
PharmaCamp 2022:
Personalised Medicine - The Future of Pharma
15-16th September 2022,
Auditorium, Gertrud-Woker-Strasse 5, 3012 Bern
Compete with other young professionals and students in a pharmaceutical case-challenge. Show your skills to leading pharmaceutical companies in Switzerland and win the award.
Applications until 7th August 2022 at 11:00 AM
ABOUT

The premiere edition of PharmaCamp in Bern bridges top young talent and pharmaceutical industry. The goal of the event is to provide the ambitious students, PhDs, PostDocs and recent graduates with an opportunity to showcase their creative problem solving and presentation skills in front the top pharma companies and give them a platform to compete with their peers. On the other hand, the companies will have a perfect opportunity to meet the most perspective young minds and their potential future coworkers/employees.
The event consists of two parts. First part is open for public, who will have a chance to learn about new trends in pharmaceutical industry by experts from the field of personalised & precision medicine. The following talk session will be aimed at the important considerations when opening and running a biotech startup as well as at how to convince the investors to invest in your venture. In the second part of the two-day event, a realistic case-challenge from pharmaceutical industry will be presented and the selected participants (registrations via the Google form in the "Apply now" button) will be divided into balanced groups. The problem solving will require multidisciplinary approach and we therefore encourage people from all natural sciences, engineering as well as business fields to apply. Participants will have time to come up with innovative solutions and prepare a presentation until the next day's afternoon, when they will have a chance to convince the expert panel that their solution is best. The winning team will be awarded with 2'000 CHF (divided between 5 team members) as well as with the eternal glory and fame.
1ST DAY SCHEDULE
15th September 2022
REGISTRATION
8:15-9:00
Registration of participants at the auditorium at the Gertrud-Woker-Strasse 5.
TALKS BY EXPERTS - PART 1
(open for public)
9:00-10:20
Greeting by the organisers and partners.
Opening talk session about personalised medicine in pharma industry.
COFFEE BREAK
(open for public)
10:50-11:15
Coffee provided on-site.
TALK BY
EXPERTS - PART 2
(open for public)
11:15-12:15
Continuation of the talk series about considerations when opening a biotech startup and business pitching.
LUNCH BREAK
12:15-13:45
Lunch provided by Swiss Women in Chemistry (SWC) - closed for the case-challenge participants and SWC guests.
BEGINNING OF THE CASE CHALLENGE
14:00-14:30
Presentation of the challenges and division of participants into balanced teams.
WORK IN TEAMS
14:45-18:00
Teams work in separate seminar rooms.
2ND DAY SCHEDULE
16th September 2022
BREAKFAST & COFFEE
8:15-9:00
WORK IN TEAMS
9:00-12:00
LUNCH BREAK
12:00-13:00
Provided at the accomodation.
Teams work in separate seminar rooms on their solutions and finalize their presentations.
Organised lunch.
PRESENTATION OF PROJECTS
13:00-15:00
Teams present in front of the expert panel.
BREAK
15:00-15:30
The participants have time for networking while the panel decides on the winning team.
AWARD PRESENTATION AND APERÒ
15:45-18:00
The panel declares the winning team and the award is presented to the winners. The participants and the companys' representatives have time to network at the aperò.
SPEAKERS
Jean-Christophe Leroux is full professor of Drug Formulation and Delivery and head of the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences at ETH Zurich, Switzerland. He was trained as pharmacist at the University of Montreal (Canada), obtained his Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Geneva (Switzerland) and worked as postdoctoral fellow at UCSF (USA). Dr. Leroux was professor of Pharmaceutical Technology at the University of Montreal from 1997 to 2008. He has made important fundamental and applied contributions to the fields of biomaterials and drug delivery, and has also been involved in the development of innovative bio-detoxification systems. He is a fellow of the AAPS, EURASC and CRS, and the co-founder of Versantis AG and Inositec AG, two ETH spin-off pharmaceutical companies.
