Global biomedical researchers and industry representatives discussed strategies for translating innovation from the laboratory to the marketplace at Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar’s (WCM-Q) Industry Academia Interactions event. 
Held in collaboration with Qatar Foundation, Qatar National Research Fund, Sidra Medical and Research Centre and Qatar Science and Technology Park, the event explored ways to foster productive partnerships among researchers, funding institutions and businesses to develop commercially viable Intellectual Property.
The two-day event featured presentations by academic and industry experts on issues such as research funding, development of new pharmaceuticals, encouraging biotech startups, building a knowledge economy, investment in the biomedical sector in the Middle East and North Africa region, and startup incubation.  
Dr Javaid Sheikh, dean,WCM-Q, said: “The pace of change in Qatar’s knowledge-based economy has been incredibly swift - in the past decade the country has built a level of capacity in research and development that took more than 100 years in the countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. This rapid growth and development is what makes Qatar such an exciting place to work.”
The speakers included Dr Hsiao D Lieu, managing director of Chorus, the integrated clinical research division of Lilly Research Laboratories, a global pharmaceutical research and development organisation; Dr Bruce Conway, programme director of the Robertson Therapeutic Development Fund and faculty member at the Clinical Centre for Translational Science at The Rockefeller University, New York; and Dr Danny Ramadan, acting director, Strategic Research and Technology Investment Adviser at QSTP, among others.  
The event included multiple panel discussions where local and international experts tackled the issues of translation of research findings in the biomedical arena to commercially viable entities in Qatar and the region.