 And we continue with Ana Maria Meryko, Ana Maria Meryko had a biology background but with a large experience in patent and technology transfer and now she is the head of technology transfer of Teleton Foundation which is probably the larger private foundation that finance research in medical area in Italy and there's a very important track record in technology transfer so please Ana Maria. So thank you so much, I think we have a video just to introduce from that side of Teleton I think this is the best way to do that and if not in this video presentation so I think this is sorry it was in Italian we are actually a major Italian charity and I think this is really the best way to share with you the inspiration that really guides our work and when I say our of course I mean also all the scientists that actually have it doesn't work okay thank you so all the scientists that actually shared with us our big vision I'm very proud so these are the numbers of a 30 year career of Teleton I'm very proud of this number we have been able actually to involve more than 1600 scientists in this big project but what I really would like to highlight is that the success and the achievement of Teleton are really the result of the work of a broad team broad in terms of not only number of people but in terms of expertise and in terms of efforts and I think that all these people really are guided by a unique vision a sole vision that is to really convert the results of the research into novel therapies for patients so I think that also after all the presentation okay so I think I understood the trick okay so I don't really I don't have to to explain why we want and we need to team with industry and with investors yesterday someone asked if there is any specific reason or parameters we have to take into consideration to choose between industrial partnership and startups actually of course there are differences there is not a single specific rule I would say that in industrial partnership of course the pharma has all the expertise and machinery to get to the market but at the same time your project will simply complete with the big pipeline of the pharmaceutical company and and of course I would say also that the scientists may have let's say less control may have less opportunity to influence how the the research can actually progress within the industry when the industry takes over the program whereas the startup of course has to do a lot of effort actually to to to bring all the expertise and collect all the money that is actually needed to progress but at the same time all these efforts all these competencies are really focused on your technology and on the products that of course the startup has to develop and in that respect in the early stages for sure scientists can really influence a little bit more how the the science and how the research can actually advance within the company but having said that I think that Telethon is a let's say unique example in that we actually operate in a very very challenging field which is the field of genetic diseases and for this reason genetic homogenic diseases are mostly rare so for this reason actually we have to implement a number of competencies and also infrastructures that maybe are not that common in academia and for sure not that common in in the charity world I mentioned here in this in this slide drug development competencies regulatory affairs clinical operations to be able to for instance conduct a multi-centric clinical trials and also as uh Reginaldini yesterday okay yesterday pointed out we also created an infrastructure in particular a T-jet um really to support the the risking faces of of projects and we are doing that not only supporting the advancement of the research but also taking care of the quality of the data that are generated so through a process development lab through our GLP certified laboratory is yesterday professor Maldini already described this through a clinical trial office but also investing you know a big amount of money in the manufacturing in terms of gmp manufacturing all this is very relevant in terms of accelerating the drug development in terms of um being able to provide to your industrial partner data and support that the industrial partner will be really able to use in us in in filing for the marketing authorization so in the final dossier um of course this is none of these actions are typical of charities I was saying but I would like also to highlight one more one more aspect which is uh you know more broadly available and also to the scientists actually in in our model technology transfer activities really starts at the very very beginning of a project so much earlier than the moment in which we have in our hands good results much earlier than the moment we can really talk with the partners about the appealing results that you have achieved and talk about next steps so I the first message I would like to share with you is that one one partnership that the scientists can really build easily builds and at the very beginning of their career is the partnership with the technology transfer office so that technology transfer person your person should be a sort of confident or if you're not that romantic sort of consultant let's say with whom you really can share and discuss your project of course this is not a discussion in terms of scientific discussion but it is more about the vision that you have and where you want really to uh to go so I would like to discuss with you and try to um to share with you the kind of rule that scientists can also play in terms of technology transfer and I would like to do that through two real life examples of course I can't say anything on this because it is everything is confidential but having said that the bad news is that funding is really a critical ingredient in drug development so I don't have really a solution for this but what I can I can say you and this is by really by experience is that an early interaction with technology transfer office can