Who doesn’t like a rooftop networking social? If you’re a fellow University of Virginia Darden School of Business alum and plan to attend our Alumni Weekend, join us on Saturday. See details, below.

AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot raised questions Tuesday about the company’s future in vaccines while hinting at potential M&A activity on the near horizon.

In an interview with Reuters, Soriot discussed the company's plans, which he said include building on its portfolio of antibody therapies. AstraZeneca is also considering bolt-on acquisitions in oncology and cardiovascular areas, Soriot said.

Getting out of the COVID-19 Vaccine Business?

Overall, in the COVID-19 space, the company has shifted its resources to antibody therapies.

Image: Pascal Claude Roland Soriot - 23 May 1959 (age 63) France - Wikipedia

The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory has been awarded a contract for research, development, test and evaluation of military-related technology that could be worth up to $10.6 billion, the Defense Department announced Monday.

The lab, based in Laurel, Maryland, was awarded a $4.4 billion cost-plus-fixed-fee, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for RDT&E programs throughout the DOD that fall “within its core competency areas including strategic systems test and evaluation; submarine security and survivability; space science and engineering; combat systems and guided missiles; air and missile defense and power projection; information technology, simulation, modeling, and operations analysis; and mission related research, development, test and evaluation,” according to the DOD contract award announcement.

Image: Photo of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab's Kossiakoff Center. (Photo courtesy of JHU-APL)

Novel Nanotechnology Supercharges Immune System Molecules to Fight Cancer

Researchers from Cytimmune Sciences presented new data at a cancer therapeutics conference in Boston, MA demonstrating the potential of their nanoparticle-based platform to supercharge synergistic immune system stimulators called cytokines.

SUMMARY OF DATA PRESENTED

• Data focused on industry leading, first-in-class, multi-cytokine immunotherapies
• CYT-IFNg-TNFa (A dual cytokine immunotherapy nanomedicine)
• 100x increase in direct cancer cell killing potency vs native cytokines
• 30x increase in cytokine accumulation in tumor tissue
• Induction of a cancer specific immune response after treatment
• Other novel cytokine-based immunotherapies
• Introduction of nanomedicines including combinations of IL-12, IL-2, IL-15 & IL-1b
• 175x increase in potency of IL-12 presented on nanoparticles vs. native IL-12
• CYT-6091 (high dose TNF alpha)
• Unpublished preclinical data showing CYT-6091 induces cytotoxic T-Cell tumor infiltration
• Phase 1 clinical safety data and preclinical mechanism of action data
•  

Deloitte Consulting remained atop Modern Healthcare’s annual ranking of the largest healthcare management consulting firms based in the US.

Deloitte US’ sizable healthcare consulting practice realized $2.698 billion in revenue in 2021, with $962.8 million coming from healthcare providers.

Guidehouse jumped from third place 2020 to second place in 2021, achieving $970 million in healthcare consulting revenue, with approximately half from providers. The firm was boosted a significant industry acquisition in 2021, adding Dovel, an 1,800-person IT consultancy with a focus on health IT, life sciences, and public safety.

Intralytix receives Phase II Fast Track NIH SBIR contract to continue development of a universal, scale-independent AI-based platform for manufacturing high titer bacteriophage preparations for clinical applications.

Columbia, Maryland, USA. – August 22, 2022 – Intralytix, Inc. announced today that it has received a Phase II contract in the amount of $1,498,045. This contract is made through the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)  program from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This project is the continuation of a successfully completed NIAID-funded Phase I contract (see Intralytix, Inc.) and will further leverage Intralytix’s existing proprietary PhageSelector™ program, big data, and manufacturing know-how along with machine learning to advance an artificial intelligence (AI)-based universal manufacturing platform, the PhageEngine™, to deliver methods for producing high titer, high quality bacteriophage preparations suitable for clinical applications. Dr. Alexander Sulakvelidze, President and CEO of Intralytix and the Principal Investigator of the SBIR contract, commented, "We are very pleased to further extend this work with support from NIH after successfully competing Phase I of the project. The resulting technology will significantly increase Intralytix’s capabilities as well as help advance the phage biocontrol and phage therapy fields in general and will ultimately have a very significant positive impact on public health. We look forward to continuing this important project in collaboration with NIH. "

Tonix Pharmaceuticals, a company that has a research lab in Frederick, is developing a vaccine to prepare for a future where the monkeypox virus is endemic outside of Africa.

To do that, the company is looking more than 200 years in the past.

