Juan Carlos Lopez of Roche and Mike Gill, Secretary for Maryland’s Department of Business and Economic Development, Join BHI Board
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI) announced today that its Board of Directors has unanimously voted and approved the appointments of Board Member Juan Carlos Lopez, Ph.D., Head of the Academic Relations and Collaborations (ARC) Group at Roche Pharma Research and Early Development (pRED), and Ex-Officio Board Member Mike Gill, Secretary, Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED), State of Maryland.
“We are pleased to have two powerhouse individuals join our dynamic board,” said Richard Bendis, BHI President and CEO. “We also want to thank Roche’s Dr. Judith Dunn for her commitment and service to our board during her tenure, which has now ended. We are grateful for her leadership and contributions during her time with us.”
Dr. Lopez leads the Roche pRED’s team in conducting outreach to academic and non-profit biomedical research and healthcare organizations for purposes of enhancing and complementing their internal R&D efforts. He began his career with the Nature Publishing Group in 2000, coming on board as an Associate Editor to launch Nature Reviews Neuroscience. In less than a year, he advanced to Chief Editor and led the publication to become the top monthly reviews journal in the neuroscience field, a position it retains to this day. In 2004, he was named Chief Editor at Nature Medicine, which is ranked by the Institute of Scientific Investigation as the world’s top journal in experimental and research medicine.
TEDCO recently awarded BHI with a $10,000 grant to support up-and-coming biohealth enterprises. The funding comes from TEDCO’s 2016 Incubator Assistance Program (“The Program”), to which BHI submitted a proposal earlier this year. The Program is intended to assist Maryland’s incubators in providing added value to their client companies.
“BHI continues to be a leader in identifying and supporting biohealth companies that will make a difference in our region,” said TEDCO’s President and Executive Director Rob Rosenbaum. “Our Incubator Assistance Program—which has become highly competitive—is designed to reward those incubators that will have a significant impact and continue to maximize Maryland’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. We are pleased to present this funding to BHI.”
Secretary of Commerce Mike Gill is looking for an energetic and focused individual to lead the State’s activities in the life sciences arena. This is a highly collaborative role. Its objective is to advance Maryland as the premier center for biotechnology innovation and entrepreneurial vitality in the nation. The position is based within the Department of Business and Economic Development, and reports to the Managing Director of Business and Industry Sector Development.
MedImmune, the global biologics research and development arm of AstraZeneca, and Cancer Research UK today said they have opened a new laboratory focused on the discovery and development of new biologic cancer treatments and diagnostics.
The CRUK-MEDI Alliance Laboratory in Cambridge, UK, on Granta Park, was opened this week by UK Life Sciences Minister George Freeman, MP. The new lab reflects an alliance involving MedImmune, Cancer Research UK, and its commercialization and development subsidiary Cancer Research Technology.
Monday, September 21, 2015 from 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM (EDT)
This event is to gather interested small businesses seeking assistance from the Small Business Innovation Research grants program from the National Institutes of Health. This is a free event brought to you by BioHealth Innovation. Hear from the SBIR managers on current Institute funding priorities. Meet one-on-one with program managers regarding your current project. Learn of SBIR assistance provided by BioHealth Innovation.
Billionaire physician-entrepreneur Patrick Soon-Shiong seems to be orchestrating an entire M&A ecosystem within his own entities.
Two more Nant companies reporting mega-funding: NantOmics has raised $150 million and NantCell has raised $100 million, both from a single investor, according to two SEC filings (here and here). These startups fall under the umbrella company NantWorks that was launched by Soon-Shiong in Los Angeles in 2011.
The project team includes leading behavioral health, family practice, and implementation scientists at Drexel University, the University of California Los Angeles, Northwestern University, and multiple primary care and behavioral health organizations and practice sites. This contract is for the enhancement of the referral relationship and the data dashboard components of www.BH-Works.com. It will help all sizes of networks, including Performing Provider System (PPS), Accountable Care Organization (ACO), and other kinds of provider groups and organizations, to improve the management of their patient populations as related to behavioral and mental health. mdlogix will apply its Relational Network Optimization (RNO) methodology to guide and measure continuous improvements in referral relationships.
Rockville-based RegenxBio Inc. has priced shares for its initial public offering, which could raise as much as $121 million.
