Mount Sinai Innovation Partners (MSIP) Hosts i3 Asset Accelerator Launch Event

Mount Sinai Innovation Partners (MSIP) launched the i3 Asset Accelerator on Thursday, April 12 with over 100 researchers, venture capital firms, and entrepreneurs from the NYC life sciences ecosystem gathered in the Davis Auditorium. i3 is a new funding opportunity created by Mount Sinai that enables select research discoveries to reach patients at a faster pace.

“We’re thrilled to be launching i3,” Erik Lium, PhD, (Senior Vice President of Mount Sinai Innovation Partners) said. “The institution is making a major investment here in innovation and it’s a measure of the level of commitment at Mount Sinai.”

The event kicked off with opening remarks from Dennis Charney, MD, (Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Dean of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and President for Academic Affairs for the Mount Sinai Health System). A fireside chat moderated by Lium followed, with Sean Ianchulev, MD, MPH (Professor of Ophthalmology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Director of the Ophthalmic Innovation and Technology Program at the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai) and Yiannis Ioannou, PhD (Professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai) discussing the importance of i3 in the healthcare technology landscape and offering their perspective as inventors who founded startups based on their research. After the chat, the first three i3 projects were presented by their inventors. The audience asked thought-provoking questions after each presentation and continued their interactions with the inventors at the networking reception that followed.

i3 was established with an initial investment of $10 million over four years. According to Erik Lium, PhD, Senior Vice President of MSIP, philanthropic efforts have already begun to increase its size. With a team of field professionals and a milestone-based development plan, i3 allows nascent discoveries from Mount Sinai’s inventors to rapidly generate commercially relevant data, secure additional funding, and quickly partner technologies with corporations, startups, or professional investors.

“We view i3 as a way of catalyzing funding for commercially-relevant research,” Lium said. “This is something that allows us to take risks and at the same time generate rewards in terms of patient benefits for the future.”

To learn more, visit About i3 Asset Accelerator.