Dr. Mahler is currently CEO and Board Member at ten23 health AG, the human-centric and sustainable pharmaceutical development partner. From 2015 to 2021, Dr. Mahler has been building and leading the Drug Product Services (DPS) Business Unit at Lonza AG. Prior to this, he led Pharmaceutical Development & Supplies at Hoffmann-La Roche (Basel), and built up Formulation R&D for biologics at Roche (2005-2015). From 2000-2005, Dr. Mahler was working at Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany as Principal Formulation Scientist, Lab Manager for Protein Formulation Development and Clinical Trial Manufacturing and CMC Team leader for Erbitux. Dr. Mahler obtained his pharmacy degree and Ph.D. in Toxicology at the University of Meinz as well as Pharmacist specialization degrees in Toxicology & Ecology and Pharmaceutical Technology. He was further trained in Economy and Marketing. Dr. Mahler obtained his habilitation from the University of Frankfurt in 2010 and is adjunct faculty and lecturer at the universities of Frankfurt, and Basel.
Sebastien Hug is the Head of the Innovation Office at the University of Bern since September 2021. The mission of the Innovation Office is to promote and support entrepreneurship and innovation throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital, Bern University Hospital. Previously, Sebastien was the CEO and Consul General of swissnex India, Consulate General of Switzerland in Bangalore, India, from 2017 - 2020. Before that, he was Scientific Advisor in charge of the swissnex Network at the State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (2013-2017), Project Leader Higher Education and Partnerships at swissnex Boston in Boston MA, USA (2011 – 2013) and Science and Technology Counselor at the Embassy of Switzerland in Ottawa, Canada. He holds a MA in Modern History and Political Economics from the University of Fribourg, and a Master’s in Public Administration (MPA) from the University of Ottawa, Canada.
Jean-Christophe Leroux
Professor of Drug Formulation and Delivery and head of the
Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences at ETH Zurich, Switzerland.
Hanns-Christian Mahler
Chief Enablement Officer (CEO) & Board Member,
ten23 health AG, Basel, Switzerland
Sebastien Hug
Head of Innovation Office at the University of Bern
Sven Rottenberg
Institute of Animal Pathology (Vetsuisse Faculty) and Cancer Therapy Resistance Cluster (DBMR), Bern Center for Precision Medicine, University of Bern, Switzerland
EXPERT PANNEL
Jean-Louis Reymond
Professor of Chemistry at the University of Bern, Switzerland
Nadine C. Martin is Head of Innovation Management at sitem-insel AG since 2015. Her particular interest goes to Open Innovation in the Life Science sector and she focusses on activities that inspire an innovation culture for all stakeholders to think and act out of the box in order to translate better and faster. She holds an MD and a specialist degrees in Anaesthesiology and in pharmaceutical medicine and a certificate in Innovation Management. She has a long standing experience in pharmaceutical industry and served on boards of professional associations, and as VP on the Board of LIH and now heads the Scientific Council of the FNR, besides being an expert judge and mentor at MassChallenge Switzerland”
Nadine C. Martin
Head of Innovation Management at sitem-insel AG
Theresa Visarius is the Vice President of Business Development at Immunophotonics and Managing Director of the Swiss subsidiary IPS Biopharma AG. She joined the company in 2015 after 8 years as an entrepreneur where she worked with global leaders in health care as well as start-ups to facilitate market access of innovative medical technologies.
At the company, Theresa combines a strong scientific foundation with a passion for game-changing innovation that can lead to impactful patient benefit. Theresa received her PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Bern, Switzerland and holds degrees is biology and chemistry from the USA. She has conducted research in clinical pharmacology, mitochondrial bioenergetics, and molecular toxicology, with a focus on cancer research and clinical pharmacology.
Theresa Visarius
Vice President of Business Development at Immunophotonics and Managing Director of IPS Biopharma AG
TBA

Jean-Louis Reymond is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Bern, Switzerland. He studied Chemistry and Biochemistry at the ETH Zürich and obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Lausanne on natural products synthesis (1989). After a Post-Doc and Assistant Professorship at the Scripps Research Institute, he joined the University of Bern (1997). His current research focuses on chemical space exploration methods combining data science, artificial intelligence, organic synthesis and biological assays to discover new bioactive small molecules and peptides, with applications in membrane transporters modulators, kinase inhibitors, antimicrobials and transfection reagents (https://gdb.unibe.ch). He is the author of > 300 scientific publications and reviews.