The base infrastructure that Tonix researchers use to design vaccines for infectious diseases is based on a virus called horsepox. That’s the same virus Dr. Edward Jenner used when he started developing the first smallpox vaccine in 1796.

Dr. Amrie Grammer, co-founder of AMPEL BioSolutions, joins the show to discuss biotech and her company Hosted by Paul Sweeney and Matt Miller.

After getting smallpox vaccine ACAM2000 from Sanofi and an anthrax treatment called raxibacumab from GlaxoSmithKline, Emergent BioSolutions is buying again, this time an entire company: PaxVax.

In an all-cash deal worth $270 million, Maryland-based Emergent, a vaccine company that has focused on biodefense, will buy California-headquartered specialty vaccine maker PaxVax, which also has close ties with the government.

Congress has approved a new agency — the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) — that will ‘supercharge’ breakthrough medical research and provide over $1 billion in new research funding.

A fight has broken out, however, over ARPA-H’s headquarters’ location. The Maryland congressional delegation is working to locate it in state, but when a majority in Congress senses a chance to put a prestigious scientific headquarters in their home districts, Maryland likely will not win this battle.

Emergent BioSolutions is mobilizing its M&A war chest again. Hard on the heels of its $270 million deal for vaccine expert PaxVax, the frequent government contractor is buying Adapt Pharma and its opioid overdose-reversing drug Narcan.

The Maryland-based firm is paying $635 million upfront and up to $100 million for potential sales-based milestones through 2022. Narcan, the only FDA-approved nasal spray of naloxone, has been on the market since 2016. Emergent  estimates the drug will contribute $200 million to $220 million to the company’s top line in 2019. In addition to Narcan and an opioid overdose-focused pipeline, about 50 Adapt employees will come aboard Emergent.

We just released 8 new high priority funding opportunities where your company can make a difference in meeting the needs of cancer patients… Please see the solicitation and join our webinar on August 24th….

SEATTLE, Aug. 16, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- AGC Biologics, a leading global Biopharmaceutical Contract Development and Manufacturing Organization (CDMO), announced today a strategic partnership with RoosterBio Inc., a leading supplier of human mesenchymal stem/stromal cells (hMSCs), highly engineered media, and bioprocess development services.

The partnership creates an end-to-end solution for the development and production of hMSC and exosome therapeutics leveraging RoosterBio’s well-established cell and media products and process development services, coupled with AGC Biologics’ global cell and gene therapy manufacturing capabilities.

The Washington, D.C./Baltimore region continued to see a tightening in its life sciences real estate market.

In particular, the region saw a decrease in life sciences vacancy in the second quarter of 2022, dropping from 3.6 percent to 1.4 percent since last year, according to CBRE’s latest national life sciences report.

Image: THE RECENT DEAL FOR THE TWINBROOK OFFICE CENTER HIGHLIGHTS THE DEMAND FOR LIFE SCIENCES SPACE IN THE MARYLAND SUBURBS OF D.C. PHOTO: BY NEWMARK

The fiscal year 2022 program is now closed.  The fiscal year 2023 program will begin accepting applications as follows: Commerce will begin accepting Form B QMBC applications on 8/23/2022, and Form A Investor applications on 9/7/2022. Additional information is available under the “Apply” section.

BIITC provides an investor with a refundable State income tax credit for an eligible investment in a Qualified Maryland Biotechnology Company (QMBC). The program supports investment in seed and early stage biotech companies to promote and grow the biotech industry in Maryland.

Aug 15, 2022

• If authorized, Novavax' vaccine would be the first protein-based COVID-19 booster for adults
• If authorized, the Novavax COVID-19 Vaccine, Adjuvanted could be used as a booster dose for adults aged 18 and older vaccinated with any other currently available COVID-19 vaccine

GAITHERSBURG, Md., Aug. 15, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Novavax, Inc. (Nasdaq: NVAX), a biotechnology company dedicated to developing and commercializing next-generation vaccines for serious infectious diseases, today announced that it submitted an application to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) of its protein-based COVID-19 Vaccine, Adjuvanted for active immunization to prevent coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) as a homologous and heterologous booster in adults aged 18 and older.

Two new medical startups, focusing on addressing vision loss and catheter-associated urinary tract infections (UTIs), are on the horizon thanks to the $200,000 in grants the research teams received from the Johns Hopkins University’s Louis B. Thalheimer Fund for Translational Research.

14 researchers applied to the Thalheimer Fund, which was created to provide seed funding for proof-of-concept and validation studies of inventions coming out of Hopkins. The awards from the fund range from $25,000 to $100,000.

