For more than 100 years, Fox Chase Cancer Center has led groundbreaking discoveries that deliver better cancer care in the local community and around the world. Those discoveries, before they are born in the laboratory and taken to the patient bedside, often begin with industry partnerships that make the research and development of new therapies possible.
At Fox Chase, those partnerships are led by Dr. Sangeeta Bardhan Cook, Chief Innovation Officer. With more than 20 years’ experience in translational science and medicine, Dr. Bardhan Cook leverages her expertise in commercialization strategy, business development, tech transfer and intellectual property law to oversee collaborations with technology and pharmaceutical companies, which are critical to the development of novel cancer treatments.
Through the shared goal to uncover the most innovative treatment options and make them accessible to more people, Dr. Bardhan Cook’s work is integral to Fox Chase's commitment to the industry and giving cancer patients a better chance at survival – and someday, maybe even finding a cure.
From an early age, Dr. Bardhan Cook prepared for a life in science and academia. She earned a degree in biology from the California Institute of Technology, then a doctorate in molecular biology from the University of Southern California. As a research and teaching assistant at USC and Caltech, she directed and supervised research in a premier cancer and aging lab and an evolutionary biology lab under multiple funded fellowships.
When it came time to shift away from academia, Dr. Bardhan Cook wanted to stay close to what she had spent so much of her life and passion training to do. She joined an intellectual property boutique firm and became a registered patent agent before earning MBAs from Columbia Business School and London Business School.
After nine fruitful years at NCI-designated City of Hope in California, eventually becoming Executive Director of Business Innovation, she arrived at Fox Chase in 2022. Her role here also includes serving as Senior Vice President of Commercialization Strategy and Business Development for Temple Health.
“We talk about accelerating discovery to delivery – I'm working to ensure we are building the infrastructure that enables that,” Dr. Bardhan Cook says. "We have many people at Fox Chase who discover a new target at the bench that could possibly alleviate some of the pain and suffering that cancer patients go through. There are a lot of steps that go from that target to what eventually ends up as a treatment for the patient."
A perfect example: the work of Dr. Margie Clapper, Samuel M.V. Hamilton Chair in Cancer Prevention at Fox Chase and a longtime faculty member. As principal investigator for the Cancer Prevention-Interception Targeted Agent Discovery Program (CAP-IT), which aims to develop better agents for intercepting cancer early and reducing cancer risk, Dr. Clapper credits Dr. Bardhan Cook and her team for their role in accelerating the pace of important discoveries under this NCI-funded research initiative.
“Our goal is to take a very promising agent, identified at Fox Chase, from the lab to the clinic as quickly as possible,” Dr. Clapper says. “That can only be done in collaboration with Dr. Bardhan Cook’s team, which has in-depth knowledge of the commercialization process and can match our needs with the expertise of external partners to facilitate this research.”
Dr. Bardhan Cook’s successes in research and development (R&D) commercialization are defined by one central theme: de-risking early-stage technologies through the clinic to differentiate in the market and connect patients to therapies faster. She has been instrumental in the structuring, negotiation and execution of hundreds of bespoke deals for oncology, diabetes and immunology disruptive technologies across several stages of drug development — from discovery to pre-clinical testing to phase 1 and 2 trials.
With the City of Hope senior leadership team, Dr. Bardhan Cook spearheaded corporate development efforts of in-house technologies, with multiple technologies licensed through multimillion-dollar initiatives to enable first-patient dosing in clinical trials. She also served many patients through her expertise in cGMP manufacturing business development strategy, specifically in cell and gene therapy.
Most notably, she managed and supported the business and R&D efforts to bring to approval Breyanzi — the first regenerative medicine therapy with RMAT (regenerative medicine advanced therapy) designation to be licensed by the FDA. In addition, she cultivated and nurtured long-term relationships with early-stage to mid-size licensees – yielding multiple licenses, eight initial public offerings, eight highly capitalized Series B funded companies, and multiple acquisitions.
“Sometimes I’m working with scientists directly on the best strategy to take them to that next level, and that’s where I rely on my PhD training,” Dr. Bardhan Cook says. “But it’s also more transformational moves like making patient access a key initiative. That’s incredibly important to Fox Chase and the entire health system.”
Perhaps the most significant partnership Dr. Bardhan Cook has developed at Fox Chase so far is with Nucleus RadioPharma, specialists in the development and distribution of theranostic radiopharmaceuticals – targeted therapies that deliver radiation directly to cancer cells.
The company’s technology platform, designed to advance new therapies from clinical trials to commercialization, is considered at the forefront of radiopharmaceutical research. The partnership and investment with Fox Chase are structured to fuel ongoing trials, currently numbering in the hundreds, and make these targeted therapies more widely available.
The Fox Chase Cancer Center Director’s Innovation Fund, which incentivizes translational research and science, supports this initiative along with investments from the Mayo Clinic and several other organizations. Together, they will accelerate Nucleus RadioPharma’s work in research, manufacturing and supply chain efficiencies – including the development of two regional factory hubs, one of which will be constructed in the Philadelphia area, to supplement the primary facility near the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota.
