborating with big pharma and the exponential scaling that follows.

What they do enjoy and rely on for survival is speed as, with limited resources, they need to move fast. This is in stark contrast to the conservative, risk-averse nature of the pharmaceutical industry, which needs to move slowly, because of the enormous cost of drug development and the ramifications of getting it wrong.

Healthtech hubs – a scientific melting pot

Traditionally, the contrast between these business models could have stopped innovation in its stride. However, modern-day approaches to drug development recognise it as a strength, resulting in the establishment of thriving ecosystems replete with companies of all shapes and sizes.

For example, the Novartis Campus in Basel, Switzerland opened its doors to the outside world in 2021. As a result, the Switzerland Innovation Park Basel Area was established on site, offering a place for startups, growing companies and partners in the life sciences to work in close proximity to one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. In fact, many of the spaces are publicly accessible, breaking the shackles of the traditionally private pharma ethos. This provides a unique environment designed to catalyse scientific progress by encouraging collaboration between great minds from all aspects of drug discovery, from microbiologists and chemists to healthtech developers and data scientists.

Matthias Leuenberger, Country President for Novartis in Switzerland, weighed in on the subject, saying: “The Novartis Campus in Basel is a space for dialogue, collaboration and scientific innovation, characterised by its dynamic and lively working environment and its unique atmosphere encompassing parks, restaurants, cafes, event spaces and sports facilities.

“Every architectural and artistic detail has been carefully selected to better foster inspiration and cooperation, providing the ideal environment where researchers, entrepreneurs and other experts in the healthcare industry can meet to work on new ideas and develop partnerships.

“We open our doors to companies and institutions of different sizes to inspire and bring the best minds in the industry together in Basel, which has established itself as one of the most important scientific hubs in the world today.”

A catalyst for innovation

The Basel area is home to over 700 life sciences companies, comprised of more than 32,000 employees – including 8,000 for Novartis at the campus alone – making finding the right person to pitch to, or company to partner with, an intimidating prospect. The startup mindset may lead to individuals eagerly trying to sell their idea or technology, without considering its relevance to the therapeutic indication of the other company’s portfolio.

On the other side of the table, big pharma can be slow to engage its smaller counterparts, where speed – as well as access to funding and resources – can be make-or-break factors.  A means to ignite the critical conversations that lead to the discovery of mutual interests is often needed, followed by a way to nurture the relationship into a successful long-term collaboration.

A major factor for the ongoing success of this healthtech hub is access to support from Basel Area Business & Innovation, an independent, non-profit agency that provides assistance with the relocation or expansion of companies. The company has helped over 30 startups settle in the Novartis Campus, as well as hundreds more businesses and entrepreneurs in the cantons of Basel-Stadt, Basel-Landschaft and Jura.

A key aspect of its remit is to provide community management activities on campus – including frequent events, roundtable discussions, pitch sessions and more – to generate networking opportunities. Its DayOne Accelerator has also been vital in helping many startups scale their technologies.

Scaling new heights in Basel

Many of these startups are in the rapidly expanding field of AI, offering products or services through partnerships or software licensing deals that can be applied to pharma pipelines. One notable example is Holmusk – a company originally from Singapore – that expanded its operations to the Novartis Campus to capitalise on the robust life sciences and pharma presence in the Basel area, as well as the wealth of specialised talent. The company uses AI-powered analytics to enrich its large mental health platform ‘NeuroBlu.ai’, helping pharmaceutical companies improve drug development and commercialisation.

The future of healthtech

Pioneering ecosystems such as the Novartis Campus – located in an equally scientifically vibrant city – help to not only accelerate drug discovery and development, but also secure a prosperous future for the region by enticing global players to its shores. The world-class resources, state-of-the-art facilities and varied personnel found there only attract more investment, additional startups and other major pharmaceutical companies, perpetuating the innovative environment that is nurtured by local agencies established to accelerate scientific progress. This has led to a healthtech hub bursting with talent and novel ideas that continues to deliver cutting-edge tools to enhance drug discovery, accelerate time to market and improve patient access to care.

Impressions of the event

Published by International Hospital & Equipment

Alarmingly, chronic pain affects more than 30 percent of people worldwide, [1] yet current treatments can be ineffective or lead to drug dependence, leaving many individuals in dire need of innovative solutions that will help them find relief. New ways to manage pain – from neuroplasticity training through interactive games to therapies that use virtual reality (VR) – promise to shake up the status quo of clinical pain management in the years to come.

Pain is a complex and multifaceted biomechanism that is experienced differently by each person. Its subjective nature means that it can’t be measured or quantified; a person’s perception of pain is unique and influenced by various factors, including genetics, past experiences, and emotional state. Psychosocial elements – such as mood, stress levels, and support systems – also shape how a person perceives and copes with pain. This complex web of factors has plagued healthcare professionals for a long time, making chronic pain treatment incredibly challenging. Traditional therapies offer temporary relief, but long-term use can lead to dependence and addiction, which is evident with the opioid crisis in countries such as the  US. Many clinicians are therefore looking for alternative treatments, while also seeing the benefits of taking a more holistic approach to the pain management paradigm.

