Biohealth Innovation
Every startup wants to change the world, but DC-based incubator and seed fund 1776 fosters the type of early stage companies that just might have a chance.
The incubator is focused specifically on startups for the public good and you won’t find any benign photo sharing apps in 1776’s portfolio.
MedImmune, the global biologics research and development arm of AstraZeneca, is probably best known for its work in discovering and developing therapeutics based on antibodies -protein molecules produced by the body as a primary immune response. However, for a number of reasons, including the large size of the molecule, antibodies may not always offer the most appropriate solution for treating some diseases. In those cases there may be alternative, innovative approaches which can be explored in parallel with our usual work with antibodies.
A U.S. House of Representatives panel today released a widely anticipated proposal for speeding the development of new medical treatments. The massive, 393-page document, dubbed the 21st Century Cures Act, has been under development by Fred Upton (R–MI) and Diana DeGette (D–CO) of the House Energy and Commerce Committee since last April. It grew out of a series of hearings and roundtables last year on ways to spur biomedical research innovation and streamline clinical trials and the drug approval process. The result is a long list of ideas summarized in this document.
The Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer is proud to announce the winners of its 2015 Awards. Now in its 32nd year, the awards have recognized the outstanding efforts of scientists, technology transfer professionals, and their partners in academia and industry. Many technological breakthroughs that have become an essential part of our everyday lives have been winners of the FLC awards.
This year, nearly 100 nominations were submitted from eight federal agencies, which made the decision to select 23 winners a difficult one. But those selected represent technology transfer at its highest level.
Johns Hopkins University will give $15 million to promising researchers over the next three years.
Two new grants, totaling $15 million over three years, are intended for early-career researchers, who are increasingly being passed up for federal research grants. The grants will also support researchers who collaborate with others outside their school. Hopkins President Ronald J. Daniels is concerned about a potential dearth in new researchers entering the field, and in early January told the Baltimore Business Journal he planned to earmark more university funds to support their work.
Silicon Valley Bank’s annual healthcare M&A report, Trends in Healthcare Investments and Exits, examines the merger and acquisition and IPO activity of private, venture-backed biopharma and medical device companies.
Twenty-five U.S. institutions have been selected by the NSF-funded National Center for Engineering Pathways to Innovation (Epicenter) to join the Pathways to Innovation Program.
The Pathways to Innovation Program is designed to help institutions fully incorporate innovation and entrepreneurship into undergraduate engineering education. The program is run by Epicenter, which is funded by the National Science Foundation and directed by Stanford University and VentureWell (formerly NCIIA).
DATE: February 11, 2015 3:30 - 5:00 PM
LOCATION: Montgomery County Department of Economic Development, 111 Rockville Pike, Suite 800, Rockville, MD 20850
We're kicking off 2015 with a new (permanent) location and a wide variety of new programs for innovators and entrepreneurs in Montgomery County. Have you heard of the Thingstitute? Do you know about the Venture Mentoring Program? Guess what - there's also a new life sciences accelerator! All of this (and much more!) including Montgomery County's new emphasis on identifying funding sources for your business. You won't want to miss this program.
In what it's calling a 'historic' announcement, the Department of Health and Human Services has set new goals to speed the U.S. healthcare system toward value-based care.
HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell announced Monday that the agency wants to tie 30 percent of fee-for-service Medicare payments to quality or value through alternative payment models, such as accountable care organizations or bundled payments, by the end of 2016. It also aims to have 50 percent of payments affiliated with these models by the end of 2018.
DreamIt Health Baltimore announced its second cohort on Monday.
The startups that make up the accelerator’s class of 2015 include a telehealth platfrom, an app to improve patient handoffs and a photo-sharing service for healthcare professionals. Five of the six companies are from outside Baltimore, with one hailing from Spain. Officials also noted that two of the companies are female-founded.
Improving patient handoffs, autotransfusion, Epic alumni and a couple of women-led startups figure into DreamIt Health Baltimore‘s second class of early stage healthcare companies. They will also be the first to occupy its permanent office at a new shared working space.
In a phone interview with DreamIt Ventures Managing Director Jason Hardebeck, he noted that the accelerator has added new partners — University of Maryland in Baltimore, including its medical school, and The Abell Foundation.
In early January Brenton “Brent” Saunders, the chief executive of upstart pharmaceutical giant Actavis , reclined in a medical chair on a stage in an Orlando hotel ballroom as a plastic surgeon pierced his face 30 times, delivering needles full of Botox to the crooks of his eyes and nose and injecting Juvederm Voluma, a dermal filler, into his cheeks. A cameraman documented every prick and projected it on a huge screen behind him. These are bestselling products for Allergan AGN -0.51%, which Actavis is buying for $67 billion, the biggest health care deal in six years. The audience, 1,000 Allergan sales reps, went wild.
