The Parliament of Catalonia holds a hearing session within the Committee on Institutional Affairs to address the Draft Law for Asbestos Eradication. The session includes testimonies from social organizations, public health experts, neighborhood associations, and local authorities. The bill aims to provide a legal framework for the safe and definitive removal of asbestos, which remains a public health concern.

Key participants include representatives of former industrial workers, municipal entities, and prominent medical experts in respiratory health and occupational safety. The CEO of AROMICS Dr. Plasencia, was one of the representatives attending to the hearing.

Our presence at ASCO reflects the commitment to advancing innovative therapies for difficult-to-treat cancers like mesothelioma, and to bringing RNA-targeted science to the forefront of precision medicine. From Barcelona to the global stage—we stand with patients and science.

This audiovisual project reflects our deep scientific and human commitment to developing new, precise therapies for underserved cancers linked to environmental risk factors, such as asbestos. By sharing real stories, La Fibra Sensible fosters awareness, empathy and mobilization—values we share fully at BERMES project. We stand with patients, families, and all those fighting for justice, visibility, and access to innovative solutions.

▶ Watch the documentary and learn more about the cause we champion.Tráiler: vimeo.com/1068778507

They have also met with the Spanish Ambassador to Japan His Excellency Mr. Fidel Sendagorta and the Commercial Counsellor in Japan Mr. Gonzalo Ramos Puig, to whom the companies have presented their projects and discussed their concerns.

Later they had the opportunity to visit the facilities of LINK-J, the Japanese association of all companies and stakeholders in the sector, where they participated in a networking session and presented their projects.

The congress will take place at the Hotel Iruña Park from 9:00h until 14:30h.

The opening of the congress will have the presence of the MEP Da Ma Eugenia Palop (online or in person) and the MEP Da Adriana Maldonado, the act will be presented by Do Vicente Navarro, Da Concha Vidaurre and Da María Asun Fernández. The congress is divided in four round tables: Health, Technical, Justice and Social aspects. Different professionals (medical doctors, oncologists, scientitists, architects, lawyers and patients' associations)  will discuss on the #asbestos problem and main advances in the area. 

Proposals for IDEA² were invited from anywhere in the world, and selected teams come from Sweden, Spain, Chile, Argentina, Poland, and the United States. IDEA² program contributors for the 2024 edition include the MIT Institute for Medical Engineering and Science (IMES), the MIT Deshpande Center, the Medicine Innovation Program at Massachusetts General Hospital, the US Department of Veterans Affairs, Boston Landing, and MIT Hacking Medicine. 

BIOSPAIN is one of the leading conferences in Europe that brings together more than 850 innovative organizations working in health, sustainable agri-food and solutions to climate change. More than 1,500 professionals from 30 countries are taking part in this event, with more than 200 exhibitors and more than 50 investors. AseBio expects to hold more than 3,500 one-on-one meetings during these days. The congress will have an exhibition space, about 40 conferences on various topics, company presentations and networking activities.

The main objective of this event is to promote innovation, investment, collaboration and new business opportunities in the European biotechnology field.

Through workshops, plenary sessions, oral abstracts, poster sessions, and other events, this meeting will  offer plenty of networking opportunities with leading scientists and researchers, and also with patients and their associations. The resulting stimulating ideas will help to establish research collaborations and to fund projects.  This year iMig Conference is in France on summer 2023. Registration is now open!

Various sources of exposure to many environmental factors are known, which enter the organism through the digestive, respiratory, dermal and/or percutaneous routes.  One of these polulants is asbestos. Once inside the body it will produce different effects, with varying window periods from the time of exposure. Indeed asbestos-related diseases will have a representation in the meeting with the presentation of Aromics' CEO, Dr. Carme Plasencia.  

Provided recent results of the WHO report confirm that at least 23% of global deaths and 26% of deaths in children under five years of age are due to modifiable environmental factors, the meeting will review different aspects of these diseases and threats for human health.  Please see details of the program here:  PROGRAMA_I Encuentro Internacional de Salud Medioambiental.pdf. 

The eradication of this element, considered a first degree carcinogen and which is present throughout our territory, requires the involvement of multiple sectors: administration, professionals and specialists, citizens and neighborhood movements. Without this joint will, it will not be possible to remove all asbestos in ten years (six in public areas), as indicated in the European guidelines. This convention should serve as a meeting point and a turning point to mobilize all the sectors involved. The convention counts on the presence of doctors and researchers from the medical community, professionals with expertise in the treatment of ACM, lawyers who will discuss the legal framework that we must provide and social movements that are witnesses of the deadly consequences of asbestos will be present.
In order to guarantee the highest level and richness in the debate, we are planning the presence of several speakers from other countries. The objective of the Convention is to influence the administration and the different levels of our society to assume with determination the total eradication of asbestos. The Convention will conclude with the reading of a manifesto where the main challenges to overcome will be marked, such as the immediate need to have a correct census of asbestos, the provision of infrastructures sized to adequately accommodate the waste of the more than 4.2 million tons of asbestos cement estimated to exist in Catalonia and the approval without further delay of the National Plan for the Eradication of Asbestos with its corresponding economic allocation.

