Dinara Fayskhanova, a fourth year student of Institute of Fundamental Medicine and Biology, became one of the winners of the Commercialization Pathfinder Business Pitch Competition jointly held by the Research and Development Small Businesses Assistance Fund of Russia (FASIE) and CRDF Global.

The results were announced during The 10th Kazan Venture Fair in April. Ms. Fayskhanova's project will now be further promoted by international mentors.

The winner speaks about her work: “We created an animal drug prototype with address delivery. Dysbacteriosis is a serious problem causing many deaths among farm livestock. The appropriate drugs are very expensive and mostly produced outside of Russia. The cheap ones are inefficient. We developed a new bacterial membrane consisting of lipid-containing emulsion for Bifidobacteria. This unique membrane allows bacteria to freely pass an aggressive environment in an animal's stomach and end up where it should be – in a duodenum”.

Two years ago, when the project was in its initial stages, Dinara already won the UMNIK prize and a “50 Best Innovative Ideas” diploma – both awarded by the Republic of Tatarstan.

Commercialization is the young researcher's next goal. “I develop and promote this new technology. Three-day training organized by FASIE and CRDF was very useful for me – scientists often have no idea how to commercialize their work. Catherine Mannick, a mentor from the USA, told us about foreign venture funds and business angels. We learned something about how to move our work to the market, how to build sales, how to establish your company. We also broadened our knowledge in patent registration, recruitment, business modeling, financial planning, startups and SMM”.

Looks like Dinara Fayskhanova is bound to succeed in her endeavors. Besides the awards that were already mentioned above, she was also the winner of the young leaders competition called “Up!” and one of the finalists of the republican “Talent Pool” contest.