BioNB is the trusted bioscience authority in New Brunswick, Canada. We promote a supportive business environment for bioscience ventures through coaching, community building and advocacy.
Our Story
Responding to the growing importance of biotechnology for the development of natural resource sectors, in 1995 New Brunswick’s industry associations and provincial government resolved to take a proactive position on biotechnology in the province. The NB Biotechnology and Technological Innovation Strategy called for the establishment of the New Brunswick Biotechnology & Technological Innovation Centre of Excellence. This not for profit agency would run at arm’s length to the government with a mission to spearhead, coordinate, and synergize the provincial bioscience community’s efforts.
The NB Biotechnology Centre of Excellence acted as a coordinating body for the community’s stakeholders, working with research and industry to identify and encourage new biotechnology research initiatives, bringing a higher profile to the sector inside and outside of the province, and keeping everyone “plugged in” to what’s happening in the sector.
For obvious reasons, the Centre soon changed its name to the catchier BioAtlantech. Over the next few years, the agency assumed an administrative role for major institutional projects including The Canadian Potato Genome Project and The Potato Innovation Network. BioAtlantech acted as a shareholder and incubator for three biotech companies: Vaccinium Technologies (wild blueberry and cranberry nutraceuticals), Solanum Genomics International (potato genomics) and Sylvar Technologies, (a forestry biotechnology company that was acquired by the Swiss company Andermatt Biocontrol).
BioAtlantech continued working toward its mandate, but it became clear that current partnerships and projects weren’t aligned with the needs of the industry. The agency reached out to its network in an effort to better understand how it could drive progress in the province’s bioscience sector.
In 2012 BioAtlantech was chosen as the agency to work with governments on the delivery of the Provincial Bioscience Strategy, and so began a period of accelerated growth for both BioAtlantech and the bioscience sector as a whole. The strategy outlined specific deliverables around the promotion, development and commercialization of our province’s assets like our research capacity, intellectual property, entrepreneurial talent, and stockpile of natural resources.
In 2014, as the agency’s reach extended beyond its original mandate with a focus on business incubation, commercialization support and asset promotion, new team members breathed new life into the organization, and it became a time for a new name: BioNB.
BioNB’s mandate became focused on growing New Brunswick’s bioscience sector by providing leadership and support to increase the research, development and commercialization capacity in New Brunswick. Over the next three years, the number of bioscience start-ups in the province doubled and employment in the sector grew by 15%. During this time, home-grown companies such as LuminUltra Technologies, ADI Systems, SomaDetect, Resson Aerospace, Soricimed Biopharma, WEnTech Solutions and Chinova Bioworks raised the profile of New Brunswick’s bioscience sector considerably, through their tireless pursuit of growth in international markets.
Under Executive Director Meaghan Seagrave’s leadership (2013-2019), BioNB transformed into the trusted and high-impact industry champion that it is today. Her vision of revitalizing New Brunswick’s economy while embracing the technologies that will improve our health and address climate change attracted the attention of leaders far and wide. Through many innovative partnerships and deep dives to uncover New Brunswick’s real value proposition around its traditional forest, agriculture and marine industries, several game-changing opportunities for the province are emerging.
With this foundation, the future of BioNB is an exciting one. New Brunswick has all the building blocks for a successful bioeconomy: which is an economy that will drive the renewal of our industries, modernize primary production, protect the environment and enhance biodiversity. We have the assets needed for this development and the research expertise to make it happen. The potential to deploy clean technologies, data science and automation is massive, as is the potential to become a world leader in the ocean economy, the cannabis sector and in the valorization of forest, agriculture and marine biomass.
We look forward to supporting ventures, both new and well-established, who will join us in driving growth in the bioeconomy in the years to come.
Why BioNB?
Sector Intelligence
BioNB holds strong relationships within industry, research and government making us a crucial ally.
for all sector interactions. We are the trust authority on who’s who and what’s what in NB’s biosector.
Special Events
BioNB hosts regular events to foster sector networking and to educate companies, decision makers
and the public on current issues and emerging trends.
Information Flow
We are the information hub for all things NB bioscience and are up-to-date on international news
that will impact our region and industry as a whole. We communicate sector intelligence through
many channels, so connect with us to stay in the know. Be sure to follow @biosciencenb on Twitter,
like BioNB on Facebook and subscribe to our newsletter by visiting BioNB.org or contacting us at info@bionb.org.
Business Services
The BioNB team is well rounded with backgrounds in biology, IT, business development and marketing.
We offer a range of business services from proposal editing to collateral design and business plan
development to pitch coaching.