Blog: From molecule to medicine

At Cyclica, we believe in giving back to the community and providing educational opportunities for the next generation. That’s why, since 2014, Cyclica has provided University of Waterloo (UofW) students the opportunity to gain valuable work experience through a collaboration with the UofW’s’ co-op program. Over the years, Cyclica has had co-ops on almost every team, including Data and Web Platforms, Machine Learning, Digital Chemistry, Drug Discovery, and Strategic Partnerships, with work opportunities including full stack software developer and computational scientist. In this Employee Spotlight, we highlight two of Cyclica’s co-op students: Shirley Lin and James Stapleton! Shirley Lin Hey everyone! I’m Shirley Lin, a co-op student who works on the Digital Chemistry team at Cyclica. I’m currently in my second year at the University of Waterloo studying Biomedical Engineering. During my free time, I enjoy photography especially on nature and sky related topics so you can often find me traveling around and exploring with my equipment. I also love designing and mixing cocktails, as well as working on handcrafting projects such as making leather bags and silver rings. Describe your role while you worked at Cyclica. My time at Cyclica has been fantastic – I have had an amazing experience learning about drug discovery. I appreciate the collaborative environment established here where I have the opportunities to join sessions such as the science and dev meeting to explore various projects. I also found chatting with colleagues who work at different teams with varying expertise very helpful to gain insights on both the technical aspect of the work as well as potential career paths. What did you like most about your experience and working in a startup environment? Any specific lessons or learnings you would like to share? One of the most important lessons I've learned during my time here is to never hesitate to reach out if there’s curiosities in something someone else is familiar with – everyone has been incredibly kind and supportive. After working at Cyclica, have your career plans changed? What are your future career goals? While I am excited to explore other areas of healthcare technologies, after having a four month work term here, I believe pursuing the drug discovery career path is an excellent option for my future. I am grateful to everyone at Cyclica for their support, which has made my time here truly memorable. Thank you all! James Stapleton Hi! I’m James, and I’m currently in my 4th year at the University of Waterloo studying biology and biochemistry. Before Cyclica, I worked at Roche in pharmaceutical external quality, as well as at the University of Waterloo doing structural biology research. In my spare time, I enjoy working out, watching movies, hiking, and playing ultimate frisbee! Describe your role while you worked at Cyclica. As a business development co-op, I worked with the Partnerships team on a number of projects, related to both internal processes and partnering externally. My main, term-long project was focused on collecting and organizing information about our current and past partnerships. With that data, I created high-level visualizations to help the team capture the prospect to partner pipeline, understand what works well about our processes, and what can be optimized. I also had the chance to perform market analysis on existing companies to help identify new potential partners, and build some new frameworks for how we go about researching other companies. What did you like most about your experience and working in a startup environment? Any specific lessons or learnings you would like to share? I was very grateful for the opportunity to have been a part of a very tight-knit team. One of the greatest benefits of working in a startup environment is the accessibility of conversation with colleagues. It was great to take on those conversations and learn from people with tons of experience in the drug discovery industry! There is an incredible diversity of therapeutic research currently going on, and being part of a company that is actively playing an innovative role has truly been an eye-opening experience. After working at Cyclica, have your career plans changed? What are your future career goals? Although I have had experience working at a large pharma company before, working at Cyclica really exposed me to the depth and breadth of the drug discovery industry. There are so many groups researching an even larger variety of targets and diseases. I would love to continue to play a part in driving scientific innovation forward, particularly through undertaking and mediating collaborative efforts between companies and researchers.

Rebecca Woelfle, Marketing Communications Specialist

Employee Spotlight - Co-ops

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