Coala Life vinner the Rising Star Award 2017

Stockholm, 28 aug, 2017 - På Swedish-American Life Science Summit 2017 (SALSS) i Stockholm utsågs Coala Life som vinnaren av The Rising Star Award 2017. Syftet med priset är att uppmärksamma ett svenskt bolag som har kapacitet att revolutionera och påverka en global marknad.

-Vi är otroligt stolta och glada för utmärkelsen, och att Coala Life är det första bolaget som får priset. Den imponerande juryn bakom The Rising Star Award är synnerligen välrenommerad och ett bevis på att svensk forskning och utveckling håller världsklass,säger Philip Siberg, vd på Coala Life.

SALSS leds av Barbro Ehnbom och samlar årligen några av Life Science-branschens mest betydelsefulla forskare, företagsledare, entreprenörer och investerare. Målet är att skapa samarbete och strategiska relationer mellan academia, industri och finansiärer och på så vis utveckla Life Science-branschen. Årets tema var Cancer Moonshot, HealthTech Transformation och Impact Investing.

I priset ingår mentorskap av juryn och internationella dörröppningar. Rising Star Award delades ut av jurymedlem Susanne Najafi på Nasdaq i Stockholm. Juryns motivering till priset var:

’’We are proud to award Coala Life the SALSS 2017 Rising Star Award, for being a novel company with commercial potential, great impact and early approval.

Coala is well advanced with their product and business model. It is highly scalable and the product is based on consumer insights. The main product is in the analysis of the data, not in the physical product that could be replaced by other market leaders. It also makes a significant impact as it helps detect one of the biggest causes of death today.

The company is pursuing the hot space of mobile patient centered digital device technologies, applied for better monitoring of heart functions. This can improve future medical practice by integrating patient information continuously rather than episodically. They have already advanced a product to the local Swedish market and is now expanding into new customer segments.’’

Den internationella juryn bestod av:

Dr. Robert Langer, Professor, MIT.

Dr. Mikael Dolsten, President Worldwide R&D, Pfizer

Dr. Carl-Henrik Heldin, Professor and Chairman, The Nobel Foundation

Dr. Eugen Steiner, Partner, HealthCap

Ms. Susanne Najafi, Entrepreneur & Investor, Founding Partner Backing Minds

För mer information, kontakta:

Titti Lundgren, CMO, 070 8353328, titti.lundgren@coalalife.com

Philip Siberg, VD, 070 7906734, philip.siberg@coalalife.com

Ylva Nicolae Santesson, Senior Project Manager SALSS, 070 2792524, ylva@salss.com

Om Coala Life

Coala Life är ett svenskt medicintekniskt företag inriktat på hjärtdiagnostik och mobil hälsa. Företaget har utvecklat en portfölj av patenterade produkter och tjänster för digital distansövervakning och screening av hjärtat. Bolagets medicintekniska och individorienterade produkter och tjänster möjliggör analys, distansmonitorering, effektivare hjärtutredningar och integrerade vårdtjänster, allt i realtid. I skrivande stund har Coala analyserat över 1,2 miljoner hjärtslag.

The Swedish-American Life Science Summit

The Swedish-American Life Science Summit (SALSS) är en konferens som samlar några av Life Science mest betydelsefulla forskare, företagsledare, entreprenörer och investerare. Målet är att skapa samarbetande och strategiska relationer mellan academia, industri och finansiärer och på så vis utveckla Life Science. SALSS grundades 2005 som ett initiativ för att öka den gränsöverskridande verksamheten mellan världens största marknad, USA, och en av Europas viktigaste centrum för Life Science-industrin, Sverige.

Barbro C. Ehnbom - Founder & Chairman SALSS

Ms. Ehnbom has been a pioneer in the Life Science industry throughout her whole career. She was one of the first female executives in the US pharmaceutical industry, and also a top analyst on Wall Street. She followed this with many years of investment banking, including heading the M&A activities in Scandinavia for Wasserstein Perella as they held a market leading position. As a long time board member of the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce and Chairman Emeritus of the Swedish Economist Group in New York, Ms. Ehnbom has 30 years of experience in creating successful financial partnerships involving Sweden and the U.S. Ms. Ehnbom is active not only in the commercial field but also in areas as diverse as academics, music, the arts, and social entrepreneurship. As founder of the prestigious scholarship Female Economist of the Year, awarded to female students at the Stockholm School of Economics, Ms. Ehnbom tirelessly supports and promotes female economists as they enter into professional life.

Om tävlingen

Rising Star Award 2017 är en entreprenörstävling för startup- och tillväxtbolag. En expertpanel väljer ut 10 bolag, som deltar på SALSS 2 dagars-program. En jury bestående av välrenommerade professorer och innovationsexperter utser det vinnande bolaget.

