Wednesday, October 8, 2025
Location: CURE.
345 Park Avenue SOUTH, New York, NY 10010
Between 25th & 26th Streets
4:15pm, Cure. Rooftop: Sustaining U.S. Global Primacy in Life Sciences
The United States has long maintained global leadership in life sciences, driven by its world-class research institutions, robust regulatory systems, and deep commercialization infrastructure. However, recent developments—including funding uncertainty, regulatory inertia, and rising international competition—pose serious risks to that leadership. Join our distinguished panelists as they debate critical issues, priorities and possible solutions.
Thursday, October 9, 2025
Location: Apella by Alexandria
450 East 29th Street, 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10016
9:00am: The Leadership Imperative: Guiding Therapies, Diagnostics, and Biomedicine from Vision to Impact
Biotech founders today are navigating unprecedented challenges as tighter capital markets, evolving regulatory requirements, and heightened payer scrutiny reshape the path to market. With longer development timelines, rising R&D costs, and intensified global competition, leaders in the life sciences must balance bold scientific innovation with disciplined capital strategy, regulatory readiness, and early commercial planning. These pressures extend beyond therapeutics to include diagnostics and other breakthrough biomedical technologies, where rapid validation, reimbursement hurdles, and IP protection add further complexity. This session will explore how innovators are adapting to advance the next generation of therapies, diagnostics, and life science technologies that have the potential to transform health care.
10:45am: Venture Spotlight: Paradigm-Shifting Medicine at the Industry’s Inflection Point
Novel therapeutic approaches—including molecular glues, antibody-drug conjugates, and iPSC-based regenerative therapies—are advancing through the clinic and tackling disease mechanisms once considered beyond reach. They expand treatment options, deliver meaningful outcomes, and complement existing therapies to meet critical unmet needs. Early results signal their potential to redefine standards of care.
12:45pm: The Next Frontier In Clinical Development: China as Biotech’s Global Accelerator
The global biotech map is being redrawn. China has rapidly evolved from a fast-follower market into an accelerator for global drug development, powered by capital, talent returning from abroad, and unmatched clinical execution capacity . At the same time, U.S. biotechs and investors are increasingly looking eastward for efficiency, scale, and new partnership models. This panel will explore the emerging China–US development paradigm through case studies like Kailera, created from Hengrui’s obesity portfolio, and parallel efforts such as those being built by world class cross border venture capital. Panelists will examine how companies on both sides of the Pacific are rethinking trial strategy, regulatory pathways, and out-licensing as they race to deliver innovation. Expect a candid discussion on where collaboration works, where it breaks, and how investors and strategics should position for what comes next.
2:30pm: From Lifespan to Healthspan: Investing in a New Healthcare Paradigm
With over $8B raised in 2024 alone and tech titans backing next-gen biotech, the longevity sector is booming – on track to surpass $60B by 2025. But this isn’t just about living longer; it’s about delaying the onset of multiple chronic diseases by targeting aging itself. From cellular senescence to epigenetic drift, new therapies are addressing the biological drivers of aging, with the potential to upend how we treat everything from obesity to heart disease. As geroscience gains pharma buy-in and health systems feel the strain of aging populations, the ROI case is clear: one aging-targeted drug could disrupt entire therapeutic categories. Join us as we explore how science, strategy, and investment are converging to redefine medicines’ most ambitious frontier.
4:30pm: Investor Round Table: Resilience and Innovation in Life Sciences Amid Macro Shifts
At the intersection of breakthrough technological advances and shifting capital dynamics, this discussion assembles leading investors to explore actionable strategies for building high-value, durable companies. As the industry enters a new era marked by regulatory uncertainty, interest rate volatility, and shifting investor sentiment, topics will include developing resilient business models amid policy and market volatility, leveraging data and tools to remove biology risk and drive capital efficiency toward value inflection milestones, and navigating emerging funding pathways beyond traditional equity rounds. Investors will share insights on operational excellence, diverse financing structures, and approaches for de-risking development pipelines. Attendees will gain direct perspectives on how visionary leadership and strategic adaptability unlock long-term value amid evolving regulatory, macroeconomic, and industry dynamics—essential insights for capitalizing on disruption while building resilient and adaptable enterprises.