About 50 HR responsibles witnessed a 2 hours during introduction of Social Media by Geert Conard. Starting from his own experiences and the way he learned how social media could open up opportunities, he took us with hem through the mass of existing media. He explained key features and how to filter information, referred to generation Y and let us find out more about the kind of networker we are. Of course online networking costs time, but cannot be seen as a seperate activity. It has to be seen as embedded in the larger frame of activities we're doing. It was worth seeing the enthusiam and the optimism of Geert.

After the introduction Michiel Stoffels started his presentation about Vividlinks, the Life Sciences Career Community. He explained the possibility of this brand new "NICHE" website. Not only Vividlinks opens important black boxes of the Euregion life sciences labour market (companies, careers, people). It also gives possibilities to activily boost expand your professional network. This HR seminar is part of the Skills³ project. This project is realised with the financial support of the European Fund for Regional Development ( Interreg Euregio Maas-Rijn), the Flemish Community and the province of Limburg

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How to get 260 pupils enthusiastic about science and entrepreneurship?The recipe is not that easy. Voka – chamber of commerce, the Innovation Centre and LifeTechLimburg, worked together to offer an attractive programme: the LifeTech Alive entrepreneur day.

These partners organized a competition starting from the challenge: what will be the future drink for youngsters? Ofcourse you cannot compete without a warming up to free the creativity. In the following brainstorm this creativity led to a lot of ideas out of which one was chosen to be used for a business plan. Three CEO’s of life sciences companies were invited to share their experiences in entrepreneurship and show one of the ways to reach Rome. Of the 21 participating groups of pupils three nominees were selected to present their top idea in front of a professional jury. Minister of Innovation, Ingrid Lieten, had the honour to announce the winner.

Pictures: UHasselt.be

On March 17th and 18th the Euregional life sciences summit Biomedica took place in Aachen. This summit was organised by LifeTechLimburg and its euregional partners and aimed to build bridges between scientists and companies. Almost 1000 people from 20 nations came to attend Biomedica conference where “Science meets business and business meets science.” They came to listen to the presentations held by about 40 experts, to be part of the discussions which followed, and to visit the high-class exhibition with its numerous product developments and innovations

The exhibition’s lectures, matchmakings and 31 booths were all about innovations and new products. The high-level research taking place at universities and research institutions and the know-how of innovative companies such as Philips, DSM or Chemelot were presented to an international audience from the fields of science and business.The focus of the two-day congress was on transnational networking.

The participation of LifeTechLimburg at Biomedica is made possible with the financial support of the European Fund for Regional Development ( Doelstelling 2 Vlaanderen), the Flemish Community and the foundation ‘LSM’

Website Biomedica2010: Biomedica 2010
Pictures: UHasselt.be

On the 23th of March, Minister Ingrid Lieten, officially opened Bioville, the Limburg life sciences incubator. Bioville encourages and nurtures start-ups and expanding companies in the field of biomedical life sciences. The life sciences incubator is the result of a joint venture between LRM, Hasselt University and the Limburg development agency POM Limburg. BioVille aims to become a landmark for the the life sciences sector in this region. The official opening started with the première of the movie on the development of life sciences in Limburg. After speeches by Marc Vandeput (POM Limburg), Piet Stinnissen (Uhasselt), Hugo Leroi (LRM) and Ingrid Lieten (Flemisch Government) and a short lecture by Koen Van Mechelen, the selected audience enjoyed a networkreception. This networkevent was made possible with financial support of the European Union (EFRO – Doelstelling 2 Vlaanderen).

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Website Bioville: Bioville.be
Pictures 1: UHasselt.be
Pictures 2: Photogallery

Amakem obtains part of Devgen’s former pharma assets and closes EUR 1.5 million seed financing round
Diepenbeek and Gent, February 11, 2010 - Amakem and Devgen (Euronext Brussels, DEVG) announce today the closure of a EUR 1.5 million seed financing round and the contribution in kind of certain assets, intellectual property and know-how of Devgen’s former pharma division. The financing round was led by LRM, through its ARKIV subsidiary KMOFIN. Other investors are Life Sciences Research Partners (LSRP) and VINNOF.


About Amakem NV
Amakem is a chemistry driven company embedded in the Limburg life science community and starts as a centre of medicinal chemistry excellence, paving the way to becoming an integrated pharma company. The core activity is to deliver advanced medicinal chemistry solutions for drug research. The mission of Amakem is to obtain a leading position in the discovery and development of safe and effective kinase inhibitors with localized activity and to create substantial value via an internal proprietary pipeline of drug candidates. Initially Amakem will focus on a unique kinase inhibitor concept for the treatment of major chronic diseases such as glaucoma, allergic asthma and COPD.

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3 new publications on the development of life sciences in Limburg and the importance of LifeTechLimburg and the Life Sciences Development Campus in this process clearly illustrate that Limburg is the best place to  be for Life Sciences
• Life Sciences in Limburg (Dutch version) annex to Knack january 2010 - read more
• Life Sciences in Limburg (English version) annex to Knack january 2010 - read more
• Special starters  (dutch only) annex to De Standaard january 2010 - read more
• Best place to be … for work in life Sciences and biotechnology (english) article in Public Service Review: Science and technology nr. 5

This interregio meeting focussed  on regional cooperation in innovative research & developments in (Bio)Medical Technology and Life Sciences. Topics such as:  How to cooperate as SME’s with knowledge institutions and how to finance these innovations, and what rules & regulations apply were discussed in several presentations. 2 members of the life sciences community in Limburg presented their business cases: Medinvents (what’s in a needle) and Technical Services Stevens (The insulin Reminder). All presentations can be found at www.hemolab.nl  

On the 29th of October, LifeTechLimburg hosted the first of the relaunched series of interregio Technologiecafés. This meeting focused in particular on the opportunities of ICT applications in the health sector. Through the introduction e-health, the quality and the efficiency of the healthcare system can be improved significantly.
After a general overview by Professor Piet Stinissen (chairman of LifeTechLimburg and professor at Hasselt University), the program presented a number of interregional "good practices"

• the benefits of telemonitoring in the treatment of patients with chronic hart failure (Prof. dr. Paul Dendale, Virga Jesse Hospital and Hasselt University) or cancer patients (Prof. dr. Rianne de Wit, Maastricht Universitair Medisch Centrum +).

• Jos Geboers of the Compliers Group (Eindhoven) demonstrated a very practical tool to monitor and increase therapy compliance.

• Siegfried Jaecques from Leuven Medical Technology Center demonstrated a number of Biomonitoring projects that could lead to future telemedicine applications

• Geert Hauben from Uhasselt presented a prototype for medical and other digital services in service flats.

• A delegation from ‘Het Wit-Gele Kruis’, a Flemish organization specialized in domestic (medical care), demonstrated their electronic care dossier.

The highly successful meeting ended with a much appreciated network reception. This meeting was part of the project “LifeTechLimburg@work”. This project is realised with the financial support of the European Fund for Regional Development ( Doelstelling 2 Vlaanderen), the Flemish Community and the foundation ‘LSM’)