really help scientists to define let's say the innovation value of your project to define those critical steps or critical gaps that then will be fundamental to solve and to achieve uh to uh proceed in your in your development and also to define potential business models that then will be you know the core that you will together with the technology transfer office discuss uh with uh partners and investors and um I think that this is relevant also when you are looking for um non-profit grants like the ones that are mentioned here this is a project related to a therapy for rare eye diseases and um it is conducted at TGM our institute of genetics and medicine in in Naples and of course here Teleton was the first investor uh in the project many many years ago um I think that our interaction with the scientists here was very much important also to direct the scientist towards very specific funding that was sort of coherent with the sort of ideal for the stage of development of the project for instance uh yesterday I think and Matai mentioned the POC grant these are really small grants in terms of money but our big grants in terms of setting the scene let's say of the of the technology and the product for the subsequent discussions with potential partners industrial partners and this grant for instance are really something that comes out of an arms in arms work uh between the scientists and the technology transfer offices uh then also I would like to to highlight the fact that it is important to manage IP since the beginning um in terms of your collaborations uh in the consortia that you will be participating into um also to have access to materials to technology and at the same time having always um that um freedom then to use your results um of course a use that is adapted to the the future development of the of the project and then of course the other ingredients I think and I always have a problem here okay um we have discussed about patent I think that intellectual property um is something that um if discussed with the the technology transfer officer um then becomes broader than the patent there is no how but there are also tools that sometimes are really fundamental for the program and these also are a big value uh to be discussed with your future partners and also um really it is very much important to continue discussion with technology transfer officer because um one of our task is also not only to patent but also to define the best strategy it might be a single patent it might be a group of patents it might be that many different embodiments than are in your um in your uh program in your plans but not yet actually um proved uh in in lab and our task is really to expand patent protection to have the broader patent protection so that uh those failure um Alessandro mentioned are possible for you uh without losing then you know the opportunity of the value that a patent can really give to the project um I also would like to stress the fact that papers are a fundamental component a fundamental ingredient of technology transfer um papers in my opinion are sort of still of excellence papers are uh those um you know um are those um tools that can help me demonstrate also to the partners potential partners that's the idea the invention the technology and therefore also the project is something validated that key opinion leader agree that this is something valuable that the scientific community also actually supports the invention and this is very much important in terms of innovative um innovative ideas um so I think that uh as as of course has already been explained the patent and papers are not enemies I think that these are both uh very important tools for the subsequent interactions with uh with potential partners so this is another example I think that here also um I would like to highlight funding patent papers as fundamental ingredient this is a project on therapy for rare bone diseases it is conducted in in academia and we have a mandate um to find the industry investors partners then in the real life I have to say that we have worked a lot with this scientist also in terms of setting academic collaborations in terms of managing intellectual property again here we have really worked hands in hands um to um apply to our POC grant again a very important step for the scientist to really um uh have awareness of the potential of its own uh own project so if I haven't yet okay convinced you why management of IP is important because IP simply is your results so nothing more than your results so I think that um apart from the fact that your institution is or not the owner of the results I think it is important for you uh to be aware if you are really free to use the results if you're really free to publish them if you're really free to use them in collaboration with others or in collaboration with industrial partners and our task is really to get the right degree of freedom which is not a full freedom uh so sometimes the institution is not the owner of the results but at the same time we can really together with you define that degree of freedom the degree of access that is substantially enough for your project and then we come to the more appealing part so uh partnering uh with with uh industry so in my experience partnerships with industry with investors um is always a learning process and this is because as yesterday uh someone actually mentioned two cultures somehow start to talk together and there is really a cross fertilization and this is as Alessandro also mentioned before both when things are good and go on and when things are terminated and this is something that happens um for instance in the case of this therapy for rare eye diseases we are so happy in 2014 because we started an agreement with big biotech and actually this was an option agreement and actually in 2016 the company opted in so enthusiasm unfortunately um I would say a couple of years after that the company terminated everything and this not because the project had failed uh