Novel solutions for treating pain

Dr Elan Schneider is CEO and Co-founder of the Israeli company TrainPain – comprised of a team of healthcare professionals, scientists, and technology experts who have developed a neuroplasticity training game for chronic pain. Dr Schneider has dedicated the best part of his career to finding novel solutions for treating pain. He explained: “Pain can destroy a person’s quality of life for prolonged periods, yet there isn’t always a clear correlation between the physical damage in the body and the intensity of pain felt. The latest understanding of pain suggests that neuroplastic changes can heighten the sensitivity of the body’s pain-processing nerves. This means that even minor threats to the body can trigger pain, amplifying these nerve signals and resulting in disproportionate levels of pain relative to the actual harm.

“Despite extensive research in this field, many findings haven’t made their way into clinical practice. At TrainPain, we’ve translated some ground-breaking concepts from neuroscience into tangible solutions. Our method is to train the body’s natural ability to regulate pain by enhancing the neural circuits that naturally turn down the volume of pain-related nerve signals sent to the brain. While this approach isn’t new – opioids and cannabinoids, for example, work similarly to mimic the body’s inhibitory neurotransmitters – traditional medications not only come with side effects, but also fail to promote the body’s inherent learning capabilities for long-term changes in pain regulation.”

Transdiagnostic pain management

The team at TrainPain has taken a transdiagnostic approach to pain management, looking at mechanisms that are common across different types of chronic pain. This could help to meet the dire need for novel therapies for neuropathic pain – including fibromyalgia, complex regional pain syndrome, and phantom limb pain – where current treatments are largely ineffective or insufficient.

Dr Schneider continued: “Various conditions display an overlap, with neuroplasticity in the nervous system being a pivotal factor. Engaging in numerous repetitions of therapeutic tasks can help address these maladaptive neuroplastic changes and promote healthier alterations in the nervous system. To this end, our solution harnesses sensory perception tasks, delivered through video games, to provide the necessary engagement and ensure that patients participate for sufficient time to benefit. This form of training aids learning and induces changes in how sensory neurons activate and communicate.”

Basel: a hub for scaling innovation

TrainPain is one of a handful of companies attracted to Basel, Switzerland, which is now arguably the healthtech capital of Europe. Basel and the surrounding area are replete with highly specialized scientific entrepreneurs and large pharmaceutical players, where growing companies such as TrainPain can be immersed in a forward-thinking environment to foster innovation. The company signed up for the DayOne Accelerator with Basel Area Business & Innovation – a non-profit agency that helps innovative companies develop and expand – to make the vital connections it needed to take its ideas to the next level and, ultimately, reach the patients they are designed to help.

Commenting on the accelerator, Dr Schneider said: “Participating in this accelerator gave us the opportunity to talk with the right people at the intersection of pharma and digital health. We learned a lot about the pharmaceutical industry and its needs, where our solution fits, and how to make important collaborations with healthcare organizations to ensure we are ready for the future.”

Another alum of the DayOne Accelerator is Rescape, a Welsh startup that develops VR solutions for reducing pain and anxiety. Rescape knew about the beneficial ecosystem of the Basel area, which helped the company take its innovation from conception to completion. Matt Wordley, Co-founder and Board Director at Rescape, explained: “We don’t get much exposure to pharmaceutical companies in Wales, so spending time in Basel has been crucial for our development as a small startup. It has allowed us to understand the complexities of the pharma world, and network with the right people. In fact, a couple of the collaborations born out of our time in Basel have really helped us fast-track our business, and a number of other opportunities are still being pursued. The team at Basel Area Business & Innovation has also opened the doors to mainland Europe, helping our VR solutions conform to the EU medical device regulations.”

Virtual reality in healthcare

VR is most often associated with gaming, but its applications are being explored in a variety of industries. In healthcare, a recent analysis of VR and augmented reality in scientific literature found more than 8,000 research papers on the topic, with the most common medical conditions under investigation including pain, stroke, anxiety, depression, fear, cancer, and neurodegenerative disorders. [2] Pain and anxiety management have the largest evidence base for the use of VR in medicine, [3] where distraction through immersion – along with neurophysiological changes – contribute to therapeutic effects. This could lead to novel treatment options for patients with chronic pain, potentially reducing the reliance on opioids. [4] In addition, Rescape is already seeing significant benefits in a more acute setting.

