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President’s Entrepreneurial Fellowship Alumni Profile: Meya Ngundam, PharmD ’23

Thursday, June 6, 2024

Meya Ngundam
Meya Ngundam won the 2023 Pharmapreneur’s Market competition.
When Meya Ngundam, PharmD ’23, gravitated to the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy (UMSOP) pharmapreneurship pathway with the encouragement and mentorship of her faculty advisor, Magaly Rodriguez de Bittner, PharmD, FAPhA, FNAP, the Felix Gyi Endowed Memorial Professor in Pharmapreneurship and associate dean for clinical services and practice transformation at UMSOP. The pharmapreneurship pathway offers select PharmD students the opportunity to pursue special interests in innovation, entrepreneurism, and creativity with a high degree of individual attention and coaching by faculty and external advisors.

With a growing entrepreneurial spirit, Dr. Ngundam also joined the 2021 cohort of the UMB’s President’s Entrepreneurial Fellows (PEF). She was quickly struck by how many innovative minds are involved at every level of the healthcare ecosystem, and saw many opportunities for scientific experts, business leaders, and entrepreneurs to collaborate in an impactful way.

As part of the PEF program, Fellows are trained and mentored to explore and develop new business ideas. This framework served Dr. Ngundam well, and helped her identify and create her own venture – a company, LabConnection, that helps laboratory researchers dispose of or move unneeded laboratory equipment. The concept blends her experience from pharmacy school and experience working in research labs.

While engaged with the PEF program, she developed a viable business model for LabConnection. “Sharing my ideas with the PEF cohort and mentors were not only welcomed but valued. I could see that my concept was further strengthened with each iteration,” commented Dr. Ngundam.

In 2023, Dr. Ngundam participated in and won the UMSOP’s inaugural Pharmapreneurship Pitch Competition, which came with a $100,000 investment to support the launch of her company.

Following her graduation, Dr. Ngundam continues to grow LabConnection, with the goal of headquartering the company in the Baltimore region. She is also advancing her pharmaceutical training through a Fellowship at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research in the Office of Clinical Pharmacology.

Dr. Ngundam shared that her favorite aspects of the PEF program were the mentorship and learning to become flexible and comfortable with new ideas. “Don’t be afraid to make changes and sometimes drift. Definitely don’t let it be what holds you back.”

For more information about the PEF program, please visit www.umventures.org/PEF.