Yet another major American city is looking to capitalize on healthcare innovation and the rapid changes across the industry, this time in Seattle, where Cambia Health Solutions and a host of other stakeholders have launched a new accelerator dubbed The Cambia Grove.
Cambia, the parent company of Regence BlueShield, is backing the effort with the goal of making Seattle a hub that can rival traditional healthcare capitals like Nashville, Boston and the Bay Area.
It’s a first-of-its kind for Washington, but Cambia says this new accelerator also differs from others in several key respects, chiefly that it’s not focused solely on startups and will include industry veterans and employers.
“While there are a handful of healthcare accelerators nationally, the Cambia Grove is more of a collaborative to support the industry holistically,” Rob Coppedge, senior vice president of Cambia Health, told MedCity News in an email. “In short we need a place that doesn’t view itself as an incubator but catalyzes the region itself to accelerate the development and scaling of the next healthcare system. We are focused on three things – convening stakeholders across the region and the industry, identifying shared challenges and opportunities for innovation, and catalyzing new businesses and bringing these solutions forward with access to capital and pilots.”
The Cambia Grove will open in a 9,000 square-foot facility, currently under construction, in the first quarter of 2015. It is backed by a number of public and private figures, among them Gov. Jay Inslee, Nick Hanauer, a venture capitalist with Second Avenue Partners, Lee Huntsman, president emeritus at the University of Washington and Chris Rivera, CEO of the Washington Biotechnology and Biomedical Association, among others.
Coppedge said talks are already underway with possible tenants and partners, and that it plans to announce them on an ongoing basis. Even traditional competitors will be included, Coppedge said.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
“We’re engaged in a number of conversations with employers, providers and health plan partners and have commitments from companies, investors and institutions across the country,” he said.”We believe working collaboratively across the healthcare sector is more impactful to the startup community than simply launching an incubator – our intent is to have the community become the accelerator.
The Cambia Grove will be led Nicole Bell, serving as executive director.
Combining providers, academics, employers, entrepreneurs, insurers and government will help the effort “address the core issues facing the healthcare industry” and identify the region’s overall strengths.
“Bringing these elements together will drive improvements in health care products, technology and services to raise the quality of care and shift the focus to the consumer.” Bell said.
Cambia announced the plans today at 25th Annual Governor’s Life Sciences Summit, hosted by the Washington Biotechnology and Biomedical Association.
