Category: Finance
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Cancer Therapy Biotech Raises $24M in Early Funding
14 October 2014. Raze Therapeutics, a biotechnology company designing cancer therapies that stop mechanisms feeding the growth of cancer cells, raised $24 million in its first round of venture financing. The funding round was led Atlas Venture — that co-founded Raze and provided some of its seed capital — as well as MPM Capital Management,…
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Experimental Drug Kills Myeloma Cells in Lab, Trial Planned
13 October 2014. Medical researchers at Imperial College London in the U.K. developed an experimental drug that in lab and animal tests kills multiple myeloma cancer cells without the toxic side effects of other cancer drugs. The team led by Imperial medical professor Guido Franzoso published its findings today in the journal Cancer Cell, with…
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Drug-Error Analytics Service Raises $1M in Early Funding
2 October 2014. MedAware, a company harnessing big-data analytics to prevent erroneous drug prescriptions, raised $1 million in its first round of venture financing. The Ra’anana, Israel enterprise completed the funding round led by OurCrowd, an Israeli crowdfunding investment service, with contributions from GE Ventures. The company is the creation of CEO Gidi Stein, a…
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Johnson & Johnson Acquires Biotech Developing Anti-Virals
30 September 2014. The biotechnology company Alios BioPharma Inc., a developer of anti-viral medications, is being acquired by health care products enterprise Johnson & Johnson for $1.75 billion. The all-cash deal will add Alios BioPharma’s pipeline to the portfolio of Janssen Pharmaceuticals, a division of Johnson & Johnson. Alios BioPharma, in South San Francisco, California,…
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Investment Fund Launches to Support Stem Cell Ventures
29 September 2014. ReproCell Inc., a developer of stem cell lines for research and therapies in Yokohama, Japan, is starting an investment fund that aims to back new biotechnology companies bringing stem cell research to market. The fund, called Cell Innovation Partners, begins with ¥800 million ($US 7.3 million) in capital, provided by Shinsei Corporate…
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Chip Emulates Human Airway Muscles to Test Asthma Treatments
24 September 2014. Biomedical engineers at Harvard University developed a model of human airway muscles on a miniaturized chip that emulates their actions during an asthma attack. The senior author of the paper describing the airway muscles chip, Kevin Kit Parker, is also a recipient of a new National Institutes of Health grant to develop…
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Small Business Grant Funds Point-of-Care Sickle Cell Test
22 September 2014. A Cambridge, Massachusetts diagnostics company received a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant to develop a simple point-of-care test for sickle cell disease, a genetic blood disorder affecting a large percentage of people of African origin. The $225,000 grant from National Institutes of Health’s SBIR program to Daktari Diagnostics will support development…
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Small Business Contract to Fund Cancer Drug Response Tests
18 September 2014. National Cancer Institute, part of National Institutes of Health, is funding development of lab tests using a patient’s own cancer cells to help determine the best treatments for the patient. The $1.975 million contract to biotechnology company Kiyatec Inc. in Greenville, South Carolina was awarded under the Small Business Innovation Research program,…
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Sanofi, MyoKardia Partner on Genetic Heart Disorders
17 September 2014. The pharmaceutical company Sanofi and biopharmaceutical developer MyoKardia are collaborating on development and commercialization of three MyoKardia therapies for inherited heart diseases. The deal could earn MyoKardia as much as $200 million in milestone payments and equity investments from Sanofi. MyoKardia, in South San Francisco, California, designs small-molecule therapies for two types…
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Grant Funding Crowdsourced Multiple Sclerosis Drug Trial
8 September 2014. A grant from a National Institutes of Health agency is funding a crowdsourced clinical trial of a generic blood pressure drug to help treat multiple sclerosis. The $1.4 million grant from National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) is supporting an intermediate stage clinical study by Transparency Life Sciences LLC, a drug…