June 22-25 | San Diego

Start-Up Stadium

About Start-Up Stadium

Start-Up Stadium is designed to provide start-up and emerging biotechnology and life science companies — with fewer than 20 employees and that have raised less than $10 million since inception — a unique platform to engage directly with the global investment community. Read the FAQs below for more information.

This high-visibility opportunity helps startups gain valuable exposure, receive expert feedback, and connect with key stakeholders across the biotech ecosystem.

Two prizes will be awarded after BIO 2026: One Seed Stage Start-Up Prize Winner; and one Emerging Start-Up Prize Winner. Don’t miss your chance to take the field and share your innovation on a global stage.


Sponsored by:

vwr

city of phoenix

Start Up Stadium is open to all attendees. Come to Room 5B on the upper level to hear about innovations from these companies:

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  1. Start-Up Stadium 5B
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    1. Diamante is a female-led biotechnology company pioneering plant derived, immune tolerance-inducing therapies for autoimmune diseases. Its proprietary platform is designed to reset the immune system wi ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Immunology
      5B
    2. We’re developing first-in-class oral therapeutics for food allergy, based on forward genetic discoveries that identify disease-driving targets in vivo.
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Immunology
      5B
    3. Scienta is a techbio company founded in 2021 by Camille Bouget, Vincent Bouget and Julien Duquesne to boost drug development in immunology & inflammation. Its AI platform, EVA, is the first cross-spec ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Immunology
      5B
    4. Paldara Pharmaceuticals is a biotechnology company developing advanced bacteriophage-based therapeutics and synergistic drug delivery technologies. Its platform localizes and controls bacteriophage de ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Infectious Disease and Vaccines
      5B
    5. Founded in July 2020, Vacino Biotech is committed to the development of novel nucleic acid drugs and universal vaccines. With the self-developed next-generation vaccine design SED technology, we have ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    6. Mangrove Therapeutics is developing first-in-class therapies targeting a novel RNA-mediated master regulator of inflammation, addressing a key gap in polygenic disease biology. While over 95% of patie ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Inflammation
      5B

     
  2. Start-Up Stadium 5B
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    1. Chiromesh Therapeutics is a biotechnology company developing innovative solutions for localized, sustained drug delivery in solid tumors. The company’s lead platform, μMESH, is a conformable, micro-st ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    2. Palo Alto Immunotherapeutics (PAI) is developing advanced immunotherapies for the treatment of cancer. Cancer vaccines have centered around identifying mutant proteins as the target with little regard ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    3. Odycell is transforming cancer treatment by combining cell therapy with nanotechnology to overcome the limitations of current CAR-T approaches, particularly in solid tumors. While CAR-T therapies have ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    4. Montani Bio is a WV-based vaccines and therapeutics company focused on the expansion of the mRNA platform into new areas of disease. The company spun out of the Vaccine Development Center at West Virg ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    5. Sift is a preclinical-stage biotechnology company using AI and high-throughput T-cell screening to develop peptide immunotherapies for cancer and autoimmune disease. Founded in 2024 as a UC Berkeley s ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    6. TippingPoint Biosciences is building the first scalable platform to model disease-specific epigenetic states and systematically discover small molecules that selectively kill cells driven by inappropr ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    7. Ypsilon Therapeutics is expanding the reach of antibody therapeutics. Ypsilon is advancing a new class of cancer therapies with TCR mimics (TCRm), designed to address unmet needs in solid tumors. TCRm ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    8. Apmonia Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing first-in-class peptide therapeutics targeting extracellular matrix signaling and the tumor microenvironment. Our lead program, ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    9. CNCure Co., Ltd. is a South Korea–based biotechnology company headquartered in Hwasun-gun, Jeonnam, focusing on cancer theranostics that combine therapy and diagnostics for precision medicine. The com ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B

     
  3. Start-Up Stadium 5B
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    1. Viska Bio is developing targeted extracellular oxidative therapies to convert “cold” tumors into “hot” tumors and enhance immunotherapy. Its proprietary nanobody–enzyme fusion platform combines a VHH ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    2. Voro Therapeutics is a privately held biotechnology company based in San Diego, spun out of Alloy Therapeutics’ 82VS Venture Studio. The company’s PrimeBody platform is a best-in-class conditionally-a ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    3. Deck Bio is an emerging biotechnology company focused on expanding the number of patients who can benefit from T cell engagers by overcoming fundamental market access barriers that limit this modality ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Oncology
      5B
    4. Celliaz Co., Ltd. is a biotechnology company founded in 2022 at KAIST, South Korea, dedicated to developing innovative therapies to restore vision in patients with degenerative retinal diseases. Celli ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Ophthalmology
      5B
    5. Infixion Bioscience is developing first in class, FDA bound treatments for Neurofibromatosis Type 1 (NF1), a genetic disease affecting 125,000 people in the U.S. and 2.5M worldwide. Founded by NF1 par ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Orphan and Rare Disease
      5B
    6. AddGraft has reimagined autologous cell therapy by transforming engineered skin cells into living biofactories for durable protein production, enabling local or systemic activity across a variety of i ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Regenerative Medicine
      5B
    7. Sarcomatrix is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company dedicated to redefining the treatment of muscle-wasting diseases through the power of regenerative medicine. Our mission is to develop first-i ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Regenerative Medicine
      5B
    8. Wink Biotherapeutics is developing novel, RNA-based therapeutics that allow for a functional cure for diabetes. We are the only company in the world that allows for targeted pancreatic beta cell regen ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Regenerative Medicine
      5B
    9. PAX Therapeutics, having completed IND-enabling studies, is on the cusp of clinical trials to demonstrate optimized tendon healing by the delivery of our growth factor vector which in preclinical stud ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Regenerative Medicine
      5B