"What really is tremendous is that it's going to be a center to produce drugs not just for the people at Fox Chase, not even just for the people in the greater Philadelphia area, but be able to supply novel drugs and therapeutics to people all over the East Coast of the United States,” Dr. Bardhan Cook says. “I was very excited to be able to have Fox Chase be part of that, to be a leader in it and to be part of this nexus point. This is a great example of how we take the inventions and turn them into actual innovations for the benefit of the patient."
Radiopharmaceuticals offer a highly targeted approach to various cancer types and stages, including the most prevalent forms like breast, lung and colorectal. As a highly effective treatment for solid tumors, which constitute about 90 percent of all cancer cases, they also maintain a superior safety profile. But only a small fraction of patients has access to these drugs because of limited production capacity and an outdated, fragmented supply chain.
Nucleus RadioPharma works to ensure that cancer patients can access these potentially lifesaving therapies by developing technologies to modernize their clinical development, manufacturing and supply chain. With more than 2 million new cancer diagnoses expected by the end of 2024, the potential impact is far-reaching.
Another recently announced partnership for Fox Chase involves Segmed, Inc., which provides real-world imaging data to support AI development and further clinical research. As Segmed expands its footprint in the healthcare AI space, it will bring medical imaging to the biopharmaceutical and life science world, along with technology allowing clients to access, de-identify, standardize and build cohorts of medical imaging data within their own environment.
In addition, PGDx, now part of LabCorp, and Fox Chase are finalizing a precision oncology strategic alliance to investigate if cutting-edge liquid biopsy molecular tools can better ensure that the right therapies are going to patients at the right time; as well as a working relationship with ConcertAI, to accelerate insights and improve patient outcomes through leading real-world data, AI technologies and scientific expertise in partnership with the leading biomedical innovators, healthcare providers and medical societies.
Dr. Clapper, who also is Co-Leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at Fox Chase, has dedicated her life’s work to driving innovations in cancer prevention. In 1991, she created one of the first basic research programs nationally to focus on developing strategies to reduce cancer risk among high-risk individuals and promote early detection and prevention – an idea not widely accepted at the time. The program has since grown and broadened its focus to include both prevention and early interception research on colorectal cancer and non-small cell lung cancer in never-smokers, with a strong pursuit of translational opportunities.
Currently, with Dr. Clapper as principal investigator, Fox Chase is one of two founding members of the NCI CAP-IT Program, with the goal of discovering molecularly or immunologically targeted agents designed to prevent or intercept cancer growth in higher-risk populations. Although Dr. Clapper says they started at “Ground Zero,” the commercial partnerships secured by Dr. Bardhan Cook’s office have accelerated the pace of the program and better positioned them to make the clinical impact they’re hoping for.
"My team and I have been able to make significant progress with the CAP-IT projects in just a short time, not only with support from the NCI but also with Dr. Bardhan Cook’s help," Dr. Clapper says. "It’s key to have her and her team listening and identifying areas where we can benefit from the specialized expertise of an external partner. They provide opportunities on the commercial side that complement our unique strengths at Fox Chase – partners like pharma or other academic laboratories who may have novel resources themselves."
Dr. Clapper says their partnerships have set Fox Chase up for a comprehensive drug development pipeline, which she cites as an ongoing challenge during her 30-plus years there. Now, she views this opportunity as a highlight of her career as a basic scientist.
"Not only can we do this in a very nimble way, but we can grow it from the ground up and then take it into the clinic," she says. "If there are points in this process where we are not well set up at Fox Chase to do a particular task, the commercialization group comes in and assists us with identifying the right partners to keep the science moving forward. The commercialization aspect, while it has other goals in mind, is really accelerating this process of taking our discoveries from the bench to the bedside."
Fox Chase is home to some of the nation’s top cancer specialists, with robust research programs and cutting-edge clinical trials that are not easily accessible elsewhere. As industry partnerships provide the necessary foundation to make many scientific and clinical advancements, cancer patients in the Philadelphia region and beyond are benefiting from the innovative approaches to research, care and treatment.
With expertise in strategic planning and a high-level view of how partnerships expand access to care, Dr. Bardhan Cook plays a role that goes far beyond simple business development. She builds and nurtures relationships that serve to advance science and bring forth new therapies, for the opportunity to give cancer patients a better chance at a longer life.
"Fox Chase is an amazing concentration of intellectual capital. We are in a great position because we’re at the right size and we’re at the right intellectual sharpness," Dr. Bardhan Cook says. “This is where you can really drive impact, and that's why we’re so focused on enabling infrastructures. It’s not something that's just Fox Chase. It's something that may start with Fox Chase but impacts so many people beyond us.”
That is a key benefit of Fox Chase’s elite standing as an NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center as well. As Dr. Clapper and the many other extraordinarily talented scientists at Fox Chase make fundamentally important discoveries in the lab, they drive better clinical outcomes and make a world of difference for patients in greater Philadelphia and all other communities they serve.
"What's kept me at Fox Chase for many years is the strong connection between the research and the clinic. It’s been very easy with the help of clinical colleagues to take something from the bench to the bedside," Dr. Clapper says. "And the partners who support our work have the same goal as we do – to take our discoveries as quickly as possible from the laboratory to the patients who will benefit the most from our accomplishments."
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