When it comes to finding cures for rare diseases and addressing emerging viral infections — like COVID-19 — the traditional pharmaceutical business model just doesn’t cut it. Solutions require global collaboration and open-access research, and that means a new research innovation ecosystem — exactly what the Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) is building.

For several start-ups that are resident at JLABS @ Toronto, not even COVID-19 has paused their plans to recruit talent and scale up; they counted on Mitacs’s programs to help set their businesses up for potential success.

When the COVID-19 pandemic was announced and the Government of Canada called upon researchers and businesses to develop solutions, Ramtin Rasoulinezhad answered.