News Archive

Roche Holding AG said Sunday it would pay $8.3 billion for a California biotech firm that has yet to turn a profit on a new drug to treat a deadly lung disease—the latest gamble by a pharmaceutical giant to buy its way into a lucrative corner of the industry.

The takeover would allow the Swiss company to expand its presence in the treatment of respiratory disorders, one of the world’s biggest drug markets. Roche’s offer of $74 a share represents a 38% premium over InterMune’s closing share price on Friday of $53.80, and a 63% premium before takeover speculation surrounding the biotech started circulating this month.

The interest in using health IT tools as a way to improve healthcare delivery and efficiency has produced many rapidly growing healthcare companies, many of which can trace their origins within one or two years of Obamacare’s passage. These companies have reached a stage of their development to accelerate growth and that has coincided with a readiness by healthcare providers and payers to adopt or ramp up their technology.

With a nod to the top healthcare company on Inc’s 5,000 Fastest Growing Companies, molecular diagnostic companies with smartphone-enabled technology have also become more attractive as investment and acquisition targets.

The 2014 Steering Committee of the Montgomery County Executive Hispanic Gala (MCEHG) announces the first of three awards to be presented during the gala celebration on September 18, 2014 to take place at The Fillmore Silver Spring. 

University of Maryland President, Dr. Wallace D. Loh, will be the 2014 recipient of the “Advocate of the Year Award”.

The Daily Record announced Thursday its 2014 Innovators of the Year, celebrating Marylanders and Maryland-based companies for their innovative spirit.

Twenty-eight innovators will be celebrated during the awards event on Oct. 15 at the American Visionary Art Museum, at 800 Key Highway in Baltimore.

In July, alongside the ÜberResearch team, we launched a Twitter competition open to PhD students. The task was to tweet how you would spend £10 million of science funding using the hashtag #uberresearchprize. 

We had hundreds of tweets and the top three, as voted by our judging panel, were then invited to write a blog post, delving into their original tweet. Over the next few days we will publish the top three blog posts here on our blog, announcing the winner on Monday 25th August. 

The Maryland Technology Development Corp. is launching a new investment fund dedicated to cyber security.

The fund will make investments of up to $100,000 in companies that are developing and commercializing new cyber security projects.

JMI Equity closed a $1 billion growth equity fund targeted at investing in software companies and services companies, it announced Wednesday.

The fund is the largest raised by JMI, a private equity firm operating out of offices in Baltimore and San Diego. The firm has raised more than $3.1 billion in committed capital since its founding in 1992. The largest fund JMI previously closed on was an $875 million fund completed in November 2010.

DATE: September 10, 2014 – 3:30 – 5:00 PM

LOCATION: Germantown Innovation Center, 20271 Goldenrod Lane, 2nd Floor, Germantown, MD 20874

As a federal agency, the Department of Energy is creative and innovative. Unlike other federal laboratories, each contractor-operated laboratory manages its own tech transfer agreements. Learn how to navigate these various opportunities and identify the best way to gain access to the technologies and partnerships to enhance your companies growth.

David E. Koegel
David Koegel is the senior technoogy transfer advisor in the Office of Science (SC) at the Department of Energy. A member of the Department’s Technology Transfer Policy Board, his experience in technology transfer goes back to the early 90’s when he was the Office’s Program Manager for American Textile partnership in the Laboratory Technology Transfer Program, a technology transfer collaboration among members of the integrated textile industry, the DOE national laboratories, a number of universities, and several research/education/technology transfer organizations. A member of the National Advisory Council of the Federal Laboratory Consortium, David has been the Department’s representative to the FLC for many years, as well as their representative to the federal Interagency Working Group on Technology Transfer. One of his significant duties involves the annual appraisal of the ten Office of Science national laboratories and is the primary point of contact for the various programs and organizations that use the laboratories’ personnel and facilities. Previously, he had been the Department’s Senior Technology Analyst in the SBIR/STTR Program, the Office of Science Small Business Program Manager, as well as the Program Manager for the Advanced Energy Projects program.

David joined the Department after spending several years at the Pentagon in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Research, Development, and Acquisition, most notably during Desert Shield/Desert Storm, acting as a liaison to the Army’s laboratory system. Prior to this, he conducted research at the Army’s Night Vision Laboratory using metal organic chemical vapor deposition for the development of advanced infrared imaging devices.

David earned a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and an M.S. in Materials Science Engineering.

Location: MD, Gaithersburg – Corporate Headquarters

This will be a highly visible position dedicated to ensuring MedImmune further builds its collaboration efforts with governments, universities and non-profit organizations. The primary objective of this role will be to further entrench MedImmune in key biotech clusters to gain access to leading science and technology, enhance MedImmune’s reputation and create operational flexibility. The role will entail scouting for cross-therapeutic scientific collaboration opportunities, negotiating deals, working closely with internal scientists, event planning and strategic planning and analysis.