Growing focus on university innovation helps sleep-disorder start-up

Ceremedy is a company full of mystery. It is a spin-out from Innovation District Copenhagen-partner University of Copenhagen. In May 2023 it secured an investment of a secret sum from an undisclosed pharmaceutical company to fund development of medication against a confidential sleep disorder. The one thing the founders feel comfortable talking about is the amount of support they have gotten as their university has increased its focus on innovation. By Jes Andersen.

Potential game-changer for the sleep deprived

University of Copenhagen pharmacists Bente Frølund and Petrine Wellendorph from Department of Drug Design and Pharmacology had discovered a drug that might change sleep regulation. This could lead to a completely novel treatment principle for sleep disorders and together with neuroscientist Birgitte Rahbek Kornum from Department of Neuroscience they decided to form a company in 2018.

We formed the company to absorb seed-funding from the venture fund NOVO Seeds. The ink was barely dry on our incorporation papers when we started having talks with the company that is now our sole investor”: Birgitte Rahbek Kornum, CEO & Co-founder, Ceremedy.

A maze of rules were streamlined

At the launch of the company, Kornum started having talks with the university about getting access to its facilities. At the time it seemed that every unit had its own rules for renting out equipment and space. By the time their investor wanted this access described in a contract, this had all been standardized across the university.

We found that the University had moved tremendously over just a few years. One thing is access to equipment and space. A much more important thing is that the university has allowed all three co-founders to work part-time with the company. This was a vital value proposition to our investors”: Birgitte Rahbek Kornum, CEO & Co-founder, Ceremedy.

Co-location means colleagues and facilities

Using labs at the university has proven a tremendous advantage to the company. Ceremedy researchers spend most lunches chatting to university researchers about technical challenges and top-of-the-line facilities are all a short walk away. This includes a world-class microscopy facility, a leading facility to study the function and structure of proteins and last but not least the university’s units for experimental animals.

Department administrators had to go above and beyond the call of duty in order to provide us with access to research infrastructure. None the less they have cleared the way and made it easy for us, and we are very grateful for the help we have received from them all”: Birgitte Rahbek Kornum, CEO & Co-founder, Ceremedy.

Side-stepping incubators

Apart from labs and research infrastructure, the company also had access to several incubator and accelerator-programmes in the innovation district. These could have helped them grow the company and find funding, but as it turned out, Ceremedy did not need any of these.

It so happened that I had a close friend with deep insights into business development in life science. He became a co-founder of the company, and he has taken care of all these business development things that the rest of us were not trained for as neuro- and pharma scientists”: Birgitte Rahbek Kornum, CEO & Co-founder, Ceremedy.

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