TBA
TBA

Stefanie Dobitz is Innovation & Startup Advisor for Health, Medicine, and Life Sciences at the University of Bern and Inselspital, Bern University Hospital. Her focus is on supporting and connecting people for their innovative and successful entrepreneurial journey. Stefanie earned her doctoral thesis from ETH Zurich studying the synthesis and biological evaluation of oligoproline-based peptide ligands for tumor targeting, and holds a CAS in innovation management. Prior joining the University of Bern, Stefanie worked as sales manager for a Swiss CDMO, wherein she supported the pharma and biotech industry in the lead finding of future drug candidates, medical devices, as well as cosmetics.
Stefanie Dobitz
Innovation & Startup Advisor for Health, Medicine, and Life Sciences at the University of Bern and Inselspital
From 1999-2004 Sven Rottenberg received a dual education in veterinary pathology (Dipl. ECVP) and molecular biology (PhD) at the University of Bern. In 2004 he joined the group of Piet Borst at the Netherlands Cancer Institute (NKI) in Amsterdam where he became a tenured staff member in 2012. At the NKI he established a new research focus: the study of anti-cancer drug resistance using genetically engineered mouse models of human cancer. In 2014 he returned to the University of Bern as head of the Institute of Animal Pathology. The focus of the Rottenberg group is to understand the underlying mechanisms of resistance to anti-cancer therapies, including both radio- and chemotherapy. His group has identified various mechanisms of PARP inhibitor resistance and thereby generated novel insights into basic mechanisms of the DNA damage response. Moreover, the Rottenberg group has generated unique preclinical models to study residual disease and they have pioneered the use of 3D cancer organoids to study therapy escape.
ORGANISING TEAM

When I am not occupied holding a pipette or writing my PhD thesis, I love dedicating my time to work in NGOs and create platforms to bring people together.
Gregor Bordon
Co-founder & Coordinator

PhD researcher in Pharma Tech at the University of Bern, where I'm also challenging myself to learn additional languages, dance, and organize events.
Marianna Carone
Co-founder & Coordinator

Head of the Innovation Office at the University of Bern. Holds a MA in Modern History and Political Economics from the University of Fribourg, and a Master’s in Public Administration (MPA) from the University of Ottawa, Canada.
Sebastien Hug
Strategic Advisor

Postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bern-I have always been fascinated by science, and challenges have always been a boost to learning.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/despo-chatzikleanthous-phd-94773a131/
Despina Chatzikleanthous
Public Relations Manager

PhD researcher in Artificial Intelligence in Health and Nutrition. Passionate about travelling, programming, and meeting new people.
Ioannis Papathanail
IT Manager

PhD researcher in Enzyme Engineering and Flow Biocatalysis at the University of Bern. When I am not occupied performing enzyme-catalysed reactions, you can find me in the Wallis moutains where I enjoy hiking, bivouacking, ski-touring, climbing, or having a couple of beers with friends.
Laurianne Pillet
Marketing Manager

PhD researcher in MR imaging and cardiovascular pathologies at the University of Bern; when I am not working you can find me travelling or in the mountains, skiing, hiking or on my bike.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/camilla-giulia-calastra-236043193/
Camilla Calastra
Marketing Manager

Zarja Peters is an entrepreneur with an extensive track record in managing performing arts promotion and event management. Her personal signature is the design of tailormade solutions for public and corporate events. She is managing director of Sonus Nobilis art promotion agency acting out of Zug / Switzerland.
Zarja Peters
Catering Manager
COLLABORATORS



SPONSORS