“We are excited to have received strong applications for disruptive technologies with commercialization potential that can have a future impact on human health and well-being,” Nicole Snell, associate director of ventures at Johns Hopkins Technology Ventures’ (JHTV) FastForward accelerator, which helps university-affiliated founders commercialize their technologies, said in a statement.

Click here to read more.

VISION 2030: From Excellence to Preeminence

This summer, the University System of Maryland unveiled a new 10-year strategic plan—Vision 2030: From Excellence to Preeminence. The plan reflects 18 months of in-depth analysis. It coalesces intense discussions among dozens of groups of people with a stake in Maryland’s public universities—people with different opinions on higher education’s main objectives and different ideas on how to achieve them.

But one theme emerged across all groups: That students must serve as our starting point. They must set our agenda. They must center our work.

Click here to view the PDF

WALTHAM, Mass. and DUBLIN, Aug. 15, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Q32 Bio, a clinical stage biotechnology company developing biologic therapeutics to restore immune homeostasis, and Horizon Therapeutics plc (Nasdaq: HZNP), today announced that they have entered into a collaboration and option agreement to develop ADX-914 for the treatment of autoimmune diseases.

ADX-914 is a fully human anti-IL-7Rα antibody that re-regulates adaptive immune function by blocking signaling mediated by both IL-7 and TSLP. Q32 has recently completed a biomarker-enabled Phase 1 study characterizing pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics and safety of ADX-914 that demonstrated pharmacological effect on T cells in healthy volunteers. Q32 expects to initiate a Phase 2 trial in atopic dermatitis later this year and is planning to initiate a Phase 2 trial in a second autoimmune disease next year.

The world hasn’t seen commercial supersonic travel in nearly 20 years since the Concorde was retired in 2003, but all that is about to change with the development of a new, environmentally friendly airliner.

Meet Overture – the world’s fastest airliner that was developed by Denver-based Boom Supersonic.

Image: https://nypost.com

A quarter century after it began life as a garage start-up, Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc.’s (NYSE: ARE) decision to focus on the niche segment of life science real estate looks sounder than ever as demand for sophisticated lab space across major U.S. markets sits at an all-time high.

Pasadena, California-based Alexandria is the only publicly traded, pure-play office/laboratory REIT. The company, led by founder and Executive Chairman Joel Marcus, focuses exclusively on highly specialized lab space used for research and development in the booming life science industry.

Image: Lilly Institute for Genetic Medicine, 15 Necco Street, Seaport Innovation District, Greater Boston. Photo courtesy Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc.

UMBC will expand its work boosting diversity in academia from Maryland to the national level through a new NSF INCLUDES Alliance: Re-Imagining STEM Equity Utilizing Postdoc Pathways (RISE UPP). The RISE UPP Alliance, anticipated to officially launch in fall 2022, is modeled after the AGEP PROMISE Academy, a high-impact initiative co-led by UMBC that supports faculty diversification in the biomedical sciences across University System of Maryland (USM) institutions.

Image: Albin O. Kuhn Library (Marlayna Demond '11/UMBC)

It was a pleasure to welcome Congressman David Trone, Senator Ben Cardin, Senator Chris Van Hollen and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Manufacturing Extension Partnership Director Laurie Locascio to our new facility in Frederick this week and to see Ellume’s #manufacturing capabilities first-hand.

Ellume's Frederick facility provides a sustainable U.S. domestic industrial base for #diagnostics production and stands ready to respond to any future surge in #COVID19 demand, while accelerating #innovation to develop solutions for future public health needs. A multimillion-dollar automation program is underway to further enhance the production capability of the facility.

Maryland is home to a number of STEM entrepreneurs with quality projects and the skills to succeed. What entrepreneurs often lack are the right connections and access to funding, which is especially true for women-led life sciences start-ups.

“In 2021, women founders raised just 2% of venture capital money and only 23% of biotech CEOs are women said Margia Argüello, formerly with the Maryland Department of Commerce’s Office of Life Sciences.

Image: The three busy female founders of innovative life science startups CarrTech, NasaClip and PerSoN Clinic took time to share what TEDCO’s Builder Fund and other TEDCO resources have meant to their companies.

The arc of the technology transfer profession can be tied to the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 in the United States and similar enabling legislation from across the globe. This week  a new transformational law was passed – the CHIPS and Science Act – supporting U.S. semiconductor production and catalyzing research and development in many key technology areas and in new innovation regions of the country. Most importantly, this new law has a key provision titled “Planning and Capacity Building Awards” (Sec. 10391), which authorizes an unprecedented $3.1 billion to support technology transfer capacity building for research institutions.

