Sanaria Inc. today announced it has received U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Fast Track designation for its preventative vaccine for malaria, Sanaria® PfSPZ Vaccine.  Sanaria believes its PfSPZ Vaccine is the only malaria vaccine to have ever received this distinction.

According to the FDA, “Fast Track is a process designed to facilitate the development, and expedite the review of drugs to treat serious conditions and fill an unmet medical need. The purpose is to get important new drugs to the patient earlier.” A drug (or vaccine) that receives Fast Track designation is eligible for Accelerated Approval and Priority Review,which can considerably speed the time to market.

The Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore is set to develop a plan focused on growing jobs in the region through innovation districts.

EAGB received a $233,500 grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration for the effort. It will allow the organization to take inventory and map incubators and other areas of clustering that already exist in the city, as well as in Baltimore County. The roadmap would have several layers, bringing in demographics and other features.

Looking over a cross-section of members of the region’s tech community, real estate developer David Cordish, Gov. Larry Hogan and Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake stood on a stage and spoke of the importance of startups and entrepreneurs for job creation.

Rawlings-Blake talked about how the new coworking space they were gathered to open, called Spark Baltimore, was a sign that “smart, young people from around the country are trying to move here.” After they flipped the switch on the ceremonial lightbulbs, Cordish, whose firm developed the space, raised both arms in celebration, as if celebrating a championship.

BrainScope Company Inc. scored a big win last week when it received clearance from the Food and Drug Administration to market a new medical device that assesses traumatic brain injuries.

Medigene AG (MDG1, Frankfurt, Prime Standard), Germany, and bluebird bio, Inc. (Nasdaq: BLUE), USA, today announced the signing of a strategic research and development collaboration and licensing agreement encompassing T cell receptor (TCR) immunotherapies against four targets.

"We are delighted to collaborate with bluebird bio, a leader in the field of cell and gene therapy, including cancer immunotherapy," said Dolores J. Schendel, Chief Executive Officer and chief scientific officer, Medigene. "With its T cell immunotherapy expertise and outstanding gene delivery and genome editing capabilities, bluebird bio is an ideal partner for us to jointly discover and develop a new generation of T cell therapeutics to treat unmet oncology indications."

Today, the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced $10 million in awards to 10 "Big Data Spokes" projects to initiate research on specific topics identified by the Big Data Regional Innovation Hubs (BD Hubs).

Project topics range from precision agriculture to personalized education. The data spokes reflect the unique priorities and capabilities of the four BD Hubs, which represent consortia from the Midwest, Northeast, South and West of the country.

Universities are the secret weapon of national startup hubs like Silicon Valley and Boston. And over the last few years Baltimore has done its best to follow suit.

Consider spaces like Johns Hopkins’ FastForward incubator, the University of Maryland BioPark and IMET’s Harbor Launch incubator, and even accelerator programs like Dreamit Health Baltimore. These are all spaces where research takes the leap into commerce.

As the child of a military physicist, Richard Lifton was forced to move around a lot, from Washington D.C., to Albuquerque, New Mexico to Ankara, Turkey. As an adult he settled in Connecticut, where he became a renowned geneticist at Yale University.

Now he’s on the move again, relocating to New York, where he faces perhaps his biggest challenge yet: serving as president of one of the city’s famed research institutions, Rockefeller University, and in so doing taking over for Marc Tessier-Lavigne, someone widely seen as igniting the city’s biotech scene.

Wed, October 5, 2016, 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM, Relevant Health Rockville, Maryland

Learn from the experts in the fields of Legal, Finance, Biotech, and Regulatory Affairs as to what to look out for and how best to avoid those pitfalls. Bring your personal stories to share with other SoPE members and connect with healthcare innovators and entrepreneurs with a passion for bringing new technologies to our patients.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded five new grants to teach entrepreneurship and to support research and innovation at regional hubs across the United States under its Innovation Corps (I-Corps™) program.

The innovation hubs, known as I-Corps nodes, provide the research infrastructure and training to help researchers transition fundamental science and engineering discoveries to the marketplace. They also support a number of I-Corps sites across the country and deliver a seven-week I-Corps curriculum to the I-Corps teams.

Bethesda-based health technology company RightEye LLC has acquired exclusive rights to tests it says could help doctors diagnose autism and Parkinson’s disease earlier and more accurately than ever before.

