By Dennis Ford, Founder & CEO, LSN

 RESI @ JPM has generated feedback from a wide swath of attendees thus far. What LSN has heard has been two quite distinctive words: “Crazy good.” An interesting mantra, and it’s right on.

The overriding response was that the RESI conference is not stale (same old talking heads for decades) or burdened with a sterile-like quality of private white meeting rooms. RESI is not the “quiet car,” and most certainly is not projecting a low energy library-like atmosphere.

On the contrary, when you step into the beehive of RESI and into its palatable energy and buzzing noise, you know it’s different. It’s not only for the elite phase III and commercialization cadre that play in the later stage life science arena.

The RESI conference series is the Wild West of the life science arena, with preclinical and early stage players not looking to be catered to with pomp and circumstance – actually just the opposite. The game is afoot – let’s engage in the hunt for assets! Send forth the hounds, blow the trumpets, let’s make some noise!

Packed into an eclectic 12-story Spanish Colonial-style building built in 1926, RESI attendees were walking up and down tight flights of stairs to get around the crowd, but many seemed to know the drill – it was the third RESI @ JPM event.

And the RESI vibe brings down the walls and barriers and everybody is talking and meeting; it’s just a really open and accepting crowd.

The real win is that the attendees are the who’s who of global early stage investment. Savvy fundraising CEOs are smart enough to figure it out, and booked up to 16 meetings with investors that fit their stage and product – not to mention the additional ad hoc meetings that are the hallmark of the event.

There is a tribe of players, both global early stage investors and startup CEOs, that follow the RESI conference throughout the year. In 2017 there will be 5 RESI events through out North America: San Francisco, Toronto, San Diego, Boston and New York.

RESI is happening and capital is flowing into the drug, device, diagnostic and health IT startups. We hear about the resulting allocations almost every week.

It’s crazy good!

By Lucy Parkinson, Director of Research, LSN

Throughout 2016, Next Phase has brought you updates and advice on early stage life science fundraising. This week, we’d like to take a look back at the highlights of the year, from some hard data on drug development funding to tips on marketing and pitching your company. We hope you enjoy this roundup of our top 10 articles of the year. See you in 2017.

1. Drug Development: What Does It Cost, and Who Has The Capital?
2. The Journey of the Executive Summary and the PowerPoint Pitch Deck
3. It’s a Numbers Game: Why Some Folks Book Lots of Partnering Meetings and Others Don’t
4. Is the Early Stage Opportunistic Investment Strategy Broken?
5. Top Takeaways for Pitching from the WIB, JLABS, and J&J Innovation Lobster Pot
6. Short-Term Investors in Long-Long Development: Matching an Investor’s Time Horizon
7. Calling All Capital Raising CEOs
8. Corporate Partnerships On The Rise: The Toronto Opportunity
9. How Massachusetts Wins the War for Global Talent
10. R&D Tax Credits: A New Non-Dilutive Funding Source For Startups

By Dennis Ford, Founder & CEO, LSN

As crazy as this may sound, LSN has more early stage investors signed up for Redefining Early Stage Investments (RESI) conference (423 registered) than we have fundraising CEOs and scientist-entrepreneurs. I mean think about it! Raising capital is first and foremost a numbers game – you need to get in front of as many investors as possible to increase your chance of meeting the right set of players for your companies stage of development and product. RESI on January 10th at the Marines’ Memorial Club & Hotel will provide an unprecedented moment to get you and your firm in front of the two kind of early stage investors that show up at RESI conferences.

The first group typically has a mandate to invest capital in a particular disease, platform or service. This means the money has been appropriated and they are actively seeking firms to fulfill their current investment mandates and allocate funds. The second group of investors are what I call opportunistic. If they see something interesting, they will put some money in; they don’t always need to have a preapproved mandate to invest. Many of both are attending the upcoming RESI event, and having these two kind of prominent investor types in abundance is a boon for companies looking for capital.

Historically, the last two weeks is when a lot of attendees register and start to plan out their activities in the conference arena. This tactical plan usually works well; however, being JPM, the biggest mega life science show on the planet, the old rules don’t apply. We sent out an alert last week that we fear we may have to close down registrations because we have a limit on the number of people the venue can hold. Now we actually think we may have more investors than capital raisers. January 10th is an unprecedented opportunity to meet investors, start a dialogue that leads to a relationship and hopefully an allocation in the future. The capital will not come and find you. You need to do whatever you can to get in front of investors. This is the 11th RESI conference in 3 years, it’s working, and I hope we can move the needle in early stage life science investing. We are calling all capital raising CEOs take advantage of this opportunity. Click here to register for RESI @ JPM