Speed Data-ing at Milton Park 

With Milton Park playing host to a wide range of scientific innovators, Love Data Week marked the perfect opportunity for our ‘Speed Data-ing’ event, giving occupiers the chance to come together, network, celebrate their breakthroughs and discuss areas of research.

Setting the stage

The event kicked off with a welcome talk from Philip Simister, OBN’s Head of Science, who helped guide the agenda.

Senior team members from some of Milton Park’s life science occupiers taking part in the day, including Adam Stoten from Evotec and Annelise Vuidepot from Immunocore, began with brief introductions about their companies. Attendees were then invited to walk the event floor and explore the scientific research posters positioned around the room.

To encourage flow throughout the day, partnered occupiers were given two-minute speaking slots to highlight specific areas of research and the excellent work taking place at the Park. 

A hivemind of scientists in Bee House

With a flurry of inspiring talks and an opportunity to share research posters, the event was for members of the Park with some of its most innovative occupiers, showcasing their scientific posters: 

• Adaptimmune – designs and delivers cell therapies to treat cancer
• Arctoris – fully automated biomedical research platform
• aVaxziPen – developing thermally stable, needle free, solid dose vaccines
• Convatec – unlocking and delivering the promise of therapeutic Nitric Oxide wound dressings
• Evotec – life science company delivering highly effective new therapeutics to the patients
• Immunocore – Leading T cell receptor biotechnology company
• NeoVac – creating next-generation lipid nanoparticles
• Recursion – clinical stage TechBio company decoding biology to radically improve lives

Key themes and breakthroughs

We delve into some of the exciting breakthroughs and research that occupiers presented on the day:

• Arctoris introduced how it helps pharma companies make faster and more reliable decisions in drug discovery through highly automated lab experiments. The team gave an overview of their CAR-T cell therapy, designed to kill cancer more effectively and demonstrated an automated mini-brain model which better emulates a real brain’s reaction to diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.
• Innovators in vaccine delivery, aVaxziPen, introduced its thermally stable, highly immunogenic, needle-free, solid dose vaccines. Eliminating the need for cold chain storage, its approach to vaccines, combined with its reusable nature, could significantly reduce the industry’s carbon footprint and make global distribution more affordable.
• Convatec showcased its approach to wound care, ostomy care (stomas), continence care and infusion products. The talk highlighted the history of wound dressings, their limitations and the need for future dressings which actively target several healing barriers all at once.
• Global drug discovery and development partner, Evotec, explained its full-service offering, from early discovery to pre-clinical treatment. Diving into just a few examples, it described how it’s minimising failure rates in clinical trials through its DMPK/PKPD capabilities to improve early-stage monitoring, its early and late-stage CMC service in drug manufacturing and its service for producing and analysing proteins.
• Immunocore highlighted its ImmTAAI therapy for Type 1 diabetes, which protects insulin-producing cells without suppressing the entire immune system whilst activating PD-1 signalling to target T-cells. Early studies indicate success in protecting against cell destruction, with a first in-human study planned for 2026.
• Leaders in lipid nanoparticle (LNP) research, NeoVac, discussed its next-generation LNP system for more precise and safer RNA delivery. Its early trials indicate its nanoparticles are safer and can tune immune response levels depending on application. They can also deliver RNA to specific organs and degrade safely in the body, with potential application across a range of diseases and therapies.

With a final word from Philip, the event concluded with a dedicated networking slot, helping to bring together the Park’s most inspiring scientific minds.

Voices from the day

Dr Annelise Vuidepot, SVP Chief Science and Technology Officer at Immunocore, reflected on the day. She said: “At Immunocore, we strongly believe that connecting people and ideas is critical to driving innovation. This conviction motivated our collaboration with Milton Park to organise and participate in this event.”

“With so many life science organisations on the Park, this gathering provided a valuable platform for scientists to engage with neighbouring companies, fostering the awareness necessary to identify future synergies and collaborative opportunities.”

Philip Simister, OBN’s Head of Science, commented: “It was a pleasure to be a part of Milton Park’s Speed Data-ing event. There was a real buzz in the room all morning, a large turnout of scientists and business leaders, with the diverse set of posters attracting much interest and a highly attentive audience enthralled by the event’s flash-talks. The energy and atmosphere of collaboration was felt for the entire morning.”