Last Friday, the Emory Center for New Medicines hosted the 3D Symposium on the Future of Therapeutic Innovation, an opportunity to learn, network, and collaborate with academics, clinicians, and biotech industry leaders.

The afternoon session featured Dr. Chrystal Paulos on programming T cells as living drugs, translational ambition that's putting Emory on the map in cancer immunotherapy.

A panel convened leaders from J.P. Morgan, Biolocity, Barnes & Thornburg, and the Georgia Research Alliance to answer one question: how does Atlanta build a biotech ecosystem that competes with Boston and the Bay Area?

It already is.

Atlanta is home to the world's busiest airport. Talent flies in, and supply chains don't bottleneck the way they do on the coasts.

Brussels-based global biopharmaceutical company UCB just invested $2 billion to build their U.S. biologics manufacturing campus in Gwinnett County.

Emory features a leading research university directly next to one of the largest healthcare systems in the country, bench-to-bedside infrastructure that most biotech hubs don’t have.

For early-stage founders, these conversations matter because you don't have to leave when you decide to commercialize.

The science is here. The infrastructure is here. Capital is organizing.

If you don't think Atlanta's got what it takes, just keep watching.