The Asia Pacific region represents a diverse healthcare marketplace, where each country comes with a unique set of challenges including regulatory approval, reimbursement, distribution channels, and healthcare practice. North American startups can benefit from working with strategic partners who could help them navigate the complex landscape. Corporations from Asia Pacific are also strongly motivated to seek collaborators from overseas.

RESI Toronto provides an excellent opportunity for entrepreneurs to meet potential Asian partners face-to-face. Two exciting panels are organized on pharma and HealthTech, respectively:

Asia Pharma Partners

• Richard Soll, Senior Vice President, International Discovery Service Unit, WuXi AppTec (Moderator)
• Weiyong Sun, Senior Director External Scientific Affairs, Daiichi Sankyo
• Tianle Redanz, BD Director, Simcere Pharmaceutical
• Hiroshi Kawai, Vice President, Mitsubishi Tanabe Holdings America

Asia HealthTech Partners

• Jean Yao, Managing Partner, Med Qiao Group (Moderator)
• Akihiro Maeda, Manager, Business Development, Teijin Pharma
• Angela Mah, Vice President, Global Business Development, InTeahouse
• Zishan Haroon, Chairman and General Partner, Julz
• Zoe Zhang, Regional Manager, BGI Americas Corporation

A growing revolution in healthcare is fueling innovation and increased government spending in the sector, while opening up new opportunities for investors.

Today, thanks largely to mobile devices, people are collecting more personal health information than ever before, including family medical histories, symptoms, biometric data, and food and drug intake. Experts have taken to calling this wealth of information "big data" or the "quantified self."

This democratization of the healthcare sector-where both doctors and patients are involved in the healing process-is driving increased spending in the system, which, in turn, is fuelling new health innovations and greater interest in the sector from venture capitalists...

Diagnostics is a challenging landscape for fundraising and commercialization; however, the sector attracts interest and backing from a wide variety of stakeholders. There are many unmet needs in the sector, from finding new disease biomarkers to improving monitoring of progressive diseases.

The range of diagnostic investors attending RESI on MaRS next Tuesday provide testament to this varied landscape, with interest in novel diagnostic technologies coming from major pharma and device companies, diagnostic service providers, venture investors, and government organizations. RESI will bring the diagnostics world together for a panel discussion, moderated by Bob Williams, Vice President, Business Development and Innovation - Bracco Diagnostics, and featuring:

• Nicola Urbani, Investment Director, Emerillon Capital
• Lawrence Mahan, VP Sales and Marketing, LifeLabs
• Ihor Boszko, Vice President, Business Development, Ontario Genomics
• Lyon Wong, Co-Founder & General Partner, Spectrum 28