MAY AT THE INQBATION LAB

JOIN US FOR A GREAT LINEUP OF SEMINARS THIS MONTH

May 5 | Northwestern's Institute for Augmented Intelligence in Medicine

Third Coast AI for Health Bowl Finals Competition

May15 | Q Founder Series

MythTaken: Five Common and Bad Mistakes CEOs Make about Leadership

May 16 | Osage University Partners (OUP) Series

Patient Data Licensing

May 23 | IL FAST Center

The SBIR/STTR Playbook: Drafting a Winning Proposal

May 26 | Q Founder Series

The Do's and Don'ts for Success in Venture

More information and registration links below

NEW Q STARTUP RESIDENT

The InQbation Lab now has 10 resident startups! The most recent addition is Prof. Peng Ji's startup (FSM), Aplexis. Aplexis is an early-stage therapeutic company focused on treating myeloproliferative neoplasms with characteristic Plek2 overexpression. It has identified novel Plek2 inhibitors and is currently optimizing the lead compounds and finalizing functional testing.

STARTUP FUNDRAISING ACTIVITY

Stemloop (Prof. Julius Lucks, McC) won over $2M in NIH funding last fall to develop their first product, µSense for Lead. They launched their first generation of µSense for Lead in 2022 and successfully completed their first pilot earlier this year. Stemloop is now raising $1M to support further product commercialization.

Volexion (Prof. Mark Hersam, McC) raised over $960k in their Seed- Series 2 funding from undisclosed investors. They have raised over $2.7M to date.

If you are a Northwestern startup with an active option/license that would like to share fundraising or milestone news through this monthly newsletter, please email inqbationlab@northwestern.edu for consideration. Thank you!

Q PROGRAM UPDATES

FOUNDHER FELLOWS

The 2023 FoundHer Fellows, Dr. Ruchi Gupta (FSM), Prof. Julie Kim (FSM) and Prof. Yevgenia Kozorovitskiy (WCAS), were celebrated this past month when they presented to an audience of investors, faculty peers and women entrepreneurs. With the generous donation from the Provost's Office, the fellows worked with technical mentors, Dimitra Georganopoulou (Qral Ventures), Lilli Zakarija (EdgeOne Medical), and Michelle Hoffmann (CBC), respectively, for over six weeks. The fellows received communication coaching from Brian Burkhart (Square Planet) and graphic design support to refine their presentation decks. They are now preparing for a networking trip in Boston this summer, joining forces with MIT's Future Founder Initiative.

N.XT FUND

The N.XT Fund has opened its call for startup applications. The N.XT Fund is a $10 million gap fund designed to foster and support Northwestern’s promising early-stage startups. Investments aim to de-risk technologies to a value inflection point in order to attract potential partners and investors.

Find more details and application link HERE.

**PLEASE NOTE: DEADLINE IS WEDNESDAY, MAY 31, 2023, 11:59pm.**