TORONTO (May 11, 2016) – Johnson & Johnson Innovation LLC, today announced the opening of JLABS @ Toronto, a new 40,000-square-foot life sciences incubator, providing entrepreneurs shared lab space and…
TORONTO, Sept. 8, 2015 — The Ontario Government, University of Toronto, and MaRS Discovery District (MaRS) today announced a collaboration with Janssen Inc. to launch the successful Johnson & Johnson Innovation, JLABS incubator model in Toronto.
This announcement has been covered in the Toronto Star, Metro News Canada, Sing Tao Daily, OurWindsor.ca, FierceBiotech, BioCentury, MedCity News, BioSpace, Biotechnology Focus, Lab Product News, ChinaNews.com, Pan European Networks, Economic Development Blog, BetaKit, Torontoist, and TechVibes.
It was also featured news on Rx&D‘s and Life Sciences Ontario‘s websites.
The new facility, called JLABS @ Toronto, will open in spring of 2016 at MaRS Discovery District and will support start-ups with lab space, programs, and potential investment partners as they work to build important, successful early-stage companies.
“The arrival of the Johnson & Johnson Innovation, JLABS model to MaRS’ West Tower reinforces Ontario’s position as one of the world’s leading life sciences clusters,” said Brad Duguid, Minister of Economic Development, Employment and Infrastructure. “JLABS @ Toronto will support researchers and entrepreneurs across the province and accelerate the development of Ontario companies while connecting Toronto to potential Johnson & Johnson collaborators and investors.”
“Research and innovation are fundamental to the mission of the University of Toronto,” said Dr. Meric S. Gertler, President, University of Toronto. “We host a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem featuring nine campus-led accelerators under the umbrella of our Banting & Best Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. The addition of JLABS to this ecosystem will further propel the creation of new companies and new jobs, and ultimately new healthcare solutions that will benefit individuals and our society for years to come.”
“Toronto is home to a vibrant and prolific healthcare and life sciences community led by academic hospitals, world-class research institutions, top scientists, and a strong start-up ecosystem. For these reasons, Toronto is a natural choice for our first international expansion of JLABS,” said Melinda Richter, Head of JLABS. “The Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies has long been active within the Toronto Ontario community, forming many important collaborations. Today we are pleased to begin an even deeper relationship with this important community. Our new location, within a University of Toronto site, close to our hospital collaborators, and neighbouring the financial centre of Canada, will deliver great opportunities and impact for emerging biomedical technology entrepreneurs.”
“As hospital invest continue to invest in mobile solutions, doctors and nurses are more likely to be texting on their smartphones or swiping their fingers across a tablet PCs than tapping away on desktop computers,” Dianne Daniel writes in the April 2015 issue of Canadian Healthcare Technology in an article titled, “Smartphones and mobile tablets are becoming essential tools for clinicians” (page 12-13 of the print edition).
VitalHub Corp, a Mount Sinai Hospital spun-off through partnership with MaRS Innovation, is among the healthcare technology companies delivering services to hospitals as part of this trend.
Daniel writes:
One company that is giving clinicians the option to use their preferred device — whether iOS, Android, or Windows 8, smartphone or tablet — is VitalHub Corp, a Mount Sinai spin-off launched in Toronto in 2009. “We have found that many hospitals provide their nurses with mobile devices and can therefore select the platform they would prefer for those users, but physicians are generally expected to be BOD,” said VitalHub CEO Lisa Crossley. “So for a mobile solution to be practical, it has to be cross-platform.”
TORONTO (Dec. 2, 2014) — The University of Toronto Early-Stage Technology (UTEST) incubator, co-directed by U of T’s Innovations & Partnerships Office (IPO) and MaRS Innovation, has announced its third cohort of computer science start-up companies.
Betakit and Electronic Products &Technology covered this announcement; TechVibes featured Syncadian and Onyx Motion in recent features. The U of T magazine also featured Syncadian and CEO Hanna Janossy in this recent profile.
The five companies and the diverse sectors they target are (scroll for full company descriptions):
Past graduates include Whirlscape, TrendMD, Crowdmark, eQOL and Granata Decision Systems, among others.
CTV National News featured WaveCheck’s crowdfunding campaign on December 15 in a report by Avis Favaro. The report included an interview with MaRS Innovation’s President and CEO, Dr. Raphael Hofstein (at the 1:37 mark).
William Tran, a researcher associated with the project at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, was also interviewed on Canada AM on December 16.
WaveCheck, which closed its campaign December 4, was invented by Dr. Gregory Czarnota of Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre and Prof. Michael C. Kolios of Ryerson University. WaveCheck uses ultrasound technology to show people with breast cancer if their chemotherapy is working within weeks.
While the Indiegogo campaign has concluded, Sunnybrook Foundation is now accepting donations flagged “WaveCheck” on behalf of the researchers through its website.
At campaign close, WaveCheck ranked in the top 0.005 per cent of health-related campaigns on Indiegogo, and was covered by CBC television and Metro Morning, the Toronto Star, Sing-Tao and MedCity News.
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