A few more things from #BIOCEO24...

The Biotechnology Innovation Organization (BIO) 2024 CEO and Investor Conference (a.k.a. #BIOCEO24) took place February 26-27 in New York. The annual event brought together more than 1,000 attendees for a week of insightful panel discussions, networking, and BIO One-on-One Partnering™ to drive tomorrow’s biotech innovations.

Bio.News and Good Day BIO were on the scene to cover the panels, interview speakers and BIO executives, and learn about hot topics ranging from election year policy to AI and obesity drugs.

Here are a few more things we want to highlight before we wrap up our coverage.

How can we drive better cancer outcomes for patients?

A recent IQVIA Institute report forecasts that spending on cancer medicines is expected to reach $375 billion globally by 2027, up from $196 billion in 2022. During a February 26 panel, Tackling Challenges in Oncology Drug Discovery and Development, speakers discussed how clinical-stage companies and investors can work within the regulatory environment to contribute to better outcomes for patients.

Panelists included:

Johanna Bendell, Global Head of Pharma Research and Early Development Oncology at Roche
Kate Haviland, CEO of Blueprint Medicines
John Oyler, CEO of BeiGene
Lynn Seely, President and CEO of Lyell Immunopharma

“We’ve made such progress in terms of bringing new, innovative cancer therapies to patients over the last couple decades. However, we still know that based on the projections of the American Cancer Society, 1,600 patients are going to die of cancer in a day in 2024,” said Kate Haviland, CEO of Blueprint Medicines, which is developing precision therapies and kinase medicines. “It’s an important area to continue to drive innovation in and to make sure that we have small biotechs and emerging companies who have the type of financial and other types of resources to bring forward new and important medicines.”

“We at Blueprint focus on really looking for step-change innovation, making sure we’re bringing really exciting and interesting new science forward and at the same time doing that in a way where we can have financial discipline and efficiencies based on the expertise and capabilities that we already have in-house,” she explained.

“We all should still be shooting for the moon in terms of the types of science and impact we want to have, and we just have to be a bit more thoughtful in the context of 2024 and the last few years to make sure that we are spending our money wisely and have the opportunity to really impact patients,” she concluded.

How investors and patients can work together

How can investors fund drug R&D while keeping patients’ needs in mind? During a February 27 panel, Connecting Investors and Patient Advocacy Groups: An Overview of Funding New Therapies, we heard from patient advocacy groups and mission-driven investors about how the two groups can engage in a dialogue

Michele Oshman, BIO’s VP of External Affairs, explained the concept of “mission-driven investors” and how they can drive new innovations for patients: