Blavatnik Biomedical Accelerator

The Blavatnik Biomedical Accelerator sits inside Harvard Office of Technology Development, the university’s technology transfer office within the Office of the Provost, and it funds early-stage biomedical research that can move toward commercial use. Harvard OTD describes the program as part of its broader mission to translate inventions into products that benefit society, and the accelerator is one of the main internal funding routes it uses for that purpose. The program is restricted to Harvard principal investigators, including faculty across the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Medical School, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Its focus areas include cell and gene therapy, infectious and inflammatory diseases, platform technologies, and medical devices. The program runs an annual request-for-proposals process and uses two tracks: Pilot Awards for shorter proof-of-concept work and Development Awards for projects that are farther along toward commercialization. Public pages do not publish a complete award matrix, so the best-supported description is the scientific scope and the internal eligibility rules. The BBA is strongest for Harvard teams that already have a credible translational hypothesis and need structured support to reduce risk before a startup or licensing path becomes realistic. Reviewers are looking for projects that can move from lab evidence to something that can be assessed commercially, rather than open-ended basic research. The fit is clearest when the work can be framed as a concrete step toward a product, a platform, or a therapeutic program with a plausible route beyond the university.

Each grant below is a distinct funding opportunity with its own eligibility, scope, and deliverables.