Having trouble viewing this email? Click here September 2014 @pistoiaalliance Comings and Goings The Pistoia Alliance's Next Chapter Initiative continued to develop over the Summer period with a focus on building our business development team. Carmen Nitsche has become our Executive Director Business Development, North America. Carmen joins the Pistoia Alliance from Accelrys (now BIOVIA) where she was Vice President, Corporate Development. Working alongside John Wise, who will focus on the UK and Europe markets, this is the first time that the Alliance has had full-time business development capability. [Read the press release] In addition, Exitus Communications (London, UK) have been appointed to raise the profile of the Pistoia Alliance and its projects in the media. Work has already begun on setting up an initial campaign of media interviews with our President, Michael Braxenthaler, and other members of our operational and project teams. A wider marketing strategy is in development and should be in place by the time you read this newsletter. Hiring Project Managers We are recruiting a pool of part-time on-call project managers in readiness to look after our expanding portfolio of projects. If you have project management experience, are able to commit to 1-2 days a week per project and are interested in getting involved with the Pistoia Alliance, then please get in touch with Richard Holland for a copy of the role description. Board Matters Nominations have closed and ballot papers have been sent out for the election of a Core Member company to fill the board seat recently vacated by Lundbeck, and for the annual election of all six Participating Member board seats. The
results will be announced before the Pistoia Alliance Annual General Meeting. The AGM will be held via webinar on September 30th. Membership Matters The conference organising group have met twice already and are preparing the agenda and topics for the RSC event in London in February 2015. The group also agreed that two Pistoia Alliance conferences will be run each year in a similar format to the New York meeting. In 2015 they are pencilled in for May (Frankfurt, Germany) and October (US East Coast). Dates will be advised when available. The webinar organising group met for the first time on September 4th. The group proposed to run webinars on topics of general interest on an approximately monthly schedule. A list of topics for these webinars is being generated and members are welcome to offer suggestions or comment on the prioritisation. Please contact Richard Holland if you would like to see the list, make suggestions, or get involved. The Pistoia Alliance currently has 83 members in total;; 12 Core, 11 Participating and 60 Contributing. Innovation Platform (IP3) Launched The new Interactive Project Portfolio Platform (IP3) was launched via webinar in August. A video of the webinar is available for those who missed it or want to refresh their memories as to how to use the platform to greatest effect. [Read the press release] Those ideas that attract the most discussion and interaction on the platform will progress towards becoming a funded Pistoia Alliance project. The system is open to all to submit ideas and the assessment process is conducted in the open. The more you interact with your favourite project on IP3, the more likely it will eventually get funded, so make a point of checking IP3 regularly! Emerging Portfolio A number of ideas within IP3 are attracting considerable interest for inclusion in the next generation of Pistoia Alliance
projects. These include: Interactive Genome Analysis BioSample MarketPlace R&D Metadata Standards Standardised Data Warehouses CSCS Expert Community: initial focus (China) Analysome: phase 2 HELM: phase 2 For more information on these projects visit IP3, or contact our business development team. A webinar will be held on September 26th to introduce these projects and explain why investing in them will benefit our community. What happened to the App Strategy? The App Strategy project steering committee met in September and officially decided to close the project. The market for mobile technology and apps has moved much faster than originally anticipated. Stimulating interest in developing apps to solve specific problems in life sciences R&D remains a possibility for future Pistoia Alliance projects, but building an app store for them was no longer relevant. Pistoia Alliance Project Updates HELM Hierarchical Editing Language for Macromolecules On July 9th, the HELM project team held a webinar to showcase the project and its latest features to Pistoia Alliance members and the general research community. [Watch a recording of the HELM webinar] An excellent article on HELM, "Universal Language: The Pistoia Alliance Takes on Indescribable Biology", appeared in the July 18th edition of Bio-IT World. The HELM project will be holding a one-day HELM Theory and Practice workshop in Cambridge, UK, on Monday 22nd September. [Register to attend] CSCS
Controlled Substance Compliance Service The establishment of the Expert Community was announced on June 25th, and has already started investigating the resources needed to produce test datasets for China, and answering queries from its members about specific aspects of legislation. [Read the press release] A new project manager has joined the CSCS team after Anne Dunlop moved on to a position in the insurance industry at the end of August. We would like to thank Anne for all the hard work she has put into the project over the past couple of years and we wish her all the best in her new job. From September 15th, Claire Bellamy will be taking joint responsibility for CSCS and HELM and we are certain that the project will be in very safe hands with her. The CSCS Expert Community is always open to new members. Meetings are held monthly by conference call. [Revisit the kickoff meeting on the CSCS website] Analysome The Pistoia Alliance has developed a working prototype of the Analysome search engine and is now seeking project team members and funding to develop this concept and associated business models whereby the Analysome could become a sustainable resource for life science R&D. The Analysome team held a webinar on July 24th for all those active in or interested in the project. [Watch a recording of the Analysome webinar] The Analysome project has all but reached the end of its current phase and is now seeking funding to enable it to continue with the development of production-ready solutions. Upcoming Events HELM Theory and Practice Mon, Sep 22, Cambridge, UK MIPTEC Mon, Sep 22 - Thu, Sep 25, Basel, Switzerland Pistoia Alliance Project Investment Opportunities (via Webinar)
Fri, Sep 26 @ 3.00 PM - 4.00 PM BST Oxford Global Pharma IT Conference Mon, Sep 27 - Tue, Sep 28, London, UK Pistoia Alliance Annual General Meeting 2014 (via Webinar) Tue, Sep 30 @ 4:00 PM - 6:00 PM BST IQPC EDKM: ELNs, Data Analytics and Knowledge Management Tue, Sep 30 - Wed, Oct 1, Brussels, Belgium Forward email This email was sent to comms@pistoiaalliance.org by comms@pistoiaalliance.org Update Profile/Email Address Rapid removal with SafeUnsubscribe Privacy Policy. Pistoia Alliance 401 Edgewater Place Suite 600 Wakefield MA 01880