     
  4. Start-Up Stadium 5B
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    1. BioCurie is a TechBio startup pioneering mechanistic artificial intelligence (mAI) to transform the development and manufacturing of cell, gene, and RNA therapies (CGT). Our patented BioCurie™ mAI sof ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Cell and Gene Therapy and Genome Editing
      5B
    2. Coastar Therapeutics is a venture-backed biotech firm headquartered in San Diego, CA, dedicated to advancing next-generation gene delivery technology. The company has developed a novel eLNP technology ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Cell and Gene Therapy and Genome Editing
      5B
    3. 153 Therapeutics is a UCSF spinout developing a novel small-molecule therapy for Parkinson’s Disease. The approach targets Nurr1, a nuclear receptor that plays a central role in restoring dopamine pro ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B
    4. BrainStorm Therapeutics is a precision neuroscience company developing disease-modifying therapies for rare and neurodegenerative brain disorders. We integrate patient-derived brain organoids with AI ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B
    5. MagNETIC is a Stanford University neurosurgery spinout developing a novel IV Magnesium Threonate formulation for neuroprotection across surgery, stroke, and antenatal settings - a $3.4B+ combined mark ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B
    6. AivoCode is an emerging biotech startup pioneering the development of innovative and broad platform technologies to improve the treatment and management of neurological diseases by developing assets t ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B
    7. Editpep is a preclinical therapeutics company spun out of UC Berkeley Innovative Genomics Institute developing a next-generation non-viral delivery platform for in vivo CRISPR medicines. Its proprieta ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B
    8. Sculpta, Inc. is a San Francisco based startup founded by physician scientist and former Stanford faculty member Neal Amin. Sculpta is pioneering Protein Sculpting therapeutics, splice-switching antis ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B
    9. Zena Therapeutics is developing safer alternatives to benzodiazepines by leveraging a novel GABA-A receptor binding site. Our partial positive allosteric modulators (PAMs) deliver anxiolytic and anti- ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Brain Health
      5B

     
  5. Start-Up Stadium 5B
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    1. At O11 biomedical, we will improve the lives of millions of patients suffering from the progressive lung disease COPD: We allow breathing via the gut! Our first in-class oral drug, RESPILIQ, binds CO2 ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Respiratory
      5B
    2. Ebenbuild is a deep-tech healthcare company developing physics-based, patient-specific digital twins of the human lung. The company’s platform transforms standard CT data into validated digital lung m ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Respiratory
      5B
    3. Automated microbial evolution
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    4. Airobes is a carbon-to-value biotechnology company that developed a two-organism process that utilizes carbon dioxide as the carbon feedstock for bacterial fermentation. Through this process, Airobes ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    5. Silver Spur Therapeutics is a preclinical-stage therapeutics company spun out from the Chung Lab at the University of Southern California, focused on developing renal-targeted RNA therapies for Autoso ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    6. Crafton Biotechnology is a privately held mRNA therapeutics company developing next-generation vaccines and treatments powered by its proprietary PureCap® and CRAFT™ platforms. PureCap® enables GMP pr ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    7. Nephrogen is a biotech spin-out from Stanford University developing curative genomic medicines for kidney and pancreatic diseases.
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    8. Aleutian Therapeutics is a pre-clinical stage company developing universal stem cells to enable scalable production of a variety of cell therapies. Our proprietary technology aims to restore cellular ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B
    9. Sandia Biotech, Inc. is a biotechnology company located in Albuquerque, New Mexico that provides unique, proprietary antibody and protein-based fluorescent reagents to biomedical research scientists w ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Platform for Therapeutics
      5B

