Cambridge startup wins UMass Chan, UMass Lowell seed funding contest

Nate Hafer, who leads the M2D2 incubator at UMass Chan, stands in front of a window overlooking the UMass Chan Medical School Campus.

Photo/Matt Wright Nate Hafer leads the M2D2 incubator at UMass Chan and sees Cambridge still has a magical pull over some biotech companies and investors, but Central Mass. is trying to change that to make the feeling extend further westward.

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By Isabel Tehan

Spheric Bio, a Cambridge company developing a 3D heart implant to help prevent strokes, was awarded $50,000 for winning the M2D2 (Massachusetts Medical Device Development Center & Biotech Incubator) Challenge, a partnership between UMass Chan Medical School and UMass Lowell.

M2D2 supports startups in the medical device and biotech industries to bring their ideas from proof-of-concept to commercialization. It was launched in 2007 to grow and support the medtech ecosystem, and is part of the push to move the biotech industry ecosystem beyond the boundaries of Cambridge and Boston. The annual $200K Challenge hosted by the center aims to offer a health care forecast by selecting companies on the cutting edge of research and development, according to a Wednesday announcement from UMass Lowell.

“Medical-device and biotech startups assisted by M2D2 benefit from the partnership between UMass Chan Medical School and UMass Lowell, through the co-location of labs in Worcester and Lowell and our world-class faculty and researchers who share their expertise to advance companies’ innovations,” said M2D2 co-director Nathaniel Hafer, director of operations in the UMass Center for Clinical and Translational Science at UMass Chan in the announcement. Hafer is also an assistant professor of molecular medicine at the university.

Spheric Bio was awarded $50,000 in seed funding for winning the top spot. The funding comes from Massachusetts Life Sciences Center (MLSC), the event’s top and founding sponsor.

RevBio, Inc., a startup based at M2D2 in Lowell won second place and will receive $25,000 in seed funding. Awarded third place was Mediscen, a medication-by-patch venture based in Madrid, Spain.