Press Releases

CAMBRIDGE, MA – October16, 2024 – LabCentral, the premier Massachusetts-based network of coworking labs designed to accelerate high-potential biotech startups, today unveiled a critical new program, the Funding Innovation Studio. The kickoff event, the Funding Innovation Studio Launch Party & Sprint Showcase will be held on Wednesday, October 30.  

A new LabCentral Ignite program, the Funding Innovation Studio’s mission is to increase funding access, opportunity, and inclusion for women and BIPOC founders in life sciences.  Spearheaded by Beth McKeon, Sr. Director of Ignite VC, the program is a national community including venture investors, academics and entrepreneurs who design and run a series of experiments to identify strategies to solve persistent systemic barriers and bias in the fundraising and capital-deployment process. 

"LabCentral continues to develop new programs to address the conditions that negatively affect representation in the life sciences industry,” said Johannes Fruehauf, MD, PhD, CEO and cofounder and president of LabCentral. “With the launch of the Funding Innovation Studio, we’re convening innovators from across the investing and entrepreneurial communities to examine and evolve the processes underpinning the investments in life sciences companies.”  

The Launch Party & Sprint Showcase will share the outputs from recent experiments conducted earlier in 2024 in partnership with venture capital and entrepreneurial participants. They will include positive learnings that can be shared in organizations to help improve diverse founders’ access to capital. The Funding Innovation Studio Launch Party & Sprint Showcase is an invitation-only event that will be held in Cambridge, MA. Interested participants, including life sciences founders, investors, and community partners can request an invitation by contacting Beth McKeon. The agenda includes:  

• 12:30-2pm Lunch and Showcase Kickoff 
• 2pm-3pm Experiment Results Reveal 
• 3-4pm Activation Activity and Future Experiment Brainstorming 
• 4pm -5pm Networking 

About LabCentral   
A private, non-profit institution, LabCentral is a launchpad for high potential life-sciences and biotech startups with 243,000 square feet of space across Kendall Square in Cambridge, Mass., and the Harvard University campus. Founded in 2013, LabCentral offers a full complement of programming and networking to life sciences entrepreneurs in addition to fully permitted laboratory and office space for early-stage and growing life sciences companies. Our 10-year Impact Report can be found here, and additional information is available at www.labcentral.org.