重口味SM

JLABS gives U of T startups a place to call home

鈥淭hey鈥檒l give us the right exposure to the business side and they鈥檒l help us carve out a clear path to market鈥
photo of President Gertler, Mayor Tory and premier Wynne at the JLABS opening
Premier Kathleen Wynne, Mayor John Tory, Ontario cabinet minister Reza Moridi and U of T president Meric Gertler were on hand for the official opening of JLABS @ Toronto (all photos by Johnny Guatto)

Up until today, existed only in the virtual world.

Meetings involving the startup鈥檚 three co-founders took place in the Mercatto coffee shop downstairs in the MaRs Discovery District, while research was conducted in labs and operating rooms around downtown Toronto.

Now, they鈥檙e moving on up to the 13th floor of the MaRS West Tower 鈥 one of the first 22 up-and-coming companies selected to be part of JLABS @ Toronto, an innovative research centre designed to advance bio/pharmaceutical, medical device, consumer and digital health programs.

鈥淏eing a part of JLABS brings us one step closer to commercializing and delivering this product to market to help patients,鈥 said Jinzi Zheng of her company鈥檚 injectable imaging agent that helps surgeons see where tumours are located and remove them more precisely, while leaving healthy tissue intact.

鈥淭hey鈥檒l give us the right exposure to the business side and they鈥檒l help us carve out a clear path to market. We鈥檙e scientists, we don鈥檛 have that expertise.鈥

Of the 22 startups at JLABS announced today, at least eight have ties to the 重口味SM and its partner hospitals 鈥 like Nanovista, which developed out of research started by Zheng as she worked towards her PhD in medical biophysics. The others include: 6Biotech, App4Independence, AvroBio, , Ketogen Pharma, Ubiquitech and Proteorex Therapeutics Inc., which is working closely with Professor Robert Batey, chair of the department of chemistry.

Their new home is a gleaming 40,000-square-foot facility that has cutting-edge, modular and scalable lab space, equipment and, most importantly, access to scientific, industry and capital funding experts.

It also features JLABS鈥 first device and digital prototype lab, which was shown off today at its official opening to dignitaries including Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, Toronto Mayor John Tory and U of T president Meric Gertler

The space, which is rented by JLABS from the 重口味SM, is the result of a unique collaboration between global giant Johnson & Johnson Innovation LLC, the university, the Government of Ontario, Janssen Inc., MaRS Innovation and several hospital partners.

鈥淭he project to transform and fit out the floor into the first Canadian location for JLABS, budgeted at $18.3 million, came in on time and more than a million dollars under budget,鈥 said Scott Mabury, U of T鈥檚 vice-president of operations. 

Every speaker at the event mentioned the university and the critical role it played in making JLABS @ Toronto a reality, including Wynne.

鈥淭he opportunities that JLABS will create for Ontario are immense,鈥 she said. 鈥淎nd while the driving force behind those successes will be the people who take their research from lab to market, we need to recognize that there are other factors.

鈥淚f it weren鈥檛 for MaRS, if it weren鈥檛 for U of T, the strategic partnership stream of our Jobs and Prosperity Fund, the life sciences corridor that surrounds us today, and the whole innovation ecosystem that we鈥檝e built here in Ontario, there would be no JLABs launch today.鈥

 

photo of Meric Gertler at lectern

With five locations in the United States, coming to Toronto next made sense.

鈥淐anada鈥檚 startup scene is booming,鈥 explained Melinda Richter, head of JLABS.

The location is also perfect 鈥 smack dab in the centre of Toronto鈥檚 bustling ecosystem of hospitals, businesses and university labs that already attract more than $1.4-billion in research funding each year to the city.

The university鈥檚 Banting and Best Centre for Innovation & Entrepreneurship (BBCIE) is also just across the street, making this stretch of College Street the place to be for ambitious researchers to hang out their shingle with the hope of turning their discovery into the next big thing.

鈥淲e鈥檙e excited to have JLABS @ Toronto join the 重口味SM as the newest addition to our vibrant entrepreneurship ecosystem,鈥 said Gertler. 鈥淭ogether with our nine campus-led accelerators, under the umbrella of our Banting & Best Centre for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, we鈥檙e fuelling the creation of new companies, new jobs and solutions to some of the world鈥檚 most pressing challenges.鈥

 

For Zheng and her Nanovista co-founders, Christine Allen and David Jaffray, a world of possibilities has now opened up by joining the JLABS family.

This in addition to their academic positions at U of T. Zheng is an assistant professor in the Institute of Biomaterials & Biomedical Engineering,a scientist in the Institute for the Advancement of Technology for Health with the University Health Network (UHN) and a morning/evening MBA 2017 candidate at U of T's Rotman School of Management. Allen is a professor in the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy and GSK Chair in Pharmaceutics and Drug Delivery. And Jaffray is a professor, director of TECHNA and executive vice-president of technology and innovation at UHN.

鈥淚t鈥檚 going to be great to be able to bounce ideas around with the other startups,鈥 said Zheng (pictured below). 鈥淭hey鈥檙e going to have some of the same challenges as us, which means we can learn from each other. They鈥檒l be a healthy competition.鈥

And aside from dreams of having operating rooms around the world stocked with vials of their product, Zheng says ideally they鈥檇 like their time at JLABS to lead to them meeting the right people who can take over the business side of their company, freeing them to focus on what they know best 鈥 pushing the science forward.

photo of Zheng at lectern

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