TMU Connects with the Silicon Valley Biomedical Startup Ecosystem: President Chien-Huang Lin Leads Elite Biomedical Startup Team on U.S. Visit
To expand its footprint in the global startup ecosystem and establish international collaboration hubs, Taipei Medical University (TMU) organized a delegation led by President Chien-Huang Lin. The delegation included Vice President Chieh-Hsin Wu (吳介信), Vice Superintendent of TMU Hospital Chao-Hua Chiu (邱昭華), CEO of the Center for Biomedical Design and Innovation Meng-Huang Wu (吳孟晃), CEO of TMU BioMed Accelerator Chao-Wei Chen (陳兆煒), and Deputy CEO Shih-En Yi (易詩恩). From October 31 to November 4, 2022, the group visited Texas, Silicon Valley, and Los Angeles to engage in international exchanges and accelerate cross-disciplinary collaborations with local partners.
This highly significant visit included meetings with various government, academic, and industry entities. Government agencies visited included the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office (TECO) in Houston, the Education and Science & Technology Divisions of TECO in San Francisco, and ITRI International Inc. Academic and research institutions included MD Anderson Cancer Center, Baylor College of Medicine, Stanford Byers Center for Biodesign, Stanford SPARK, and the Stanford Sleep Surgery Clinic. Within the international startup ecosystem, the delegation visited Vivo Capital, Fogarty Innovation, MaxConnect Medical Inc., IndieBio, the UC Berkeley Life Sciences Entrepreneurship Center, and Draper University.
On October 31, the delegation met with Professor Chun-Kai Lee (李君愷) at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston to discuss the current development and applications in cancer medicine. This meeting also facilitated Professor Lee's visit to TMU's clinical system on November 15, paving the way for future collaborative research with the TMU Office of Data Science. The following day, accompanied by Director General Robert Fu-Wen Lo (羅復文) and Director Shu-Ya Yang (楊淑雅) of TECO in Houston, the delegation visited Baylor College of Medicine. They met with Professors Wei-Chin Lin, Brendan Lee, and Ming-Jer Tsai, toured the Departments of Hematology and Oncology, Molecular and Human Genetics, and Cell Biology, and discussed future collaborations regarding visiting scholars and student exchange programs.
Having implemented the "TMU-Stanford Biodesign Global Faculty In Training Program" and the "SPARK Translational Research Program" for many years, the delegation traveled to California on November 2 to meet with Stanford Biodesign Executive Director Gordon Saul and SPARK founder Professor Daria Mochly-Rosen. They exchanged insights on SPARK commercialization achievements, discussed ways to optimize future program outcomes, and planned a bilateral forum for 2023. Furthermore, they met with Professor Robson Capasso of the Stanford Sleep Surgery Clinic, inviting him to serve as an international mentor for the TMU BioMed Accelerator. They also discussed collaborating on joint paper publications utilizing data from TMU's three affiliated hospitals, Taiwan's National Health Insurance database, and Stanford's research data.
To foster further inter-university cooperation with Stanford, the delegation visited TECO in San Francisco on November 3. They met with Director General Ming-Chi Scott Lai (賴銘琪), Education Division Director Hui-Yi Chou (周慧宜), Science & Technology Division Director Chen-Li Sun (孫珍理), TAITRA Director Chang-Ching Tsou (鄒長青), and ITRI International Inc. General Manager Shao-Hua Wang (王韶華). Discussions focused on establishing a future hub in Silicon Valley to accelerate the connection with local resources. Afterward, the delegation visited Vivo Capital and MaxConnect Medical Inc., where CEO of the Center for Biomedical Design and Innovation Meng-Huang Wu (吳孟晃) signed collaboration agreements on behalf of TMU. Moving forward, these two companies will serve as crucial local partners for TMU's Silicon Valley accelerator startups and product commercialization efforts.
On November 4, the delegation met with IC Jan (詹益鑑), founder of Life Sciences Angel Network. Having previously collaborated with the TMU BioMed Accelerator on the NBRP Biomedical Accelerator Program, Jan exchanged views on the current Silicon Valley biomedical startup ecosystem and discussed strategies for co-recruiting international startups. Through his introduction, the delegation then visited the UC Berkeley Life Sciences Entrepreneurship Center, a student startup incubation hub, meeting with Professor Darren Cooke and Advisor Ben Sun. They explored UC Berkeley's planning and development in innovation and entrepreneurship to enhance TMU's own programs and accelerator teams. In the future, inter-university collaborations through TMU's College of Interdisciplinary Studies and the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship will accelerate the global expansion of student startups and facilitate international mentorship for accelerator teams.
