Difference between revisions of "Team:Hamburg/Entrepreneurship"

Line 1: Line 1:
−
{{Hamburg}}
+
{{Hamburg/CSS/bootstrap}}
 +
{{Hamburg/CSS/main}}
 +
{{Hamburg/CSS/fa}}
 +
{{Hamburg/CSS/fontello}}
 +
{{Hamburg/CSS/Home}}
 +
{{Hamburg/CSS/notebook}}
 +
{{Hamburg/Snippets/Parallax}}
 +
{{Hamburg/Snippets/Navigation}}
 
<html>
 
<html>
  
−
<div class="clear"></div>
 
−
 
−
 
−
 
−
<div class="column full_size">
 
  
 
<h1>Entrepreneurship</h1>
 
<h1>Entrepreneurship</h1>
 +
                    <div class="jumbotron">
  
−
</div>
+
                        <h2>Achievements</h2>
 +
                        <ul>
 +
                            <li>We identified the economic potential of the S.H.I.E.L.D. use cases for both malaria elimination and other industrial applications.</li>
 +
                            <li>We filed a preliminary patent claiming all identified use cases.</li>
 +
                            <li>We reached out to companies and discussed the potential of commercialization.</li>
 +
                        </ul>
 +
                    </div>
 +
                    <p>The S.H.I.E.L.D. combines multiple breakthrough technologies to a carefully assembled application with incredible potential to fight malaria. However, novel technologies require novel regulations, and application processes for new genetically modified organisms (GMOs) take long and are economically risky. To push the S.H.I.E.L.D. to the market, its economic potential has to exceed the risk of development and registration.</p>
 +
                    <p>To evaluate whether the S.H.I.E.L.D. has market potential, we evaluated its use cases within and outside of malaria elimination. Before any income could be generated with our technology, significant investments would need to be made.</p>
 +
                    <h2>Malaria elimination as source of economic growth</h2>
 +
                    <p>In 2015, US$ 2.9 billion was invested in the combat against malaria worldwide<sup>1</sup>. Apart from the humanitarian cause, there is an economic incentive for countries with malaria burden. Malaria prevention is far cheaper than malaria treatment: People who do not need to pay for malaria treatment have a higher purchasing power<sup>2</sup>, and public healthcare systems that focus on malaria prevention instead of malaria treatment save billions of dollars annually<sup>3</sup>. If public budgets are not stressed by costs caused by malaria, money can be spent for other causes, like education and infrastructure, in turn improving local economy. From a different point of view, people that get infected by malaria are not only burden the states with direct medical costs but also indirectly. The illness prevents people from attending school or work and therefore has a permanent adverse effect on progress of education and economy. It is even suggested that infectious diseases are &ldquo;trapping&rdquo; developing countries into poverty. It is clear, that combating malaria will improve the economy in several ways.</p>
 +
                    <p>As a result, every malaria prevention method that is cheaper than malaria treatment has an economic benefit for a society by which it is used. But to drive its market introduction, there needs to be a single organization willing to do the investment in the S.H.I.E.L.D. Therefore, the gross economic benefit is not a sufficient reason for a company with the necessary resources to take up and push the S.H.I.E.L.D. to market.</p>
  
−
<div class="column two_thirds_size">
+
                    <h2>The incentive for a bold investment lies beyond malaria</h2>
−
<h3>Best Supporting Entrepreneurship Special Prize</h3>
+
                    <p>Synthetic biology allows adaptations of similar constructs to many different environments and tasks. With the S.H.I.E.L.D., we invented a solution to a specific problem, but its principle has potential far beyond malaria.</p>
−
<p>
+
                    <p>The S.H.I.E.L.D. uses odor baits to attract <em>Anopheles gambiae</em> mosquitoes. The same principle can be applied to every other insect or arthropod for which attractive substances are known. This opens a whole world of opportunities and use cases for the S.H.I.E.L.D. that offer far more immediate economic potential than combating malaria. Especially in industrial agriculture, farm pest control is a mass market. In 1999, over US$ 10 billion were invested in insecticides with a strong upwards trend<sup>4</sup>. Mass application of insecticides has devastating ecological effects and breeds resistances<sup>5,6</sup>. In this context it is also imaginable to use the device as a repellent.</p>
−
In previous years, iGEM had an entrepreneurship track. Teams were encouraged to build projects and focus on commercializing their work. We have now moved to an award as the best work in this area may come from teams who are not solely focused on entrepreneurship.  
+
                    <p>The S.H.I.E.L.D. as a semi-open system, has the benefit of offering various opportunities for applications. Besides the use as a malaria prevention, it can even be used to combat other vector-borne diseases such as Dengue fever.</p>
−
</p>
+
                    <h2>Interest from the industry and application for a patent</h2>
−
 
+
                    <p>Due to the S.H.I.E.L.Ds outstanding potential, it has gained a lot of interest from the industry. We discussed our trap with Bayer CropScience and are looking forward to future discussions. Therefore, we got into contact with Tutech, a company specialized in knowledge transfer, e.g. patent applications, and in cooperation with the University of Hamburg, and we decided to apply for a patent.</p>
−
<p>The Best Supporting Entrepreneurship award recognizes exceptional effort to build a business case and commercialize an iGEM project. This award is open to all teams to show that entrepreneurship is something all teams can aspire to do with their project. This award can go to an new project, or to a previous project that a team aimed to commercialize. Have you filed a provisional patent on your project/device/process? Have you raised money to build and ship products? Have you pitched your idea to investors and received money? As always in iGEM, the aim is to impress the judges!
+
−
 
