Umeå Biotech Incubator (UBI) has strengthened its team with the appointment of two new business coaches – Lisandro Bernardo and Tobias Tovedal.
“There’s significant demand right now for business support, both in the early and late phases of development. We are extremely happy to welcome these two stars to our team”, says Jennie Ekbeck, CEO of Umeå Biotech Incubator.
Ylva Elias has been appointed Business Development Manager at Swedish life science company UmanDiagnostics. She formerly took up her new position in January this year, and is responsible for selling and marketing UmanDiagnostics products throughout Europe.
“This is an incredibly important recruitment for our company. Ylva has the perfect background to be able to help us reach out to new customers in our European markets”, says Niklas Norgren, CEO of UmanDiagnostics.
Inficure Bio a life science company focused on preclinical development and validation of drugs that target chronic inflammatory and fibrotic conditions co-presented with CymaBay Therapeutics positive data at the American Association for the study of Liver Diseases (AASLD) using the company’s proprietary NIF mouse model.
The northern Sweden’s first networking pub for people working in the life science industry will open its doors in Umeå on November 23rd. Behind the initiative is Umeå Biotech Incubator, which has previously been named Europe’s most innovative life science incubator.
“In Umeå we think it is important to ‘pay it forward’. We want to help and support one another and create a strong sense of unity and community. In order to succeed, we need to get to know each other”, says Jennie Ekbeck, CEO of Umeå Biotech Incubator.
Three investors are backing Umeå-based pharmaceutical company Vakona with funding worth millions of SEK.
“We are absolutely delighted and proud to have attracted this investment. It’s a reward for many years of hard work and takes us one step closer to clinical human trials”, says Gabriella Persson, CEO of Vakona.
Swedish-based UmanDiagnostics, a Quanterix company, has developed a new type of product that makes it easier to detect neurological diseases. Called NF-light ™ serum ELISA, it was officially launched on October 12th and will now be sold worldwide.
“Our product can be used for research inthe field of neurological diseases throughout the world. It feels very exciting, because our product is clearly revolutionary”, says Niklas Norgren, VP, Managing Director and co-founder of UmanDiagnostics.
The CEO of Umeå Biotech Incubator (UBI), Jennie Ekbeck, has been named as one of five finalists in the small company category of Sweden’s CEO of the Year 2021.
“I was surprised and very happy to find out I had made it to the final. I feel really honoured”, says Jennie Ekbeck.
The award ceremony will be held at Fotografiska in Stockholm on 11th November.
Umeå-based biopharmaceutical company Omnio has appointed Ulrika Norin, who has a long history of working with drug development startups, as its new CEO.
“I am excited look forward to being a part of Omnio’s team. We have made significant progress in finding identifying ways to help difficulthard-to-treat heal patients with their chronic wounds. Our work feels rewarding and important”, says Ulrika Norin.
We are now looking for two new business coaches for our team.
The life science industry in Umeå is booming. Employment has risen by more than 17 per cent per year and life science companies have attracted SEK 230 million in equity investment over the past two and a half years.
“Two years ago we set a goal that the life science industry in Umeå would generate more than SEK 1 billion and add more than 500 jobs by 2030. At today’s rate we will far exceed this goal”, says Jennie Ekbeck, CEO of Umeå Biotech Incubator (UBI).
Betagenon AB, a Sweden-based company focused on developing AMPK activator compounds, announced that James Hall BM, BCh, D.Phil has joined as CEO.
Umeå-based Xerum launched a home testing kit in March that detects antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 – the virus that causes Covid-19. Uptake of the kits was strong, and now the company has been given an important assignment by Sweden’s Folkhälsomyndigheten (the Swedish Public Health Agency).
“This is amazing news”, says Julia Wigren Byström, CEO of Xerum. “We will be responsible for the distribution and analysis of our self-sampling kits as part of a large study being conducted by the Swedish Public Health Agency to measure the number of people in the country who have developed antibodies”.
Umeå-based biopharmaceutical company Lipum has been working towards a stock exchange listing since 2018 – and now the moment has finally arrived.
On Thursday, April 22, shares in Lipum will be traded on the Nasdaq First North Growth Market for the very first time. The company will ring Nasdaq’s opening bell, which has been specially transported to Umeå, to mark the occasion.
Umeå-based pharmaceutical development company QureTech Bio is hiring more people as it intensifies its work to combat antibiotic resistance.
“We recently received a major investment which has created long-term security in the company. With more people in place, we can now really push on and look to the future”, says Helén Fält, who was recently appointed the new CEO of QureTech Bio.
Helén Fält har jobbat som affärscoach på Umeå Biotech Incubator i åtta år. I den rollen är hon ett viktigt bollplank till tidiga startups inom life science.
– Det är ett väldigt varierande, roligt och flexibelt jobb. Det är kul att få hänga med bolagen på deras tidiga resa och att göra det tillsammans med hela teamet på UBI, säger Helén Fält.
Global Health and Pharma Magazine has named Umeå Biotech Incubator (UBI) as Europe’s most innovative biotechnology incubator in recognition of the positive changes it is making to the biotech industry.
“We are delighted to have been given this award, and that word of our innovative way of working has spread from Umeå to the whole of Europe. It’s really cool”, says Jennie Ekbeck, CEO of Umeå Biotech Incubator.
Nordic Biomarker is now moving to new, larger premises in Umestan. The premises are four times as large as the previous one and provide good opportunities for the company to continue growing.
Umeå-based biopharmaceutical company Lipum AB is raising capital for a listing on the Nasdaq First North Growth Market in the spring of 2021.
“We are taking the next exciting step in the company’s development”, says Lipum’s CEO Einar Pontén.
Lipum AB has appointed Marina Norberg Chief Financial Officer (CFO).
Three high school girls from Umeå have started a UF (Young Enterprise) company that hopes to encourage more girls to study technology and qualify to work in the tech industry.
The three students have already attracted the attention of a number of large technology companies in Umeå who share their ambition.
“We are delighted that several major technology companies believe in us. It shows they are willing to make an effort to create a gender-equal technology industry”, says Aja Tomic, one of the three UF company founders.