Bench to Bedside
The Bench to Bedside Competition (B2B) is an exciting and vibrant program that introduces students to the fascinating world of medical technology innovation. Now entering its tenth year, the program has continued to grow in both scale and impact. B2B companies from previous years are driving forward with their innovative new technologies. As a result, several have obtained regulatory clearance and have introduced their products to market.
B2B is a multidisciplinary experiential educational program that teaches the impact and the power diversity of thought can bring to the innovation process.The program has grown immensely in scope and quality over the last eight years. We have now engaged over 1,000 students into 238 inter-disciplinary teams that have spawned innovative new health care technologies. More than 65 of these teams have move forward to commercialize their creations.
Our driving principles:
- Provide an intensive experiential education through a hands-on real-world environment
- Develop interdisciplinary teams of innovators comprised of healthcare professionals, students, investors and industry experts
- Immerse our innovation teams into the clinical environment where they can identify and understand healthcare needs first-hand
- Provide teams the ecosystem, resources, and education to all them to accelerate new technologies from concept to commercialization
Competition Overview
During the seven-month B2B program, student teams form “startup” companies to identify an unmet clinical need and design a technology solution to address the need. Each team has access to over 100 University Physicians from a broad range of specialties as well as engineering and business professionals from the Salt Lake community to serve as consultants, key opinion leaders, and stakeholders. In that seven-month time period, students will have defined the clinical problem, evaluated the patent landscape, established a regulatory pathway, created a proof of concept prototype, and then develop a go to market strategy for commercialization.
The program culminates in April with a formal presentation of team projects at the annual Bench to Bedside Competition. The event draws participation from faculty physicians, residents, industry leaders, venture capital firms, and university leadership. Projects are presented by team members, then evaluated and scored by a VIP panel of judges. Top teams are awarded milestone funding to support further project development.
