News Archive

For Marie Johnson, coming up with a better way to detect coronary artery disease is both a business and a personal mission.

Johnson is CEO of AUM Cardiovascular, a Minnesota medical device company that’s developing a potentially cheaper, simpler, eight-minute test to detect signs of coronary artery disease — the primary cause of heart attack.

Just what is a “National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence,” anyway?

I’ve heard this question muttered repeatedly, in one form or another, in the course of covering the ongoing bio vs. cyber dispute over the future of the William Hanna Center for Innovation at Shady Grove.

Cangene Corporation (“Cangene”) (TSX: CNJ) today announced that the Ontario Superior Court of Justice issued a final order approving the Plan of Arrangement for the previously announced acquisition of Cangene by Emergent BioSolutions Inc. (NYSE: EBS). Under the court-approved Plan of Arrangement, Cangene shareholders will receive US$3.24 per share (C$3.56(1) per share) in cash, for an aggregate purchase price of US$222 million (approximately C$244 million(2) ).

Cangene previously announced that the waiting period mandated under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976 in connection with the transaction expired on January 28, 2014. On February 12, 2014, the Plan of Arrangement was approved by approximately 99.95% of the votes cast at a special meeting of Cangene’s common shareholders, which constituted more than 90.1% of the outstanding Cangene common shares.

Federal and Maryland officials signed an agreement on Tuesday with the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg to develop new cyber security technology and provide opportunities for students in the state.

The agreement plans to expand on a February 2012 collaboration agreement signed by NIST, Maryland officials and Montgomery County officials to establish the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence.

Epidarex Capital, a leading international early-stage life science venture capital fund, has invested in Confluence Life Sciences Inc., a biotechnology company focused on the rapid discovery and development of drugs to address unmet needs in cancer and chronic inflammatory disease.

Confluence’s innovative KINect Technology Platform enables the identification and development of new protein kinase drugs in a fraction of the time of other approaches.  Confluence’s team of world-class drug developers has created a pipeline of drug candidates which focus on creating kinase inhibitors targeting hard-to-treat cancers.  Confluence’s lead program targets the kinase TAK1, which is important in cancer cell transformation, metastasis, tumor growth and drug resistance, especially in pancreatic and other cancers such as breast and colon.

University of Maryland (UM) Ventures and Harpoon Medical, Inc. announced today that Harpoon Medical has obtained exclusive rights to a portfolio of technologies for cardiac valve repair from the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB). The licensed technology was developed in the Division of Cardiac Surgery at The University of Maryland School of Medicine. A $200,000 award from the BioMaryland Center and a $50,000 BioMaryland LIFE (Leading Innovative Faculty Entrepreneurs) Prize supported the company’s early development efforts. Since the company’s formation in early July 2013, the Harpoon Medical team has secured more than $300,000 in competitive grants and additional award funding from the BioMaryland Center and TEDCO.

“Harpoon Medical is a particularly exciting UMB startup and the minimally invasive technology for mitral valve repair – without the need to open the chest or stop the heart – has the potential to dramatically improve patient care,” said Phil Robilotto, the University’s Assistant Vice President, Office of Technology Transfer. “Harpoon’s management team has a well-established track record, and Harpoon has already made significant progress on both the product development and fundraising fronts.”

Here in Washington, we woke up to a thick blanket of snow from the largest snowstorm of an already active winter season.  The federal government, schools and stores have closed. It got me thinking about what a snow day can tell you about your office, agency or company. It’s a good test that reveals a lot about how you are organized, your technology and your culture.

At my company, we regularly work across multiple client sites, at home, in our D.C. office and in multiple states—snow or no snow. Flexibility is one of our core values. So when a snow day hits, we just keep going. It’s not that different than any other day working from home except for the parents of young children whose schools are closed.

The Tech Council of Maryland (TCM), Maryland’s largest technology trade association with more than 400 life science and technology members employing over 200,000 in the region, today announced that individuals from Hewlett-Packard Co., Johns Hopkins University, MedImmune, RCM&D and SoBran Inc. were named to the association’s board of directors.

“We are excited to have this impressive group of individuals on the TCM board,” said Phil Schiff, TCM’s CEO. “Their individual and collective expertise will be invaluable as the association evolves to address the changing needs of our membership.”

One of IBM’s first app ecosystem partners for Watson, the health optimization company Welltok Inc., became the first firm to benefit from a $100 million venture fund IBM established to promote the use of its cognitive computing technology.

Welltok has raised $22.1 million in Series C funding led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA) with new participation from IBM and Qualcomm Ventures. This brings Welltok’s funding in the last nine months to more than $40 million.