     
  6. Start-Up Stadium 5B
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    1. Cerebral Ischemia or low cerebral blood flow (CBF) and microvascular shunts (MVS) is the final common pathway of brain injury in a broad spectrum of disorders such as stroke, cerebral small vessel dis ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Cardiovascular
      5B
    2. StrandID is building a universal genome detection platform designed to integrate into point-of-care diagnostic kits. Our technology uses computationally designed DNA probes that bind cooperatively acr ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Diagnostics and Personalized Medicine
      5B
    3. We are a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company developing a new pain medication as powerful as opioids but without the risk of dependence.
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Pain Management
      5B
    4. Ursa Science builds a portable, bench-scale modular wet lab platform with an AI agent layer that adopts commercial off-the-shelf lab instruments as native modules within a unified, AI-orchestrated sys ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Tools/Drug Development Support Tech
      5B
    5. Weka Biosciences is a Santa Fe, NM-based enzyme innovation company developing novel polysaccharide polymers with applications spanning chromatography and therapeutics. Our platform produces a non-sulf ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Tools/Drug Development Support Tech
      5B
    6. Sostos has developed a unique software technology that can identify personalized cancer treatment solutions for patients. Our Artificial Intelligence (AI) system is called CATOS - Cancer Treatment Opt ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Tools/Drug Development Support Tech
      5B
    7. Bullseye has built a fully automated engine to create medicines that unlock targets and diseases the biopharma industry has written off as impossible and “undruggable.” By harnessing biology’s most pr ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Tools/Drug Development Support Tech
      5B
    8. Lyric Bio is expanding biomanufacturing to human donor-derived biologics. Using proprietary tissue-engineering technology and a laser-printed cellular substrate, the company is developing high-density ...
      Start-Up Stadium Session
      • Tools/Drug Development Support Tech
      5B

     

Investment Resources

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Need Advice on Your Pitch Deck?

Download our pitch presentation guide for additional insight and advice on building a stellar submission.

DOWNLOAD
 

Congratulations to our 2025 Seed-Stage and Emerging Winners

 

2025 SEED-STAGE START-UP WINNER

riboway therapeutics

Riboway Therapeutics

Learn More

2025 EMERGING START-UP WINNER

tezcat

Tezcat Biosciences

Learn more

BIO has announced both winning companies together publicly via in Bio.News.

The Seed-Stage winner received:

  • Fast-track admission in the Fall 2025 or Spring 2026 cohort of The Innovation Space’s Science Inc. virtual accelerator program and/or spotlight position in The Innovation Space’s monthly Spark Factory virtual event.  Moreover, company will also be considered for up to a $240k First Fund investment (residency in The Innovation Space required for First Fund investments).

The Seed-Stage winner and the Emerging Start-Up winner each received:

  • A complimentary one-year membership for the Biotechnology Innovation Organization, including access to benefits from BIO Business Solutions®, the largest cost-savings purchasing program for the life sciences industry.
  • One complimentary registration including BIO Partnering™ access to attend the 2026 BIO International Convention, June 22-25, in San Diego, California

 

Frequently Asked Questions
 

What are the eligibility requirements to apply for Start-Up Stadium?

Eligible Start-Up Stadium applicants must have:

  • Raised less than $10M since inception
  • Previous business pitch or competition experience
  • Fewer than 20 full-time employees
  • Not previously been named a BIO Start-Up Stadium winner

What is the application process and submission deadline for Start-Up Stadium?

Submit a Start-Up Stadium application as well as upload your company logo and PowerPoint pitch presentation deck by the submission deadline, Monday, February 16, 2026, 11:59 p.m. (Eastern Time).

What is the maximum number of pages allowed in the pitch presentation deck?

PowerPoint pitch deck should include no more than 20 slides. Applications with a pitch deck exceeding 20 slides will not advance to the initial review stage.

Is there any cost to apply for Start-Up Stadium?

There is no cost to apply for Start-Up Stadium. Please note that applying for Start-Up Stadium does not guarantee participation in the event. BIO will notify all Start-Up Stadium submitters of the status of their application in late-March/early-April 2026.

If selected to be a Start-Up Stadium finalist, do I need to register for BIO International Convention to give a pitch presentation?

If selected, finalists receive a highly discounted Premier Access registration rate to attend and present in front of our esteemed panel of judges in San Diego.

How many Start-Up Stadium finalists are typically chosen?

Approximately 40 finalists will be chosen to pitch their presentations before a panel of Start-Up Stadium judges.

How many prize winners are typically chosen each year?

Two prize winners are chosen from two categories: a Seed-Stage Company winner (companies with less than $1M raised); and an Emerging Company winner (companies with more than $1M but less than $10M raised).

What do prize winners receive?

  • A complimentary one-year membership for the Biotechnology Innovation Organization, including access to benefits from BIO Business Solutions®, the largest cost-savings purchasing program for the life sciences industry and discounted registration to other BIO events.
  • One complimentary Premier Access registration (includes BIO Partnering™) for the 2027 BIO International Convention.

When will BIO announce the Start-Up Stadium prize winners?

BIO will announce Start-Up Stadium prize winners, post-convention.

Who can I contact for more information?

Please email program@bio.org if you have any additional questions about applying for the 2026 BIO Start-Up Stadium.

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