CEOCFO: Mr. Fannon, what is the basic concept at BioIT Solutions?
Mr. Fannon: BioIT Solutions was formed to address needs for advanced computational, workflow and data management systems for biological research, drug development and diagnostics. Biology has become an information science. As scientists decoded the genome and discovered genes that encode proteins, results were stored in databases that form the basis for new approaches to biological discovery. There is a lot of emphasis on digital biology these days -- work that used to require painstaking lab experiments can now be done, very efficiently, using databases and computational tools. The significant and rapid convergence of biology and information science is creating excellent opportunities for effective solutions for research, diagnostics, and personalized medicine.
Tuesday, Feb 10, 2015 From 4:00-6:00 PM
Please join us for a Business Roundtable Discussion moderated by Bernanrd T. Ferrari, MD, JD, Prfoessor and Dean - Carey School of Business, at our new FastForward East Innovation Hub!
Funding and Research Opportunities
The following funding opportunity announcements from the NHLBI or other components of the National Institutes of Health, might be of interest:
Notices:
Requests for Applications:
Montgomery County launches into the future as it establishes the Thingstitute, an innovative living laboratory for Internet of Things (IoT) technology. By providing an unparalleled test bed for start-ups, established companies, and research institutions, the lab will feature co-working space and equipment for fabricating and testing devices.
Located in Rockville's historic Red Brick Courthouse, the Thingstitute will host an opening reception on Tuesday, January 27, 2015 from 5:30-7:00 pm.
Advocates for programs spending state dollars on stem cell research or investment in technology companies were nervous about what Gov. Larry Hogan's budget would hold for them, given warnings of "strong medicine" to cure fiscal woes.
But after Hogan's spending plan was unveiled Friday, they were relieved to find that the Republican's business-friendly message spared several economic development programs that were popular under Democratic Gov. Martin O'Malley.
View the '15 Biggest Innovations in Health Tech' infographic from Innovation in Practice.
The first batch of GlaxoSmithKline's experimental Ebola vaccine has been dispatched to West Africa and is expected to arrive in Liberia later on Friday, the British drugmaker said.
The World Health Organization said on Thursday the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, the worst in history, appears to be waning but cautioned against complacency. The epidemic has seen 21,724 cases reported in nine countries since it started in Guinea a year ago. Some 8,641 people have died.
March 10-11, 2015 - Chicago, IL
INVESTORS & INDUSTRY UNITE
MidAmerica Healthcare Venture Forum is the premier healthcare investing conference, uniting active investors with corporate business development executives to facilitate investment opportunities with promising startups.
Over 300 innovative thought-leaders, prominent industry players, venture capitalists and angel investors will gather in Chicago in March, to discuss latest trends in reimbursement, a status update on healthcare accelerators, best approaches to commercialization and new business models in healthcare and beyond.
UNC-Chapel Hill has created a $5 million fund to help startups commercialize technology developed at the university.
The new Carolina Research Venture Fund, an initiative of the university’s board of trustees, aims to address the dearth of seed funding available to startups. A long-standing maxim in the startup world is that the first infusion of cash is the toughest to raise.
U.S. venture capital investment hit $48.3 billion in 2014, its highest level since 2000, according to data from the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). Investments jumped 61 percent over the previous year in terms of dollars. Deals were up as well, but by a more modest 4 percent to 4,356 deals in 2014, indicating the growth of deal size and the presence of a number of “megadeals.” NVCA also noted that investments were dispersed throughout the country, with 160 U.S. metros receiving some venture capital.
With the surge in digital health tech, entrepreneurs who dream of developing the next killer healthcare app have plenty of reason to be optimistic. 2014 was a record-breaking year with over $4.1B in venture funding for digital health companies, more than the previous three years combined, according to Mercom Capital Group. The future of healthcare technology includes wearables that monitor vitals, apps that facilitate outpatient care, CRM systems that allow physicians to forge better relationships with patients, and more.
The Federal Trade Commission has finally approved the joint venture of Novartis AG (ADR) (NYSE:NVS) and GlaxoSmithKline Plc (ADR) (NYSE:GSK) in consumer health products, and Novartis has agreed to divest its Habitrol line of nicotine patches.
District-based biotech company Regenxbio has raised a $30 million funding round to move its drugs into clinical trials. T
he Washington Post reports the company's gene therapy technology, which introduces healthy genes into patients suffering from genetic disorders, will initially focus on treating diseases affecting the central nervous system and eyes. However, executives tell the Post the treatment could be used on as many as 50 different diseases.