Baltimore Innovation Week is in full swing, with a schedule of more than 65 events ranging from student hack-a-thons to panel discussions about gender equality in technology.

Now in its fifth year, Baltimore Innovation Week is intended to celebrate Baltimore's startup and technology community and offer a way in for people who want to get involved.

Next Proposal Deadline October 14, 2016

BioFactura, Inc., an emerging Maryland biopharmaceutical research and manufacturing company, announced today entry into a non-exclusive license agreement with Momenta Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: MNTA), a biotechnology company specializing in the characterization and engineering of complex drugs, relating to one of the biosimilar product candidates that Momenta is developing.  As part of this non-exclusive license agreement, BioFactura is developing a cell line using its NS0-based StableFastTM Biomanufacturing Platform, a proprietary system to rapidly generate stable cell lines that have the potential to lower cost, produce follow-on biologics and are single-use technology compatible.  The companies are actively working together to further optimize productivity.  Momenta has the right to obtain an exclusive research and commercial license to StableFastTM for clinical development and commercial manufacture of the undisclosed biosimilar product candidate.

We are pleased to announce that Greenfield/Belser has won the BioHealth Capital Region logo competition.  Several members of their creative team contributed to the winning design: 

The winning icon is a modern and vibrant rendition of a double helix that also gives a nod to the geography of the BioHealth Capital region, with the diamond shape of DC in the center. The blue and green colors connote health and vitality. The blue right-pointing arrowhead echoes the tagline: Advancing Science/Accelerating Innovation.  

We received over 80 submissions from design firms, colleges, and freelance designers from Maryland, Virginia and DC. Each entry was carefully evaluated by a panel of 14 reviewers who considered both practical and aesthetic factors. The panel selected Greenfield/Belser as the winning designer and worked with the firm on several iterations of the icon and wordmark to arrive at the final design.

Next Proposal Deadline October 14, 2016

Market-driven new technology and innovation leads to new products and new jobs. Creating jobs in innovative Maryland companies is what the Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) program has been doing for 27 years: bringing the inventive minds and extensive laboratory resources of the University System of Maryland (USM) to bear on creating the new products that feed the growth of Maryland businesses. Since the program’s inception in 1987, MIPS–enabled products have generated sales of $30.3 B.  MIPS is nationally recognized by the U.S. Small Business Administration as a model program for best practices in transferring technology and is a proven program that contributes significantly to job creation and high tech product development in Maryland.

For Martine Rothblatt, nothing is off limits. Not even death.

The founder of Sirius XM Satellite Radio and United Therapeutics Corp. (NASDAQ: UTHR) is the quintessential innovator who lives life asking the question: “Why can’t we?”

Things aren’t what they used to be at the Virginia Economic Development Partnership. The state agency will lose its international trade division next spring, along with 17 percent of its staff and about a quarter of its budget.

BioFactura, Inc., an emerging Maryland biopharmaceutical research and manufacturing company, announced today entry into a non-exclusive license agreement with Momenta Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: MNTA), a biotechnology company specializing in the characterization and engineering of complex drugs, relating to one of the biosimilar product candidates that Momenta is developing.  As part of this non-exclusive license agreement, BioFactura is developing a cell line using its NS0-based StableFastTM Biomanufacturing Platform, a proprietary system to rapidly generate stable cell lines that have the potential to lower cost, produce follow-on biologics and are single-use technology compatible.  The companies are actively working together to further optimize productivity.  Momenta has the right to obtain an exclusive research and commercial license to StableFastTM for clinical development and commercial manufacture of the undisclosed biosimilar product candidate.

NEA Partner Sara Nayeem, MD will serve on the Best Legal Frameworks for VC Investments Panel on Thursday, September 22 in DC at the International Bar Association Meeting. 

The International Bar Association programme will feature more than 200 substantive legal sessions, workshops and panels, including topics on current events and contentious issues facing the profession. The committee sessions will offer the chance to hear from the best experts in the field. The conference will also feature sessions presenting the lessons and achievements of each of my Presidential Task Forces: on Climate Change Justice and Human Rights, the Judicial Integrity Initiative, Human Trafficking, and Independence of the Legal Profession. 

Wednesday, October 26, 2016

For over 10 years the Sartorius Stedim Upstream & Downstream Forum has provided an exciting venue for presentations, networking and discussions focusing on the latest applications and technologies.