Wordley explained: “The brain becomes ensconced in the environment that it is in, as it is not designed to cope with two realities. With VR, we are basically hacking the brain, so it shelves the pain or anxiety the patient is experiencing, and replaces it with a distracting or relaxing environment. We have found some wonderful results in paediatric patients, especially with children who are stressed or anxious about minor procedures, such as those involving needles. VR can actually help to reduce sedation requirements in children, and potentially eliminate the need for anaesthesia for minor operations. This is a huge benefit to both anxious children and stressed parents, as well as healthcare professionals, reducing the risks and recovery times for patients.”

Wordley continued: “VR is also being deployed in palliative care as a temporary respite for patients – a form of escapism – and in intensive care units (ICUs). A nice example in the latter setting involved a patient who was having around 20 panic attacks per day following an extended ICU stay, where he experienced pain and isolation from the outside world. Within a couple of weeks of using VR, he was having just the odd panic attack, and could be moved to a general ward. However, his story didn’t end there. Not long after being discharged, he needed to get his big toe amputated, but the medical team couldn’t use a general anesthetic because of his health, and it would need to be done using a regional block. This caused him to spiral into a panic attack, until he agreed to use VR to calm his nerves, allowing the operation to continue.”

Summary

The inaugural BOOM Summit will take place in April 2024. The venue will be the events hall at Messe Basel. According to a statement, the event will be dedicated to trends in digital health technologies. It will be “a highlight of the European healthtech calendar”, as well as provide an open forum for the discussions and strategies that are set to transform the healthcare sector.

The event is organized by DayOne, an initiative of Basel Area Business & Innovation, the investment and innovation promotion agency, and the Kenes Group, a leading global provider of medical conferences. The main partner is the Basel-based MCH Group, which is supporting the BOOM Summit as part of its strategy to position Basel as a leading hub for life sciences events. “The aim of the BOOM Summit is to promote collaboration and innovation in the field of healthcare technology,” commented Caoimhe Vallely-Gilroy, Director of Strategy DayOne and conference organiser.

Program offers great variety

The event is aimed at all professionals as well as entrepreneurs, investors and political decision-makers. The program includes expert panels, technology presentations, startup pitch sessions and interactive workshops. According to Dr. Leslie Anne Fendt, who is responsible for an advanced digital health project at Roche in Basel, the BOOM Summit will “bring together the best and brightest minds in healthcare technology and hopefully ensure that the latest and most exciting technologies can flourish”.

Onena Medicines has raised a total of 3.7 million Swiss francs as part of a financing round. The venture capital has been provided by the Basel-based asset management firm Avanteca Partners and Zürcher Kantonalbank, the cantonal bank of Zurich. The biopharmaceutical firm Onena, which is headquartered at the Main Campus of Switzerland Innovation Park Basel Area in Allschwil in the canton of Basel-Landschaft, is a portfolio company of BaseLaunch, the biotech startup incubator active within the Basel biotech cluster.

Onena has a pipeline of promising antibody medicines to treat cancer, which neutralize a new class of growth factors called dual SMAD inhibiting proteins (DSIPs) that are responsible for programming the cancer cells to grow and induce resistance to chemotherapy. “Our partners realize, as we do, the incredible opportunity that lies before us to lead the AI drug discovery field”, comments Neethan Lobo, CEO and co-founder of Onena Medicines, in a press release.

Efficacy already shown

Onena intends to put the investment towards its efforts to provide in vivo proof of concept with its most advanced DSIP program (OMED-2). This is a first fully human antibody that targets an as yet undisclosed DSIP target protein. The company believes this has the potential to impact solid tumors such as melanoma.

Onena’s flagship OMED-1 program has already shown efficacy in breast, colorectal and glioblastoma preclinical models in vivo. Onena uses its deep learning pipelines to humanize and optimize the binding affinity of its lead molecules.

CSL is expanding its research and development (R&D) network in Switzerland. The global biotechnology company, which is headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, officially opened a new office in the Switzerland Innovation Park Basel Area premises on the Novartis Campus in Basel. The contract with the operator includes 18 workstations.

In a statement, CSL describes the move as a “pivotal milestone in strengthening CSL’s R&D network across Switzerland”. It allows for “flexible and activity-based ways of working” and taps into “the region’s great potential” for collaboration along the drug development process.

Access to Basel Area’s talent pool

“This step is not only extending our long-standing strategic partnerships with key players in biotech located in Basel but ensuring access to the region’s talent pool and exploring further opportunities for collaboration”, commented Emmanuelle Lecomte Brisset, CSL’s Head of Global Regulatory Affairs who is leading CSL’s efforts to strengthen its R&D presence in Switzerland.

In May of this year, CSL opened an R&D laboratory on the Biopôle Campus in Lausanne. In August 2022, the company acquired Switzerland’s Vifor Pharma, which has since operated as CSL Vifor. CSL has also established collaborations with academic institutions in Switzerland, such as the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne and Lausanne University Hospital.