Faculty-Industry Ideas Workshop: Enhancing and Evolving Industry-Academic Partnerships
CSU Biotechnology Symposium 2025 Thursday, January 9 th 2:30 - 5 pm
Session Chairs:
Chris Meyer, CSU Fresno
Sastry Pantula, CSU San Bernardino
This workshop features an interactive session about how to foster collaboration between academic researchers and industry professionals. The conversion will revolve around how to bridge the gap between academic knowledge and real-world applications, including commercialization of research, technology transfer, and mutual benefits for both sectors. Industry representatives will discuss current challenges, technological needs, and market trends.and dialog with faculty of how academic research can be applied to solve real-world industry problems. Discussion will also cover opportunities for faculty, researchers, and industry professionals to build relationships, and forming partnerships for collaborative research, consulting, or joint ventures. Faculty is expected to gain insights into industry needs, helping shape future research and curricula.
This session is a follow up to last year's successful event that featured industry representatives (including many CSU graduates) from a variety of biotechnology companies in the Bay Area. The agenda included an interactive panel discussion followed by networking and brainstorming during table rotations with faculty. This year we are envisioning a two-part program with biotech representatives from Orange County/Los Angeles:
Part 1, 2:30 – 3:30 PM: An interactive industry panel with an audience of both students and
faculty
- Industry representatives sharing their “origin story" and pathways in biotech
- Industry insights on preparing students for the biotech workforce
Part 2, 3:45 – 5 PM: Group and roundtable brainstorming and networking to create and evolve mutually beneficial and reinforcing partnerships
- Exploring innovative opportunities for collaboration
- Identifying way to navigate and overcome barriers
- Develop novel work-based learning opportunities for students
- Navigating funding opportunities
- Engaging in action planning and next steps!
Speakers
- Juan Diaz, Associate Director, Antibody Discovery, Xencor
- Tala Harake, Managing Partner, Vigilant Clinical Trials Consulting
- Cheenou Her, Posstdoctoral Fellow at Amgen, Amgen
- Rebecca Idoine, External Research Program Specialist, ChromaDex, Inc.
- Jeffry Jackson, Principal Scientist - Medicinal Chemistry, Amgen
- Boris Jankowski, Interim Head, Global Regulatory Operations, Takeda
- Christy Kadharmestan, Principal Research Scientist - Innovation and Science, Global Nutrition, Nutrilite/Amway
- Leanna Levine, President, ALine, Inc., ALine, Inc.
- Raj Nihalani, Physician-Enterpreneur, Founder-CEO of Multiple Life Sciences Companies, Onciomed, Inc
- Adrian Ricarte, Process Engineer, Beyond Meat
- Arie Shen, Founder, Board member, and Fractional CxO of Multiple Life Sciences Companies, Madas, Inc.
- Dhaval Waghela, Senior Product Manager, Seegene USA
- Alon Wellner, VP for Biology and co-founder, Aureka Biotechnologies< inc
- Jared Wiig, Associate Director, Fermentation, AbbVie
- Bryce Yeh, Director of Quality Operations and Supplier Quality, ChromaDex, Inc.