On November 6 and 7, 2014, the Alliance Forum Foundation held the 2014 World Alliance Forum in San Francisco. The forum – focused on the industrialization of regenerative medicine – was a huge success, attended by over 350 attendees from patient advocacy groups, governments, funding agencies, research institutes, and businesses. The conference’s keynote speakers included Dr. Shinya Yamanaka, a Nobel laureate who discovered iPS cells – the next generation stem cells. Dr. Masayo Takahashi, responsible for the first human trial of an iPS-derived tissue and one of Nature’s 10 people who mattered in 2014, made a keynote speech on the second day of the conference. Other cutting-edge researchers such as Drs. Yoshiki Sawa, Hidemitsu Nakauchi, and Hideyuki Okano also presented. Another Nobel laureate Dr. Paul Berg participated in the panel discussion and emphasized the need for a strong collaborative relationship between academia and industry, in order to move forward stem cell therapy and regenerative medicine. The private sector was also well represented at the forum with a strong interest in seizing new business opportunities in this emerging field. The regenerative medicine industry groups from the U.S. and Japan – ARM and FIRM respectively – were present and vocal. Current regulations as well as Japan’s new legal framework allowing fast-track approvals of regenerative medicine products were among the areas of high interest.