LEADERHSIP4SMEs is a project funded by the European Union in the scope of the Horizon 2020 program, having the objective to support SMEs and start-ups developing disruptive technologies to enhance their IPR portfolio and exploit it to stimulate their growth. It aims to develop and validate with a community of IP experts, VCs, technology transfer experts and business development experts an approach to allow SMEs and start-ups an accurate valuation of their IP.

Aromics is one of the companies invited to the pitching session with biotech and pharma start ups will be open to investors and summit attendants in a double format, on site and on-line.  Dr. Carme Plasencia,  co-founder and CEO of Aromics will be presenting the innovative solution  for the treatment of malignant mesothelioma, developed inside Bermes Project supported by the  EU Horizon 2020 SME instrument program. The company will pitch in front of  a panel of qualified investors.

The InvestEU Portal and EuroQuity join forces and are proud to present this e-pitch - Women Entrepreneurs - to be held online on 29 September.

The InvestEU Portal is a programme of the European Commission. It is the online "marketplace" that connects EU-based start-ups from all economic sectors with investors from all over the world. It provides greater visibility and options for entrepreneurs to reach investors and finance their projects.

The EBAN Congress will welcome more than 400 Business Leaders; Early Stage Investors; Business Angels; VCs; Entrepreneurs; Accelerators; Corporates; Policy Makers Seed Funds and Startups. The event will focus on how business angel investors can support the EU on accelerating the innovation cycle and overcome the many challenges our society faces in the aftermath of the Covid-19 crisis.

The EBAN Annual Congress is widely recognized as one of Europe’s largest international private investment & entrepreneurship events. The event will take place over a three-days, including Investor Led Workshops, Keynotes, pitching sessions, round table workshops etc.

Discover the highest scoring companies from the 2020 Pitching Forums➡️ https://lnkd.in/eyx7PTu

Registration can be done through the Commission's website (noalamiant.org) or through the FAVB website (https://participa.favb.cat/assemblies/Amiant/f/1702/).

Different women from different countries came together for training on how to discover and develop new opportunities, as well as on the generation of new sources of value.

The course is aimed at those who are leading and promoting innovation in different environments and functions, thus promoting cross-learning and networking. Women senior executives and innovators from industry, healthcare providers, research centres and academic institutions had the opportunity to receive inspiring speeches, as well as face practical challenges through case discussions.

Attendees were trained to drive innovation through intrapeneurship, learned about co-creation methods, how to communicate better and more persuasively, and how to develop leadership strengthening.

WE Health works to improve women's participation in health innovation and entrepreneurship by: providing training tailored to women's needs, exposing them to new opportunities, and inspiring and supporting women to advance their professional growth.

The initiative also aims to raise awareness of the under-representation of women among entrepreneurs and to generate innovative ideas and evaluations that will foster a more balanced EIT health community.

Bermes project is focused  on its innovative anticancer therapy for treating malignant mesothelioma, a rare but very aggresive and incurable cancer related to asbestos exposure. The project received the support of the European Commission under the Horizon 2020 SME funding program. 

InvestHorizon fosters the investment readiness of Europe’s ambitious high-tech companies. The Investment Accelerator fast tracks the fund-raising efforts and investment relations for selected companies. InvestHorizon is financed and promoted by the European Commission in association with Eureka and delivered by a consortium, coordinated by Tech Tour of which BPI and EBN is a key part. The event will focus on the healthcare sector.

InvestHorizon fosters the investment readiness of Europe’s ambitious high-tech companies. The Investment Accelerator fast tracks the fund-raising efforts and investment relations for selected companies. InvestHorizon is financed and promoted by the European Commission in association with Eureka and delivered by a consortium, coordinated by Tech Tour. The event will focus on the following sectors: MedTech, Healthtech, Medical devices, Pharma and Biotech

More information here

During two years, and under the umbrella of the Department of Enterprise and Knowledge, the project 'EMPOWA' has offered training and personalized advice to 48 projects of women managers to access European aid.

Finally, there have been eight projects that have achieved European funding for an amount of between 50,000 and 2.5 million euros, according to the Ministry.

These amounts will allow them to carry out viability studies of their business plan during half a year or to promote the necessary pilot tests to launch their technology to the market.

