Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy Named to Top 10 List of Most Innovative Companies in Biotech by Fast Company

Less than a year after its founding, the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy has earned a place on Fast Company’s list of Top 10 Most Innovative Companies in Biotech for 2017.

Honorees on this year’s overall list of 50 Most Innovative Companies include Amazon, Google and Spotify.

“We are honored to be recognized so early on in our history. But we also recognize there is much more work to do to put an end to cancer, and are thankful to have an amazing group of collaborative partners working with us to get us closer to that goal,” said Parker Institute CEO and President Jeffrey Bluestone, PhD.

The Parker Institute launched in April 2016 with a gift from Silicon Valley entrepreneur Sean Parker, who founded Napster and served as the first president of Facebook.

With a vow to “hack cancer,” the Parker Institute has already begun upending the way cancer research is funded and conducted through its innovative new model. The institute’s core consists of the nation’s leading cancer centers: Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Stanford Medicine, the University of California, Los Angeles, the University of California, San Francisco, the University of Pennsylvania and The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies issue (March 2017) is now available online at www.fastcompany.com/MIC and on newsstands beginning Feb. 21.

About the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy

The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy brings together the best scientists, clinicians, and industry partners to build a smarter and more coordinated cancer immunotherapy research effort.

The Parker Institute is an unprecedented collaboration between the country’s leading immunologists and cancer centers: Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Stanford Medicine, the University of California, Los Angeles, the University of California, San Francisco, the University of Pennsylvania and The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. The Parker Institute was created through a $250 million grant from The Parker Foundation.

The Parker Institute’s goal is to accelerate the development of breakthrough immune therapies capable of turning cancer into a curable disease by ensuring the coordination and collaboration of the field’s top researchers, and quickly turning their findings into patient treatments. The Parker Institute network brings together six centers, more than 40 industry and nonprofit partners, more than 63 labs and more than 300 of the nation’s top researchers focused on treating the deadliest cancers.