MedImmune has formed a partnership with the National Cancer Institute to develop cancer therapies that use the immune system or attack tumor cells to fight the disease.
BioCity, the incubation specialist with locations in the East Midlands, North West and Scotland has announced a new investment fund, created following a significant contribution by AstraZeneca.
The £5 million fund, to be managed by BioCity will make equity investments, typically between £50,000 and £250,000, in life science companies based at Alderley Park, Cheshire. BioCity Chairman, Dr Louis Nisbet explains: “We are very pleased that AstraZeneca has chosen BioCity to manage these funds, not only to support the growth of a new generation of life science businesses at Alderley Park but also to make sound investment decisions that aim to replenish and grow this evergreen fund over time."
CDVCA is organizing its 20th anniversary Annual Conference in Washington, DC on March 18-20, 2015 in Washington, DC. CDVCA’s Annual Conference is the premier training and networking event for anyone interested in developmental venture capital, including social VC fund managers, emerging fund managers, investors, economic development professionals, foundations representatives, policy makers, government officials and aspiring students.
Startup Maryland's first entrepreneur-in-residence is an old hand at helping startups create leadership dream teams.
Shahab Kaviani, co-founder and CEO of CoFoundersLab in Rockville, will work with Startup Maryland members to tackle business development issues such as branding, community outreach and raising money.
BioIT Solutions, a provider of enterprise systems built on the 1Platform4™ product suite, today announced that CIO Review has chosen BioIT Solutions as one of its 20 Most Promising Biotechnology Solution providers.
BioIT Solutions was selected for its expertise in providing data management solutions for biotech research, drug development, and diagnostics. The annual list of companies is selected by a panel of experts and members of CIO Review’s editorial board to recognize and promote technology entrepreneurship.
Germantown-based Intrexon Corp. a synthetic biology company, plans to raise up to $150 million though a secondary offering of common stock, the company said late Tuesday.
Intrexon (NYSE: XON) was trading at around $29 a share Wednesday.
Washington, D.C.-based REGENXBIO Inc., announced today that it had completed a $30 million Series C financing. The round was led by Enrick and Brookside Capital. Also participating were Deerfield Management and an unnamed new investor.
Following AstraZeneca's December announcement that it is taking steps to reintroduce the EGFR-targeted non-small cell lung cancer drug Iressa (gefitinib) in the US, Qiagen said last week that it would develop a tissue-based molecular diagnostic test to accompany the drug's launch.
Venture capital investment soared in 2014, hitting a high that hasn’t been seen since 2000. As reported in The Wall Street Journal, $52.12 billion was invested in private companies last year by venture and private equity firms, as well as corporations, hedge funds and mutual funds, according to Dow Jones VentureSource.
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) has 3 targeted funding opportunities with deadlines in February. It’s also not too early to start preparing for the April 5 Omnibus solicitation deadline. Check your registrations (SAM must be renewed annually!) and reach out to discuss your project.
For questions about the NHLBI SBIR/STTR programs, contact Small Business Coordinator Jennifer Shieh, PhD at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Human Cellular Models for Predicting Individual Responses to CFTR-Directed Therapeutics— Due February 9
For the development and validation of novel in vitro human cell-based tools for predicting the responses of individual patients to cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR)-directed therapeutics for cystic fibrosis lung disease.
SBIR: RFA-HL-15-027 STTR: RFA-HL-15-026
For questions about these funding opportunities, contact:
Robert Smith, PhD, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Program Director, Division of Lung Diseases
Development of a Microfluidic Platform for Blood Testing in Neonatal & Pediatric Patients— Due February 10 (Phase II only)
For the development of microfluidic devices to analyze blood for factors related to the thrombotic, transfusion, and/or hemostatic status of pediatric/neonatal patients.
SBIR—Phase II only: RFA-HL-14-026
This application must be based on an awarded SBIR or STTR-funded Phase I project.
For questions about this funding opportunity, contact:
Ronald Warren, PhD, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Program Director, Division of Blood Diseases and Resources
Stem Cell-Derived Blood Products for Therapeutic Use: Technology Improvement— Due February 20
For tools and technologies that enable further advances in the manufacturing process to produce safe and functional blood and platelet products at reduced costs.
SBIR: RFA-HL-15-030 STTR: RFA-HL-15-029
Slides from the January 8 webinar are available—please send a request to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
For questions about these funding opportunities, contact:
Shimian Zou, PhD, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Program Director, Division of Blood Diseases and Resources
John Thomas, PhD, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Program Director, Division of Blood Diseases and Resources