This year the event continues to build the collaborative bridge between Upstream/Downstream Bioprocessing by bringing specialists from your peer group who will share their experience by presenting best practices, applications and techniques to address the bottlenecks at the interfaces of upstream and downstream. Seize the opportunity of this unique venue and book both events as a package.

Precision medicine is fundamentally changing the way therapies are being developed. Its targeted, customized approach to health care has a widespread impact on everything from genomics to medical devices, and as a result it is creating new business models for enterprises across the sector. Importantly, precision medicine provides the backdrop for researchers as they explore how genetic, environmental and lifestyle factors interact in our bodies to foster health or develop disease.

The Department of Health and Human Services has entered strategic partnerships with a Roche Group subsidiary and The Medicines Co. to develop antibiotics against multi-drug resistant infections.

HHS’ office of the assistant secretary for preparedness and response forged the partnerships with the two companies through other transaction authority under the Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness Act of 2006, HHS said Wednesday.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and his pediatrician wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, announced this week that their Chan Zuckerberg Initiative will fund a $3 billion effort to cure all diseases. Mark Zuckerberg announced in December 2015 that he was going to give away 99 percent of his wealth. But instead of forming a traditional charity, he bequeathed his Facebook shares to his own Limited Liability Corporation, called the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

Herndon, Va.-based cybersecurity startup accelerator Mach37 has unveiled the five companies chosen for its fall cohort. The startups will get $50,000 investment and spend 90 days in intensive programming where mentors will help them learn how to get their products to a market-ready point, teach them how to attract private investors and prepare for scaling up their companies. The program also serves to connect the startups with some of the very people who might be the potential investors.

The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health landed a $95 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to analyze data from a program aimed at understanding how the environment influences health beginning in the womb.

WeddingWire Inc., the leading global online marketplace for the wedding and event industry, has announced plans to expand its corporate headquarters in Montgomery County.

Currently located in Chevy Chase, WeddingWire is confirmed to lease a total of 68,000 square-feet of space in the county to accommodate its continued growth. As part of the expansion, the company plans to add 200 new jobs to its existing workforce of more than 350 local employees.

Virginia Bio, the statewide non-profit association representing the life science industry in the Commonwealth of Virginia, announced that it will support the growth and expansion of the Biosciences industry via its upcoming September 29 event, Women Building Bio: The XX Factor. Virginia Bio is actively collaborating with academic institutions as well as regional and global businesses to expand the industry’s footprint in the Commonwealth and beyond. As a partner in the BioHealth Capital Region campaign inclusive of Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia, Virginia Bio is focused on accelerating the region’s progress towards the goal of becoming "top 3 by 2023” among the biotech clusters in the U.S.

The University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC) has received $4,999,994 in federal funding through the National Science Foundation (NSF) to increase the number of minority students graduating with degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

The funding was announced by U.S. Senator Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) on Wednesday.

Wed, Oct 26, 2016 at 5:30 PM - Columbus Center 701 East Pratt Street Baltimore, MD

1st Pitch Life Science is coming to Baltimore for the first time. Hear what happens AFTER a start-up company presents to an investor group! Usually after a pitch, the investors have a closed-door discussion to decide whether the opportunity merits further investigation and possible investment.  1st Pitch Life Science (http://www.1stpitchlifescience.com) offers presenters and audience members the chance to hear what happens in those closed-door discussions, and to learn what really matters to investors.

The Medicines Co on Wednesday said it will receive up to $132 million in U.S. government funding for development of new antibiotics to fight drug-resistant infections, seen by health officials as a critically important need.

At Microsoft’s research labs around the world, computer scientists, programmers, engineers and other experts are trying to crack some of the computer industry’s toughest problems, from system design and security to quantum computing and data visualization.

It would raise the stakes even higher, but that didn't stop Jay Flatley, Illumina's then chief executive, from sending in vials of his own saliva and blood to the company's newly opened lab. It was January 2009, and Illumina's scientists were about to embark on their first mission to sequence a whole human genome.

TEDCO announced today its Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII) program has awarded $18 million to more than 180 commercialization projects and 45 start-up companies since its inception in late 2012. Awards were given across a variety of industries, including therapeutic, software, medical devices and engineering.

“MII is the only program in Maryland that supports the transition of technology from the academic research laboratory through product development to commercialization in a start-up company,” says John Wasilisin, President and COO. “The program has been a game changer for innovators at Maryland’s research universities to take the next step in becoming entrepreneurs.”