RegenxBio will offer 5,555,555 shares of common stock, with a planned price range of $17 to $19 per share. Underwriters also have the option to buy an additional 833,333 shares.
BHI is a public-private partnership with a mission of fostering commercialization of health and life sciences assets with a focus on the Central Maryland region that stretches from Baltimore to the suburbs of Washington, DC. BHI is known for providing commercial assistance to scientists and founders in the early-stages of forming new ventures and supporting the early growth of these ventures. Our goals are aimed at infusing a new class of growth companies in the vibrant biohealth ecosystem in Central Maryland and support the continued growth to be one of the leading clusters of biohealth economic activity in the world. BHI realizes this mission through our partnerships with the leading institutions from industry, government, academia and investment communities with a record of prominence and success within the industry. Our distinguished partners include MedImmune, Qiagen, Becton Dickinson, Roche, Emergent Biosolutions, Sigma-Tau Pharmaceuticals, Adventist HealthCare, SR One, NEA, Alexandria Real Estate Equities, M&T Bank, Greenspring Associates, Johns Hopkins University, and the University System of Maryland.
The Johns Hopkins University and Luminox-Health, a leading Israeli startup hub focused on digital health, have entered into a multiyear collaborative agreement connecting Israeli entrepreneurs with Johns Hopkins medical expertise, faculty thought-leadership, technology, and network of business partners and investors. Johns Hopkins faculty members will have the opportunity to team up with Israeli entrepreneurs to build solutions to modern medical challenges, which will enable Johns Hopkins to take a leadership role as a pioneer in identifying and driving e-health innovation in the U.S. and abroad.
The agreement brings together one of the world’s pre-eminent medical research institutions and the unique emerging digital health innovation ecosystem of a country that has been called startup nation. Israel is home to more startups per capita than anywhere else in the world. In spite of the proliferation of startups, Israeli entrepreneurs find it challenging to gain access to strategic U.S. partners to further develop their ideas into real-world solutions and grow their companies in the international marketplace.
Six new research professorships have been endowed with $14.9 million in private donations and state funding, the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED) announced Wednesday. The state funds were committed through the Maryland E-Nnovation Initiative, which matches private donations to universities for basic and applied research in scientific and technical fields.
The University of Maryland, College Park; University of Maryland Baltimore; and Johns Hopkins University each received $2.1 million through the program to be split among a pair of new professorships at each school.
After more than a year, MOVE continues to bring business to the county
The MOVE program continues to offer financial incentives to companies moving to Montgomery County a little more than a year after it was inaugurated. The county launched the program in February 2014 following its announcement by County Executive Isiah Leggett. It was actively marketed on both the our websites, through direct mail, with digital and print ads, along with a radio advertising campaign.
The first company to take advantage of the program was computer pioneer L-Soft. In October 2014, L-Soft’s Founder and CEO Eric Thomas moved his company’s operation from Virginia to Montgomery County.
Global venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates, Inc. (NEA) today announced the appointment of Stephen Oesterle, MD, as Venture Partner. Dr. Oesterle is a former Senior Vice President for Medtronic, Inc., the world’s largest medical device company, and brings to NEA more than two decades of experience spanning health technology investment, corporate strategy, and general management.
“Dr. Oesterle is one of the most widely known and respected leaders in the medical device industry, and it is an honor to welcome him to the NEA team,” said Dr. Josh Makower, NEA General Partner and founder of several medical device companies. “Steve brings with him a vast global network of relationships across the academic, technical, clinical, entrepreneurial, and venture communities. His experience in the health technology investment space coupled with his business development and general management background will be invaluable resources to the companies in our portfolio and to the NEA partnership.”
AstraZeneca, in a move to increase its biologics manufacturing capacity in the United States, has acquired a high-tech biologics bulk manufacturing plant in Boulder, Colo., from Amgen Inc.
Fifteen Maryland technology startups and one medium-sized company are partnering with faculty members from the state’s public universities for projects that bring new products closer to market, University of Maryland officials announce today.
Approved through UMD’s Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) program, the research and development projects, worth $3 million, span the state, its universities and technologies, including products that advance clean or efficient energy, biotechnology, software, construction, chemical sensors and aquaculture.
Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center on Thursday will break ground on its planned $100 million, 184,00-square-foot cancer center.