+
−
<br><br>
+
−
To compete for the <a href="https://2018.igem.org/Judging/Awards">Best Supporting Entrepreneurship prize</a>, please describe your work on this page and also fill out the description on the <a href="https://2018.igem.org/Judging/Judging_Form">judging form</a>.
+
−
<br><br>
+
−
You must also delete the message box on the top of this page to be eligible for this prize.
+
−
</p>
+
−
</p>
+
−
</div>
+
−
 
+
−
<div class="column third_size">
+
−
<div class="highlight decoration_A_full">
+
−
<h3>Inspiration</h3>
+
−
<p>You can look at what other teams did to get some inspiration! <br />
+
−
Here are a few examples:</p>
+
−
<ul>
+
−
<li><a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Sydney_Australia">2016 Sydney Australia</a></li>
+
−
<li><a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Pasteur_Paris">2016 Pasteur Paris</a></li>
+
−
<li><a href="https://2014.igem.org/Team:UCC_Ireland">2014 UCC Ireland</a></li>
+
−
<li><a href="https://2014.igem.org/Team:Imperial">2014 Imperial College London</a></li>
+
−
</ul>
+
−
</div>
+
−
</div>
+
−
 
+
−
 
+
−
 
+
−
<div class="clear"></div>
+
−
 
+
−
<div class="column full_size">
+
−
<h3>Patents and intellectual property</h3>
+
−
 
+
−
<p>
+
−
If your team is seriously considering commercializing and looking into building a company after the competition, you may want to look at how you are going to protect your work and secure investment. Investors will usually require some form of intellectual protection, so you may want to investigate how to apply for a patent or provisional patent in your country and region before disclosing your project at iGEM. Remember that you can only be evaluated in iGEM based on what you share on your wiki and at the Jamboree, so any work you don't present can't count towards your project. </p>
+
−
 
+
−
<p>This is an area where we are different as we care about sharing, openness and contributing to the community and investors don't always agree with these values. It is up to you and your team to decide what to do. Remember that most universities have a commercialization department and that you can talk to them before coming to a decision.  
+
−
</p>
+
−
</div>
+
−
 
+
−
<div class="clear"></div>
+
  
 +
<script type='text/javascript' src="https://2018.igem.org/wiki/index.php?title=Template:Hamburg/JS/Popper&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript"></script>
 +
</html>
 +
{{Hamburg/Snippets/Footer}}
 +
<html>
 +
<script type='text/javascript' src="https://2018.igem.org/wiki/index.php?title=Template:Hamburg/JS/bootstrap&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript"></script>
 +
<script type='text/javascript' src="https://2018.igem.org/wiki/index.php?title=Template:Hamburg/JS/main&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript"></script>
  
 
</html>
 
</html>

Revision as of 03:28, 18 October 2018

Entrepreneurship

Achievements

  • We identified the economic potential of the S.H.I.E.L.D. use cases for both malaria elimination and other industrial applications.
  • We filed a preliminary patent claiming all identified use cases.
  • We reached out to companies and discussed the potential of commercialization.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. combines multiple breakthrough technologies to a carefully assembled application with incredible potential to fight malaria. However, novel technologies require novel regulations, and application processes for new genetically modified organisms (GMOs) take long and are economically risky. To push the S.H.I.E.L.D. to the market, its economic potential has to exceed the risk of development and registration.

To evaluate whether the S.H.I.E.L.D. has market potential, we evaluated its use cases within and outside of malaria elimination. Before any income could be generated with our technology, significant investments would need to be made.

Malaria elimination as source of economic growth

In 2015, US$ 2.9 billion was invested in the combat against malaria worldwide1. Apart from the humanitarian cause, there is an economic incentive for countries with malaria burden. Malaria prevention is far cheaper than malaria treatment: People who do not need to pay for malaria treatment have a higher purchasing power2, and public healthcare systems that focus on malaria prevention instead of malaria treatment save billions of dollars annually3. If public budgets are not stressed by costs caused by malaria, money can be spent for other causes, like education and infrastructure, in turn improving local economy. From a different point of view, people that get infected by malaria are not only burden the states with direct medical costs but also indirectly. The illness prevents people from attending school or work and therefore has a permanent adverse effect on progress of education and economy. It is even suggested that infectious diseases are “trapping” developing countries into poverty. It is clear, that combating malaria will improve the economy in several ways.

As a result, every malaria prevention method that is cheaper than malaria treatment has an economic benefit for a society by which it is used. But to drive its market introduction, there needs to be a single organization willing to do the investment in the S.H.I.E.L.D. Therefore, the gross economic benefit is not a sufficient reason for a company with the necessary resources to take up and push the S.H.I.E.L.D. to market.

The incentive for a bold investment lies beyond malaria

Synthetic biology allows adaptations of similar constructs to many different environments and tasks. With the S.H.I.E.L.D., we invented a solution to a specific problem, but its principle has potential far beyond malaria.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. uses odor baits to attract Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes. The same principle can be applied to every other insect or arthropod for which attractive substances are known. This opens a whole world of opportunities and use cases for the S.H.I.E.L.D. that offer far more immediate economic potential than combating malaria. Especially in industrial agriculture, farm pest control is a mass market. In 1999, over US$ 10 billion were invested in insecticides with a strong upwards trend4. Mass application of insecticides has devastating ecological effects and breeds resistances5,6. In this context it is also imaginable to use the device as a repellent.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. as a semi-open system, has the benefit of offering various opportunities for applications. Besides the use as a malaria prevention, it can even be used to combat other vector-borne diseases such as Dengue fever.

Interest from the industry and application for a patent

Due to the S.H.I.E.L.Ds outstanding potential, it has gained a lot of interest from the industry. We discussed our trap with Bayer CropScience and are looking forward to future discussions. Therefore, we got into contact with Tutech, a company specialized in knowledge transfer, e.g. patent applications, and in cooperation with the University of Hamburg, and we decided to apply for a patent.

Funding