Five months after the Australian-based biopharmaceutical company Ellume opened its first U.S. location in Frederick, the facility is scaling up its production of at-home COVID-19 tests by starting to automate the manufacturing process.

U.S. Rep. David Trone and U.S. Sens. Chris Van Hollen and Ben Cardin visited the sprawling campus along Executive Way on Tuesday afternoon for a tour of the company’s production capabilities and a town hall meeting with its employees.

Image: https://www.fredericknewspost.com - Staff photo by Ric Dugan

TENANT AMENITIES

• 8,867 RSF lab/office suite available 1Q23

• Dedicated suite entry

• Energy efficient HVAC

• Loading dock

• Ample parking

• Complimentary access to the Alexandria FitLab

fitness center (located at 910 Clopper Road)

• On-site asset management

• Proximate to major amenities, including

restaurants, retail, lodging, and banking

Click here for more information.

The BioHealth Capital Region Forum and Investment Conference are right around the corner on September 20th and 21st, 2022, respectively. And that means great networking opportunities, engaging panel discussions, valuable investor interaction and the celebrated and highly anticipated 7th annual Crab Trap competition.

The Crab Trap competition brings together entrepreneurs with innovative diagnostics, medical devices, therapeutics or other transformative health solutions to compete for a prize package valued at $50,000, which includes cash rewards and a one-year residency at JLABS @ Washington DC. Crab Trap finalists will earn the chance to make an in-person pitch at the BioHealth Region Investment Conference. 

Gary L. Disbrow, Ph.D., Director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), visits BioTalk to discuss his career, advancing research, development, and collaboration in BioHealth.

Listen to the podcast now via Apple https://apple.co/3zCsbMl, Google https://bit.ly/3p2aAIP, Spotify https://spoti.fi/3p2V0Ne, and Amazon https://amzn.to/3BSQWqf.

This interview is part of a series of conversations with the people working at Mimetas. The 'I' in Mimetas focuses on the personal side of the scientists that drive our world. Today we have a chat with Jos Joore, CEO and co-founder of Mimetas.

What small things in life make you happy?

That's an interesting one. I would say it's, in particular, the small things that make me happy. Being out in nature, taking a run, being with family. People need a firm, happy basis to cope with challenges like setting up and running a company. That basis is made up of all the small things in life that are, in fact, the most important.

Emocha Health, a Johns Hopkins University spinout tackling medication adherence with an asynchronous video platform, has announced a $6.2 million series A round led by Claritas Health Ventures.

Like many other health technology startups recently, the company’s latest raise comes after months of pandemic-boosted growth. Emocha said in its announcement that revenue has increased 300% over the last year alone, due in part to the accelerated acceptance of virtual technologies in healthcare.

Image: Emocha Health has patients record videos of themselves taking a medication and asking questions about their treatment, which are then reviewed by a live team to ensure adherence and resolve any issues. CEO Sebastian Seiguer said it's a more effective approach than others that rely on financial incentives or prescription refill rates. (emocha Health)

What does #USPVerified mean? It means that you can trust that what's on the label is what's in the bottle. The USP Verified Mark has appeared on more than 880 million bottle labels, making quality visible so you can choose dietary supplements with confidence. Learn more about USP Verified products at quality-supplements.org #NoDoubtAboutIt

ROCKVILLE, Md.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Immunomic Therapeutics, Inc., (“ITI”), a privately-held clinical-stage biotechnology company pioneering the study of LAMP (Lysosome Associated Membrane Protein)-mediated nucleic acid-based immunotherapy, today announced dosing of the first patient in the company’s Phase 1 study evaluating ITI-3000, a plasmid DNA (pDNA) vaccine targeting patients with Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC), a rare but aggressive form of skin cancer that is typically caused by the Merkel cell polyomavirus (MCPyV). The single-center study is being conducted at the University of Washington School of Medicine and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, Washington and is being led by Drs. Paul Nghiem, Song Park and David M. Koelle.

EY Americas IPO Leader Rachel Gerring joins Yahoo Finance Live to discuss the U.S. IPO market, navigating through recessionary fears, inflation, supply chain woes, volatility, and the outlook for IPOs.

Video Transcript BRIAN SOZZI: Companies are pumping the brakes on public debuts with the number of IPOs in the US plunging by 75% in the first half of this year compared to last year according to new data from EY. Joining us now to break down the latest in the IPO space is EY Americas IPO leader Rachel Gerring. Rachel, good to see you here this morning. Have we reached a bottom yet?

Image: From Video