Our Model
No brakes. Only breakthroughs
People with cancer have no time to waste, and neither do we. That’s why Parker Institute’s end-to-end approach removes barriers, bridges gaps, and actively drives ideas forward.
We turn a stop-and-start process into a full-speed-ahead pipeline from lab to patient — so breakthroughs don’t get stuck, and more of them actually save lives, sooner.
Here’s how.
Our model
Ten years ago, we decided the promise of cancer immunotherapy couldn’t wait. We set out to rewire the way cancer research is done. Today, we think of ourselves as the connective tissue between academia and industry — here to ensure no promising science slips through the cracks.
We built an all-in ecosystem that functions fluidly across three key phases of drug development: discovery, IP development, and commercialization.
An Unparalleled Network
Parker Institute partners with top academic centers to support leading-edge research, including the long-shot ideas most funders steer clear of.
We define the scientific frontiers with the most potential to reach patients, and create the conditions for researchers to explore them freely and collaboratively. This results in a meaningful body of new research each year — with each finding bringing us closer to a future free from cancer.
1,000 researchers across 19 institutions
Promise into progress
Parker Institute's intellectual property experts help bridge the gap between lab and commercialization — so more discoveries have a chance to make a difference in the lives of more patients, more quickly.
As stewards of all intellectual property generated across our network, our team maintains a bird’s-eye view of the most exciting emerging science to develop and license to biotech and pharmaceutical partners.
We have supported the licensing and optioning of over 150 inventions
Investing in the best
We actively assist in building companies that keep promising science moving forward: recruiting leadership, leading early funding rounds, and bringing the right investors to the table. Most of the time, these companies are using innovations developed by Parker Institute investigators.
Any revenue from the success of these enterprises are ultimately recycled back into Parker Institute, and the research we fund.
17 total investments in a range of biotech companies
We built an all-in ecosystem that functions fluidly across three key phases of drug development: discovery, IP development, and commercialization.
Vital connections
It takes a village to turn lab discoveries into life-saving patient treatments — so that’s what we’ve built. Across academia and industry, our partners join forces to move promising science forward.
We built an all-in ecosystem that functions fluidly across three key phases of drug development: discovery, IP development, and commercialization.
1,000 researchers across 19 institutions
We have supported the licensing and optioning of over 150 inventions
17 total investments in a range of biotech companies
We built an all-in ecosystem that functions fluidly across three key phases of drug development: discovery, IP development, and commercialization.
Our recent portfolio build, Dispatch Bio, emerged from Penn, Stanford, UCSF, and Parker Institute itself.
Discoveries from each research team contributed to a set of complementary intellectual property, which we realized would benefit from becoming a spin-off company to expedite clinical trials.
In 2025, Dispatch raised $261M in Series A financing, led by Parker Institute and ARCH Ventures.
A Phase 1 study launched in 2026, in collaboration with CARsgen.
Dispatch is just one example of how the Parker Institute model works, with an engine built to optimize collaboration, innovation, and commercialization. Clinical trials using Parker Institute-funded innovations reached over 700 patients in 2025.
Parker Institute, together with its network of partners – from academic institutions to industry to funders – creates an ecosystem designed to achieve extraordinary impact.
Our entire model is built around one imperative: developing game-changing immunotherapy treatments, and getting them to patients who need them without unnecessary delay. Every discovery brings us closer to a future where more cancers can be prevented, controlled, and ultimately cured.