Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC), located in the Boston in the world’s largest biotech cluster, has partnered with Yokohama City to launch a new cross-border life science bootcamp program aimed at supporting the growth of participating companies into the US market. Applications for the program closed at the beginning of December 2021, and two companies have since been chosen as participants: CROSS SYNC and MabGenesis. These two Yokohama-based companies will participate virtually in mentoring and workshops arranged by CIC to increase their networking ability and prepare for business meetings in the US. At the end of the program, they will be matched for business discussions with candidates within CIC’s network that match potential business partner candidacy for the respective participating companies.

There are various kinds of international partnering opportunities for Japanese-based companies preparing to enter the US market, but rarely the guarantee of a meeting with a potential business partner. It is unfortunately common for companies participating in partnering events to send out a large number of meeting requests with only a small percentage of those requests resulting in actual meetings.

Companies looking to expand into the United States for the first time often do not yet have all the connections and knowhow to guarantee their success internationally, making international partnering and expansion a sometimes difficult goal. Therefore, in this program, Yokohama and CIC will support the establishment of opportunities for the selected companies to market their products for the US market, appropriately prepare for business meetings, and develop skills and connections that will hopefully prove invaluable for these companies while operating in the United States.

Meet the participating companies in the life science bootcamp:

CROSS SYNC

CROSS SYNC is a startup company officially certified by Yokohama City University in Japan that develops, manufactures, and sells software as medical device (SAMD) for middle to large enterprise hospitals.
Their product “iBSEN” assists the construction of a safer medical environment and enables seamless intra- and inter-hospital information sharing by consolidating patient information into a single platform. In addition, we deliver unique AI capability to predict patients’ clinical deterioration, which will lead to reducing medical incidents and opportunity losses caused by the shortage of intensive care specialist physicians.

MabGenesis

MabGenesis Inc. is a startup biopharmaceutical company providing values to partners through the delivery of quality therapeutic monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) for human and companion animals. Core technologies are quality phage display antibody libraries and efficient mAb isolation technology established by 30+ years of academic research on functional antibodies. Our technologies make it possible to isolate first-in-class and/or best-in-class therapeutic mAbs against hard-to-drug targets.

 Read about more ways the City of Yokohama supports local companies