The accelerator will support up to 12 health projects at a time, led by innovators including UW Health faculty and with resources provided by four partners including Warf.
University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW)’s medical research and healthcare system, UW Health, has launched an accelerator to drive faculty projects and others with the ability to improve healthcare provision.
Branded the Isthmus Project, UW Health’s accelerator is being positioned as a point-of-entry for healthcare innovators including its physicians, pharmacists, residents, nurses and staff.
Services on hand through the program will include help with business planning, preparations for seeking seed capital and advice on connecting with industry representatives.
Isthmus Project will target medical innovations with the scope to help UW Health’s patients and care providers which could then be scaled up to capture value in other markets.
The scheme will support between six and 12 projects at a time, nurturing each over a period spanning one or two years. It has already taken up several projects, though none were named in the press release.
Isthmus Project will operate as a subsidiary of UW Health with the support of services from partners including the university’s commercialisation arm, Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.
UW’s School of Medicine and Public Health and Law and Entrepreneurship Clinic will both also lend their assistance, as will WiSolve, a business consultancy situated on UW’s campus run by postdoctoral researchers and students.
Thomas Mackie, chief innovation officer of UW Health, is overseeing the new initiative as director. Mackie is a professor emeritus of medical physics and engineering at UW having started with the university in 1989, and has also previously invested in local biotech businesses.
