Deals & Data
The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine approved $230 million in grants on Oct. 28, including $55.6 million for projects that will be based in San Diego. The San Diego Union-Tribune reports that 14 grants the institute awarded statewide will go to multidisciplinary research teams — typically at multiple institutions — to focus on finding treatments for specific diseases.
BIOCOM President and CEO Joe Panetta recently spent several hours one recent afternoon introducing TIME Magazine reporter Michael Grunwald to Southern California’s innovative life sciences community. Grunwald has reported on biofuels in the past, but admits to know very little about biotech. Panetta showed Grunwald a sampling of San Diego’s life science companies and research institutes, being sure to stop in a virtual therapeutics company (Conatus), a medical device company (Nuvasive), and a diagnostics company (Gen-Probe). Leaders at all three companies generously spent lots of time showing Grunwald around, explaining their business and their concerns about California’s economy, health care reform and other issues. Panetta also took the reporter to the Venter Institute, where Craig Venter and his team talked about why they have set up shop in this thriving biotech cluster.
The result of the industry’s hospitality was several favorable mentions in a story about California’s economy, its innovation and its global leadership in many areas, including life sciences. And perhaps even more importantly, a senior reporter at a national publication is now better education in our complicated and life-saving industry and therefore better equipped to cover issues that impact us.
Santarus, a specialty biopharmaceutical company, announced that it ranked number 23 on Technology Fast 500™, Deloitte LLP’s ranking of 500 of the fastest growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences and clean technology companies in North America. Rankings are based on percentage of fiscal year revenue growth during the five year period from 2004 to 2008. Santarus’ revenues grew 9,559 percent during this period.
Metabasis Therapeutics said that it has agreed to a takeover by the larger San Diego company Ligand Pharmaceuticals. Metabasis, which cut its staff to seven people this year as it ran low on cash, said it will receive about $1.8 million under the deal, with Ligand also taking on more than $1.3 million in liabilities.
Amylin Pharmaceuticals said it cut third quarter losses by two-thirds, as it spent less on research and other areas. The San Diego company, which has two diabetes drugs on the market, also said it generated a slight profit when excluding stock-based compensation and other non-cash items.
Biogen Idec, which has a large research presence in San Diego, and Biovitrum said on Oct. 18 that they will move a potential hemophilia B treatment into a late-stage study. The global study is being designed to assess the safety and effectiveness of the drug candidate rFIXFc in preventing and treating bleeding associated with hemophilia B.
Amgen says the Food and Drug Administration wants more information about its osteoporosis treatment Prolia before granting marketing approval. It delays a drug seen as a potential blockbuster for the company. In a letter, the FDA said it wants to know how Amgen will monitor patients who use the drug, and wants the company to develop a strategy to evaluate the risks of Prolia, Amgen said. Amgen shares fell 3 percent in premarket trading.
Shares of Pure Bioscience rose more than 7 percent after the San Diego disinfectant developer announced that its patented silver dihydrogen citrate (SDC) antimicrobial is effective against the 2009 H1N1 flu virus, according to the San Diego Daily Transcript. The product has been included on the Environmental Protection Agency's list of antimicrobial products that have been deemed effective against swine flu based on their effectiveness against other influenza A virus strains.
Life Technologies Corp said Tuesday that demand for its products was solid in the third quarter, and economic stimulus funds encouraged greater sales. The company also raised its profit forecast for the full year, and its shares reached an annual high in morning trading, according to the San Diego Daily Transcript.
San Diego-based eBioscience Corp. has acquired privately held immunoassay technology pioneer Bender MedSystems GmbH in an all cash transaction. The acquisition, covered by the San Diego Daily Transcript, provides eBioscience with more than 1,000 high profile immunology and oncology products, including the Instant ELISA and FlowCytomix brands that target the life sciences and diagnostics markets, the company said in a statement.
Sequenom has settled its patent infringement suit against rival Ibis Biosciences.
Under the agreement, Ibis will pay Sequenom $1 million within 30 days, and San Diego-based Sequenom has granted Ibis and its affiliates, including Abbott Laboratories, a non-exclusive license under the three disputed patents.
Carlsbad’s Genoptix Inc., which specializes in laboratory testing and diagnosis for community physicians working to identify blood-based diseases, has earned the No. 15 spot on Deloitte LLP’s ranking of the 500 fastest-growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences and clean technology companies in North America, the San Diego Business Journal reported..
When prospects for raising money on the public markets dimmed late last year, San Diego biotech Phenomix pulled its planned $86.25 million initial public offering. Now armed with what CEO Laura Shawver calls the “commercial oomph” to market its late-stage diabetes drug candidate — a co-development deal with New York-based Forest Laboratories valued at up to $340 million — the company is considering whether it wants to go public or remain a privately held biotech like so many others in San Diego, according to a report in the San Diego Business Journal.
Vertex Pharmaceuticals is vying to set a new standard of care for hepatitis C in some of the toughest patients to treat, and today it is reporting some surprisingly strong evidence that suggests the drug is working like researchers hoped it would over the long haul. The Cambridge, MA-based biotech company with a strong research presence in San Diego, offered Xconomy an interim peek at results from 117 patients who took its telaprevir compound after they failed to fully respond to standard therapy.
Santaris Pharma, the Danish company that has pushed the first microRNA therapy into clinical trials, has recruited a pair of big name executives from Isis Pharmaceuticals and Amgen Ventures to help lead its new U.S. subsidiary in San Diego, according to Xconomy. Mark Wedel, the former chief medical officer at Carlsbad, CA-based Isis, will fill that same position at Santaris, while Stuart Mackey, the former managing director of Amgen Ventures, has joined Santaris as chief business officer. The two executives are part of Santaris’ U.S. growth strategy, which I described in a feature story last month.
PacificGMP, the leader in single-use bioprocessing for development and manufacturing for its client partners, announced that ArmaGen Technologies has selected it to produce its proprietary protein for a Phase 1 clinical trial. Under the agreement, PacificGMP will use a perfusion process to produce the antibody fusion protein, AGT-190, under cGMP (current good manufacturing practices) standards. Additionally, PacificGMP will perform cGMP cell bank development, a necessary component of clinical material production.
ChemDiv announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, Chemical Diversity Research Institute in Moscow, Russia, has been chosen by Viriom Ltd. of Moscow as a service partner in developing innovative HIV compounds. The program includes pre-clinical and clinical studies, which are expected to begin in 2010.