LifeScience Alley

Travelers Express Tower
Suite 725
1550 Utica Ave. S.
St. Louis Park, MN 55416-5307
Phone: (952) 542-3077
FAX: (952) 542-3088
E-mail: info@sciencealley.org

LifeScience Alley Homepage

Biomedical/Biosciences Field

Trade association

Business

Services

Short Overview

LifeScience Alley is a non-profit 501(c)(6) trade association comprised of over 550 member organizations from across the bioscience and health care industries including medical device manufacturers, bioscience and pharmaceutical companies, hospitals and clinics, health plans, insurers, education, government and research, and providers of health care products and services.

LifeScience Alley provides education and training for health care professionals hosting over 80 seminars and 2-3 major conferences per year. It also leads health care legislative initiatives that represent the broad cross-section of LifeScience Alley members. The Association assembles leaders from across the industry via its Alley Institute 501(c)(3) organization to work together in developing consensus approaches to solving health care industry problems and tackle large projects that may be grant-funded.

LifeScience Alley also helps small and emerging companies access capital and expertise via Alley Ventures LLC, a for-profit organization, and provides networking opportunities to facilitate introduction of potential business partners.

Background

LifeScience Alley, founded as Medical Alley in 1984, is a 501(c)(6) nonprofit trade association to support Minnesota's health care industry. The Association's goals were to focus on legislative issues, provide members with educational opportunities, and promote interest and investment in Minnesota as a major center of health care achievement, research and innovation. These goals remain largely the same today, while the reach of the Association has grown and expanded beyond the Minnesota border.

Diverse Membership

LifeScience Alley comprises a broad range of well over 500 member organizations that employ approximately 250,000 people in the state of Minnesota and thousands more throughout the U.S. and world. LifeScience Alley is truly a unique organization as its members include medical device and equipment manufacturers, medical technology, bioscience and pharmaceutical organizations, health plans, insurers, hospitals and clinics, education, research and government/trade organizations, and a large variety of health care service and consulting companies. While the majority of members are located in Minnesota, membership continues to grow beyond the Minnesota and United States borders.

Convener Role & Alley Institute

LifeScience Alley is uniquely positioned to bring the diverse elements of the health care industry together to discuss and develop creative, proactive, problem-solving approaches to key challenges and opportunities facing the industry. The association's convener initiatives provide a collaborative forum for LifeScience Alley members to achieve a consensus approach to particular issues and problems.

In order to expand its collaborative convener role and participate in grants from local and national foundations for large projects,LifeScience Alley added a 501(c)(3) nonprofit entity to its structure in 2002. The Alley Institute provides a more action-oriented way of addressing issues and challenges that face the health care industry.

Education and Training

LifeScience Alley continues to provide top-quality education and training for health care professionals and hosts approximately 80 seminars and 3 major conferences per year. Speakers and panelists are drawn from local, national, and international organizations, most of which are LifeScience Alley members. The Association's educational seminars focus on issues related to Clinical Studies, Reimbursement, Regulatory Affairs, Research & Development, Marketing Communications and Human Resources.

Resource Access & Networking

LifeScience Alley helps small and emerging companies access capital and expertise via its Annual Medtech Investing Conference. In March 2003, it began the process of developing an early stage venture fund (via Alley Ventures LLC) to focus on seed and early stage capital funding for medical device, bioscience, and other life sciences and health care-related companies. The Association also provides high quality networking opportunities for the broad range of members at its educational seminars, conferences and Networking Events.

Government Relations

LifeScience Alley is actively involved in helping shape health care public policy on both a state and federal level. The Association retains two legislative consultants that work with members and government leaders to affect positive changes for the health care delivery system.