it was not a technical issues but simply because the company changed its pipeline and the priorities were different and they were not more fitting with with our project um was this a waste of time I would say no uh and not only because of course Teleton safeguarded the project in terms of money but also because the interaction between the scientist and the company uh and also the technology transfer office and all the people in Teleton was good enough to help the scientist to look at his technology in terms of products to look at his technology in terms of something that should be feasible and should really go through all the clinical steps in a timely and smoothly way and actually this helped the scientist to start or to continue the research and we ended up with an alternative platform that is actually synergistic with the first one and this important this package of of results and IP actually has been the basis uh to start a startup uh avant-garde bio together with with sofie nova thanks to the investment of of sofie nova another important point uh this is for instance what happens for this therapy for rare bone diseases is that technology transfer is something uh that uh I mean it is not a single action a single uh interaction with a partner usually it is a multi interaction uh you have to talk to many many potential partners then to find the right one and um in this case for instance we had we went through a number of really diligence assessments which is not actually the number of companies or investors we talk with but specific the ones that wanted to sort of have more details on the technology and this was again a very important process for for us for the scientists because we were able talking to all these these um industry people to really define the gaps the main aspects that were perceived as a big risk um on the side of the companies and actually we changed completely the business model so actually we wanted so much to create a company at the very beginning of the story but then we realized that the companies that the ideal partner was not really an investor because the gaps had really to be covered by other technologies and and actually the real company was not the one that was that much interested in bone diseases as we tried at first but the real company the good company uh could be a company that had the right technology and actually we ended up with a couple of important agreements one more related to drug optimization and what the other one related to um to the delivery and actually they uh this last company opted in in september 2021 so let's see in two years if something happens but this is very very interesting case um so talking with uh industrial partners then you really understand uh what is the right way um really to bring a product forward so the big question um these slides i think you're already you're already you have already seen that from from maria grazia roncarolo um so the answer to this question i'm not um reading the slides anymore uh but the answer of this question is yes it is possible um i think that being on the side of academia um we need to take into consideration to keep in mind a few pillars a few pillars that and this is the rule of technology transfer here that we have to fine tune according to the partners and according to the business model that we want to to build um so safeguarding research independence of course so keeping the opportunity the possibility to continue research and continue innovation um retain intellectual property rights so that means it is better not to assign intellectual property rights but to license them and this is because as i was saying before the partners can change uh its pipeline the partners can also fail maybe um the the development of the therapy and in that case you are in the position of getting back get getting ip everything back and try to start um again maybe also with the more academic work um partnership should provide enough funding if of course research is conducted at the the academy the institute but also partnership should supply additional funding of course in terms of licensing fees in terms of development commercial milestones and this is the the to close the circle that has been has been mentioned yesterday and to make really the the the good part of this of this story and invest in more innovation the the last few slides one point that i really would like to raise is that the scientists should actually contribute if not to the negotiation because then of course we enter into technicalities but it should really contribute to define the frame of the partnership and this is because many of the items that are mentioned here actually relates to your research and not only to the um background and to what you have done in the past but it relates to what you are going to do in the future so all these items are very much important and it is very very relevant this continued dialogue that i mentioned uh in the first at the beginning of this of this talk and i would like to close this is the last slide by mentioning one tool that can be could be relevant when you want to um strategically define the next steps for your project this is a guidebook that has actually been developed for orphan drug but i think that many of the aspects that are touched in this guidebook actually can be helpful for the scientists to define how to proceed in drug development and actually describes this guidebook describes tools incentives the strategies also in terms of regulatory strategies that can be helpful for the development of the project but i would like to draw your attention on the first first part of this story the start checklist i think that the chapter that are mentioned in this start list this is what the scientists should start thinking in initiating sort of a new project on a potential therapeutic strategy so stakeholder mapping horizon scanning of what others are doing in your field um this is information so how much uh then um the the your therapeutic approach will