This week’s episode of “WisBusiness: The Podcast” is with Jon Young, head of WARF Therapeutics, a relatively new effort at the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.
“The UW-Madison campus has always had a strong focus on biological and clinical translational sciences,” Young said.
He noted two of the most lucrative products in the WARF portfolio are Warfarin and Zemplar. He says these “life-changing” drugs have impacted the lives of thousands of patients, and generated millions of dollars in royalties.
Those funds were then used to catalyze new research on campus and improve infrastructure at the university.
In his new role, Young says he wants to establish drug-discovery processes with internal and external partners.
“The overall goal is to build a portfolio of drugs that will meet the high-quality standards that industry is expecting against diseases with unmet medical needs,” he said. “The boundary between academia and the pharmaceutical industry is becoming more permeable as the two converge on common goals for the improvement of human health.”
Looking ahead, he sees some big opportunities in the fields of neurodegeneration and cancer treatment.