Om Juryn:

Robert Langer - David H. Koch Institute Professor, MIT

Dr. Robert Langer, David H. Koch Institute Professor, MIT. Professor Langer has written over 1,250 articles and he also holds nearly 1,050 patents worldwide. Dr. Langer´s patents have been licensed or sublicensed to over 250 pharmaceutical, chemical, biotechnology and medical device companies. Furthermore, Dr. Langer is the most cited engineer in history. He served as a member of the United States Food and Drug Administration´s SCIENCE Board, the FDA´s highest advisory board, from 1995 to 2002, and as its Chairman from 1999 to2002. Dr. Langer has received over 220 major awards and is one of seven individuals to have received both the United States National Medal of Science (2006) and the United States National Medal of Technology and Innovation (2011). He also received the 2002 Charles Stark Draper Prize, considered the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for engineers, the 2008 Millennium Prize, the world´s largest technology prize, the 2012 Priestley Medal, the highest award of the American Chemical Society, the 2013 Wolf Prize in Chemistry, the 2014 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences and the 2014 Kyoto Prize. He is the also the only engineer ever to receive the Gairdner Foundation International Award.

Mikael Dolsten - President Worldwide Research and Development Pfizer

Dr. Dolsten is focused on advancing the company’s scientific leadership in small molecule medicines, biotherapeutics, and vaccines. He is a member of the Pfizer Executive Leadership Team and the company´s Portfolio Strategy and Investment Committee, which governs major pipeline investments and strategic end-to-end R&D priorities. He leads the Worldwide Research and Development (WRD) organization at Pfizer, which is responsible for research at the company, including development of all compounds through proof of concept, and provides safety, regulatory and clinical operation support to the entire R&D pipeline. Prior to joining Pfizer in 2009, Dr. Dolsten was President of Wyeth Research, where he led scientists across the U.S., Europe, and Asia. Dr. Dolsten earned his Ph.D. in tumor immunology and M.D. from the University of Lund in Sweden, where he was appointed Adjunct Professor in Tumor Immunology. Dr. Dolsten serves on the Science and Regulatory Executive Committee of The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) and the PhRMA Foundation Board of Directors. He is a member of the Board of Karyopharm Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Dolsten was recently elected as Foreign Member of The Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences. Dr. Dolsten is a named inventor on several patents and has published approximately 150 articles in international journals.

Carl-Henrik Heldin- Chairman, The Nobel Foundation Director, Ludwig Cancer Research, Uppsala

Dr. Heldin was the Branch Director of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research in Uppsala 1986-2017, and since 1992 he is also Professor in Molecular Cell Biology at Uppsala University where he obtained his PhD in Medical and Physiological Chemistry in 1980. Dr. Heldin is a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and Academia Europea. Dr. Heldin was a Vice President of the European Research Council until 2014, and is also an Associate Editor for Molecular Biology of the Cell, Genes to Cells and Growth Factors. He has received several scientific awards, including Prix Antoine Lacassagne in 1989, K. Fernströms Large Medical Prize in 1993 and the Pezcoller-American Association for Cancer Research Award 2002. Dr. Heldin is also serving on the board or scientific advisory board of several Life Science companies.

Eugen Steiner- Venture Partner, HealthCap

Dr. Steiner has 30 years executive management experience as CEO or executive chairman in development stage life-science companies. As a venture partner of HealthCap, a leading European healthcare venture capital fund, he has since 1997 successfully organized and managed several start-up teams in companies which have been financed in part by HealthCap and has led financing efforts in these, which have succeeded in raising in total of over 500 million SEK from Swedish, European and US investors, enabling those companies to execute their strategies and to grow. Dr. Steiner is on the board of several public and private life-science companies as well as of the Stockholm School of Entrepreneurship. Until 1987, Dr. Steiner practiced medicine and was active in pharmacological research at the Karolinska Hospital, Sweden. Dr. Steiner received his medical degree from Karolinska Institute, and earned a Ph.D. in Clinical Pharmacology.

Susanne Najafi - Entrepreneur & Investor Founding Partner, Backing Minds

Ms. Najafi is an entrepreneur and investor. She is the founder of Venture Capital firm Backing Minds that invests beyond the homogeneous networks, in underinvested entrepreneurs that is normally missed by traditional VCs. Ms. Najafi grew up outside of Stockholm by Iranian parents and set an early goal in life to start a company that had 100 million in sales before the age of 30. She reached the goal with Eleven, one of Nordics largest e-commercial companies within beauty care where she was the founder and CEO. She has also founded 3 other companies within e-commerce and tech. She has a background as Brand Manager from Procter&Gamble and as a Ms.C-graduate in Business and Economics and CEMS from Stockholm School of Economics. Ms. Najafi is on the board of listed Stockmann and Lindex and has received several awards e.g. Young Leader of the Year 2015, Most Influential Founder under 40 by DagensIndustri and Entrepreneur Mama of the year 2016.