be actually feasible in terms of development funding resources because funding is different in different stages of the life of your of your project and target value profile which is very much important so the the final message is let's begin with the end in mind somehow and in this in this journey for sure scientists and technology transfer officer can can really you know help each other to really benefit the the development of your drug and your project thank you thank you thank you very much Anna Maria the presentation the talk is open to question discussion there's some question from the floor Fabio thank you for telling us your experience but i think it's probably the most relevant in terms of results and of process too but i would like to ask you if you apply such a process just to the your institute or have you been able to contaminate even uh i would say the academia where you fund research or the other institutions first and second which kind of relationship you mind about uh you know new ventures in the field of technology transfer such as the one we are thinking about so um first of all as you for sure know uh teletone uh grants words uh grants also to to academia in italy so it is really part of our mission also to act as a facilitator i would say so whereas for our institute of course we are the owner also of the results the intellectual property so we really act you know in strict collaboration with the institutes in terms of the uh what we call extramural research we have been playing more a facilitator rule which can be very much different case by case so in some cases we really have a mandate uh from the um from the academia in other cases we just play a rule uh in um sort of advisor uh with the scientist and also because there are really many technology transfer offices that are very much good and they are really able to to progress of course we have a specific expertise in genetic disease in rare diseases and also we have sort of brand and i think that this very much helps also in the interaction with uh with partners um i see that actually in these last years um you know in italy a number of opportunities a number of um disease for instance funds are growing and this is very much positive i think that the the the real important point here is that to generate critical mass critical mass in terms of funding and not only short let's say short time funding but also long time funding as maria grata was was actually mentioning in terms of expertise in terms of expertise also in technology transfer activities in terms i would say also and above all of infrastructures because i think that infrastructures then can really make a difference in terms of the ability also of academia to you know progress those paths and reduce the risk at least the risk that is perceived by the investors so we have challenges ahead of us but i think that's all the um i mean a number of elements are really moving in italy so we are here and we are absolutely available to make this critical mass uh let me briefly comment one point that tana maria um gave us before that which is the the strategy because the strategy uh is a key point in in my experience and is very very well present in the the experience of of telethon in there are very few uh research institutions which have this kind of strategy my in my knowledge uh i mean that this is referred to the good money that has before because good money uh requires strategy um it is very important that uh research in particular scientific research or what we call basic research and so on uh is not finalized at the beginning to obtain results to be transferred but it's very important that this happen working together in any case with technology transfer so technology transfer is not something that happens if after it's something that should follow all the path because you can know uh it's not possible to preview before so if nothing happens it's good research we like it but if something it is possible to transfer and you start after you are late so the researcher should always talk to the technology transfer without having the the problem of you need the results to transfer no this is not the point the point is to work together because if and very frequently this happens if something can be transferred you are ready to do that and not to restart because you have made some wrong some wrong point at the beginning so this strategy is very is very important it's very rare in our research community it's very rare so please if you comment your experience about that to comment this um okay first of all regarding Peloton as an institution this is very much true and um you can see that because if we look at the kind of investment that we do the amount of investment that we do in fundamental research or more uh translational research there is always a good half 50 percent that is dedicated to fundamental reasons so this is the institution uh but I would like also to comment the fact that nowadays um let's say also the scientific community in in in general each project has to uh somehow look outside so scientists have to look outside its own lab the the world is much more complex than this and I think that technology transfer offices also can help the scientists to look outside the lab to do real horizon scanning of what is happening and this is also because not only because there might be let's say competitive outside because I think that in this respect you are very much aware of that but also because nowadays I mean each project really needs a number of different technologies and number of different competencies and number of different tools and in this sense we are really a service to the scientists and you have to use us to make your project you know broader somehow and to accelerate your project by accessing everything that you really need so thank you some other questions so we can leave the with the the center that complexity is not a problem it's the opportunity yeah and we are ready for for lunch thank you Anna Maria