NIO bets big in capital
Monday, January 28th, 2008Ron Leuty at The San Francisco Business Times interviewed me last week and the result was the following pithy article: Neuroscience organization bets big in capital: Industry group seeks $200M to research brain abnormalities
A young, San Francisco-based trade organization representing neuroscience companies has lined up companies nationally and heavy hitters in the nation's capital to lobby for a $200 million superfund to help bring products to market for brain and nervous system diseases ranging from Alzheimer's to insomnia.
The 17-month-old Neurotechnology Industry Organization is working with Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis LLP -- the New York law firm also known as K&L Gates, as in William Gates Sr., the father of Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates -- to push its plan in Washington, D.C.
The NIO's five-part plan, dubbed a "Human Genome Project for the brain" by Executive Director Zack Lynch, would earmark:
* $80 million for the National Institutes of Health's "Blueprint for Neuroscience Research," developed by 16 institutes that offer grants for neuroscience issues ranging from depression and Parkinson's Disease to spinal cord research and traumatic brain injury;
* $75 million to the NIH's Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs for neuroscience startups and research;
* $30 million to increase staffing and training at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to reduce a regulatory bottleneck that has delayed approval of some therapies;
* $10 million a year for studying the societal implications -- including ethical and legal questions -- of advancing neurotechnologies; and
* $5 million annually for a national neurotechnology coordination office to aggregate what federal agencies as diverse as the NIH and the Department of Defense are doing in neurotech.
The plan would accelerate bringing neuroscience innovations to patient bedsides, Lynch said. Parts of the program, like SBIR and STTR, also would help create new companies in neurotech centers like the Bay Area, Lynch said.