The Skip Viragh Outpatient Cancer Building, named for Maryland mutual fund investment leader and former Hopkins patient Albert P. “Skip” Viragh Jr., is expected to open in 2017 at the northeast corner of Fayette Street and North Broadway. Hopkins first announced the project in May 2014.
University System of Maryland (USM) schools once again have been recognized among the nation’s top universities in recent rankings by multiple publications.
The U.S. News & World Report 2016 edition of America’s Best Colleges released this month recognizes several USM institutions for academic excellence.
On September 11, 2015, at 10 a.m. the University of Maryland’s (UMD) Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), in the A. James Clark School of Engineering, will celebrate the opening of the Texas Instruments Discovery Lab, where first-year engineering students are being exposed to basic electrical and computer engineering concepts in a revolutionary, hands-on way. This lab opening at UMD is part of a company-level commitment by Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) to ensure young engineering students are engineering- and industry-ready by inspiring them at the inception of their academic careers.
The Texas Instruments Discovery Lab is the setting for a unique approach to engineering curriculum. The Lab will house “ENEE 101: What’s Cool in ECE.” This course, being piloted this semester, is an introductory course meant to anchor students in the A. James Clark School’s electrical and computer engineering program. ENEE 101 features hands-on activities that highlight the role of electrical and computer engineering in the real world. Required for all incoming freshman students, it will allow them to understand the relevance of the technical subjects they will study and their relationship to the profession.
No one chooses to spend their time or resources on a project that is destined to be unsuccessful; but, 99% of innovative project ideas will indeed fail. While trial and error is a fundamental component of scientific investigation, recent retrospective analyses of biopharmaceutical project failure have determined that in at least 50% of the cases failure could have be predicted prior to experimentation. The objective of this webinar is to identify some of the most common causes for biopharmaceutical project failure, how they can be recognized, scored and, potentially, worked around before they occur. Not only is project success and timely tractability dependent on understanding and avoiding these, but also the attractiveness of one’s project to potential investors and partners.
Relative to other affluent countries, the United States devotes disproportionate resources to health care with disappointing results. Complex insurance rules and distorted market signals create massive inefficiencies, frustrated patients, and providers burdened by excessive paperwork. Recognizing these problems, entrepreneurs are increasingly applying information technology to health care equipment, monitoring, treatment, and service delivery, creating a sector known as digital health. These technologies, once embedded and distributed around the country, hold the potential to substantially alter the efficiency and quality of health care through the better generation, processing, and use of information; the reduction of overhead costs; and the empowerment of patients.
Research involving editing the human genome, including research with human embryos, is essential to gain basic understanding of biology and germ cells and should be permitted, according to one of the first global meetings to debate the controversial new techniques.
The bold statement was published today (Thursday, Sept. 10) by the Hinxton Group, a global network of stem cell researchers, bioethicists, and experts on policy and scientific publishing, who met in Manchester, England, September 3–4.
San Francisco and Boston accounts for the most investment in digital health and the largest volume of deals. But research from The Brookings Institution shows another way to size up digital health investment beyond these two bookends by looking at the proportion of VC money in metropolitan areas going to digital health.
Peter Thiel knows a promising tech startup when he sees one. The investor was the first outside investor in Facebook. But does he have the same touch in biotech?
The prominent Silicon Valley venture capitalist’s investment fund has put its largest ever bet on a biotech company called Stemcentrx, a private and all-but-unheard-of San Francisco company developing cancer drugs that debuted this week with a spectacular valuation worth billions (see “Peter Thiel Backs Biotech ‘Unicorn’ Fighting Cancer Stem Cells”).
The Buzz of BIO at the BIO Investor Forum competition featured 19 nominees pulling in over 3,000 votes. Winners receive one complimentary registration to the BIO Investor Forum, a complimentary Company Presentation and promotion to industry leaders including a spotlight in BioCentury Extra.
The Buzz of BIO contest drew a record breaking 3,000 collective votes. This year’s winners will join more than 120 companies presenting at the BIO Investor Forum. New presenters are continuously being added. For updates on the list of presenting companies, please visit here. If you are interested in becoming a presenter, please submit an application here. The typical audience for company presentations features public, institutional and private equity investors, research analysts, investment bankers and industry executives.
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