
TearSolutions, a Charlottesville-based biotechnology startup just received an $8.5 million shot in the arm, courtesy of the VTC Innovation Fund and Pharmstandard International, one of Russia’s largest pharmaceutical companies.

TearSolutions, a Charlottesville-based biotechnology startup just received an $8.5 million shot in the arm, courtesy of the VTC Innovation Fund and Pharmstandard International, one of Russia’s largest pharmaceutical companies.

A new innovation space from the University of Maryland, Baltimore is opening inside the historic Lion Brothers building on Hollins Street.
About 6,200 square feet of the 38,000-square-foot building will be dedicated to offices, class/meeting rooms and coworking space geared toward supporting entrepreneurship and technology startups. The new space will be called the GRID, an acronym for Graduate Research Innovation District, and will be housed in the revamped former Lion Brothers Co. clothing and embroidery factory near the university’s BioPark campus.

For the first time in five years, federal funding for higher education research and development increased in both current and constant dollars, according to recently released data from the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics within the National Science Foundation. In FY 2016, universities reported $72.0 billion in total R&D expenditures, a 4.8 percent increase from FY 2015. Of this amount, more than half (54 percent) came from the federal government. Institutionally financed research represented 16 percent, the second largest source of R&D funds at universities in FY 2016.

Epidarex Capital (“Epidarex”), an early-stage, transatlantic life science venture fund, today announced that its portfolio company, Harpoon Medical, Inc. (“Harpoon”), a pioneer in beating-heart repair for degenerative mitral regurgitation (DMR), has been acquired by Edwards Lifesciences for up to $250 million. Under the terms of the merger agreement, Edwards paid $100 million in cash for Harpoon at closing on December 1, 2017 with a potential for up to an additional $150 million in pre-specified milestone-driven payments.

The Emmes Corporation today announced its statistical and data management support of a clinical trial that offers new hope for children with cerebral palsy (CP). Stephen Wease and Dr. Beth Blackwell joined a team of prominent researchers from Duke University Medical Center to test whether umbilical cord blood would improve motor skills function in children suffering from the disorder.

The move is welcome news for Prime Minister Theresa May, who has struggled to win over large sections of industry as Britain prepares to leave the European Union.

Proteros biostructures GmbH today announced that the Company’s Supervisory board had appointed Dave Lemus, previously a non-executive director at Proteros, as Executive Vice Chairman, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer of Proteros Biostructures GmbH. Additionally, he will serve in the role of Non-Executive Board Chairman of Proteros USA, Inc., the Company’s newly formed subsidiary in the U.S.A., where he will be based.

A Rockville-based research and development company working on a cheap and fast diagnostic test for infectious diseases will be the first tenant of Inova Health System’s new accelerator that officially opened Thursday.

When the 13 teams that made up Fed Tech’s fall 2017 cohort took the stage for their first pitch night in September, it wasn’t entirely smooth sailing.
The entrepreneurs, some of whom had been introduced to their assigned technology just days earlier, struggled to pronounce long scientific words or, in some cases, explain what the technology is at all. The task wasn’t easy, but the entrepreneurs didn’t get a pass either. “You gotta tell me what you do,” the group of rowdy mentors lobbed at one team. “Tell me who cares.”

A reindeer with a red glowing nose.
A heart, two sizes two small, that suddenly grows three sizes.
A trip to the past and to the future — all in one night.