Specifically, the companies that have accessed the EC funding are Aromics, Dindog, FollowHealth, GlyCardial Diagnostics, Peptomyc, Piplus, Sonicat Systems and Zymvol Biomodeling.

The EMPOWA project is European in scope and involves, in addition to Catalonia, other European countries and regions such as Greece, North Rhine-Westphalia, Italy, Bulgaria and Lithuania.

In Europe as a whole, a total of 16 projects led by women have obtained funding, half of which are Catalan.

Our CEO, Dr. Carme Plasencia, the pulmonologist Josep Tarrés, and the engineer Lara Trujillo have participated in this debate in which they have underlined the importance of "making the public aware of the danger it represents", for the population.

The exhibition, "La lluita contra l'amiant" (The fight against asbestos), can be seen until mid-January in the Espai Mercè Sala, in the Diagonal metro station, and is being organised after TMB has recognised that 27 active underground workers have some form of pleural affectation related to exposure to this material.

We will provide an overview of different  translational and clinical research lines in malignant mesothelioma as well as about new initiatives for the generation of novel therapies to treat this cancer. Below, the information related to the workshop:

• Respiratory diseases linked to asbestosis

Dr. Josep Morera Prat - Co-director of the Servei Respiratori Centre Mèdic Teknon

• Malignant pathology in a population exposed to asbestos. The case of Cerdanyola - Ripollet

Dr. Josep Tarrés Olivella - Coordinator of the Observatory Medical Team for the Study of Pathologies Related to Asbestos in Vallès Occidental

• Update on diagnosis and treatment of malignant pleural mesothelioma

Dr. Ernest Nadal Alforja - Cap de Secció de Tumors Toràcics i de Cap i Coll. Medical Oncology. Catalan Institute of Oncology. L'Hospitalet.

• BERMES Project: Development of a new drug for malignant mesothelioma

Dr. Carme Plasencia Castillo - Scientific Director of AROMICS

The conference will take place from 12:00 to 14:00h at the Antoni Caparrós Auditorium of the Barcelona Science Park (c/ Baldiri Reixac 4-12, Barcelona).

The 2019 SIWHT is a high-level international event aims to establish communication platforms for European and Chinese healthcare technology entrepreneurs and investors to integrate into China innovation ecosystems and market, and furthermore, to explore possibilities to set up business in China and benefit from the growth of Chinese economy.

Dr. Plasencia will be one of the companies of the Catalan Bioregion lead by BIOCAT. During the conference, AROMICS will present recent advances in its EU-funded project BERMES project, looking for attraction of partners, pharma collaborators and investment to advance the product up to clinics.

The company will have the opportunity to  meet top-tier European SMEs and introduce BERMES project results, as well as other like-minded entrepreneurs and discuss how to tackle the financing gaps for SME.

As such, BERMES is a highly innovative project to come up with solutions to a real unmet medical need: to advance on a new therapy for mesothelioma patients. Mesothelioma is a rare, aggresive and incurable cancer related to asbestos exposure. It is expected that generate return that goes beyond just economics, raising awareness of the tangible and intangible social impact of its activity (Social Return on Investment or SROI). SROI is aligned with the founding principles of the European policy framework Health 2020 and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Due to its incidence, malignant mesothelioma is considered a rare disease and therefore, the medicines developed to treat it are considered orphan drugs. One of the objectives of Aromics through its project BERMES, is to advance on the development of the candidate drug NAX035 towards an early clinical stage for this rare disease.

AROMICS has recently received the support of the European Commission to its research project BERMES, devoted to complete the preclinical package of a new compound (NAX035) for malignant mesothelioma, a rare and aggressive cancer linked to asbestos exposure. 

The company will have the opportunity to  meet top-tier European investors and introduce BERMES project results, as well as other like-minded women entrepreneurs and discuss how to tackle the financing gap for women entrepreneurs.

More info here.

http://www.bermesproject.eu

About SME Instrument at Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program

The SME Instrument is a EU funding scheme intended to support the SMEs' innovation activities.  Highly innovative SMEs with a clear commercial ambition and a potential for high growth and internationalisation are the prime target. Phase 2 of SME Instrument is focused on innovation and demonstration actions (prototyping, miniaturisation, scaling- up, design, performance verification, testing, development of pilot lines, etc.) and market replication. http://eshorizonte2020.es/

About AROMICS

Applied Research using Omic Sciences (AROMICS) is a biotechnology company founded in 2005 and located in the Barcelona Science Park.  AROMICS is a focused on the development of novel therapies therapies and diagnostic products targeting and effective management of relevant human health diseases like cancer. http://www.aromics.es