A Silver Spring company is looking to build the county’s first net zero facility, a building that would produce enough energy to sustain itself annually.
United Therapeutics —a biotechnology company that works on the development and commercialization of unique medical products — is expanding its campus with the new facility on the corner of Spring Street and Colesville Road in downtown Silver Spring. The building at 1000 Spring Street will have solar panels, a green roof and special placement of windows to allow for natural light and cross breezes to push hot air out of the facility, among other environmentally sustainable features, according to a presentation the design team gave to the Silver Spring Citizens Advisory Board on July 8.
Rexahn Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NYSE MKT: RNN), a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, announced today that it has signed an exclusive license agreement with the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) for a novel drug delivery platform, Nano-Polymer-Drug Conjugate Systems (NPDCS). This technology targets the delivery of currently marketed chemotherapeutic agents directly into cancerous tumors. The direct delivery of chemotherapeutic drugs into the tumors has been shown to result in increased efficacy and reduced toxicity.
The NPDCS platform combines existing chemotherapeutic agents with a proprietary polymer carrier that contains a signaling moiety which directs the drug into the tumor. This approach minimizes the levels of freely circulating anti-cancer agents in the body, which can dramatically reduce potential adverse events, and maximizes anti-tumor activity by accumulating in the cancer tumor. NPDCS is a broad platform that has the potential to generate multiple therapeutic candidates going forward.
Emergent BioSolutions Inc. (NYSE:EBS) today announced the appointment of General George A. Joulwan (retired) to the company’s Board of Directors. General Joulwan has a highly distinguished military career that spans 36 years from 1961 to his retirement in 1997. Highlights of General Joulwan’s military service include: Serving as Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR); Commander in Chief, U.S. Southern Command; Commanding General, V Corps and Commanding General, 3rd Armored Division, United States Army Europe and U.S. Seventh Army, Germany. He has received numerous military decorations and foreign awards and decorations for his bravery and service, including two Silver Stars for valor.
Fuad El-Hibri, executive chairman of the board of Emergent BioSolutions, stated, “General Joulwan has devoted his four-decade career to serving the country, protecting our freedoms, and architecting peace around the world. He is a true and distinguished public servant, who is highly-respected in the global military community. As we expand our portfolio with specialized products that address the needs of U.S. and worldwide governments, his expertise and stature will be invaluable in guiding Emergent’s management team towards further growth.”
Overseas medical technology companies continue to stream into Greater Boston, lured by the area’s famous ecosystem of researchers, startups, and potential collaborators.
One company that flew in under the radar was Qiagen N.V., a Dutch holding company with corporate offices in Germany, which quietly acquired two privately held Massachusetts companies last year and may—or may not—be expanding its foothold in the Boston area.
Montgomery Business Development Corporation is pleased to announce the launch of their new website montgomerybusiness.org.
The enhanced website includes business-friendly features, data resources and information to support existing and future business and development in our vibrant economy.
About 20 kids garbed in lab coats, booties and goggles entered a laboratory on Friday through a door marked with a bright-red “BIOHAZARD” sticker.
Filling the small room, they gathered around lab coordinator and microbiologist Cindy Reichelderfer, who held up several petri dishes in which scientists had tested for the presence of anthrax.
Johns Hopkins researchers have coaxed stem cells into forming networks of new blood vessels in the laboratory, then successfully transplanted them into mice, a technique that could potentially be used to make blood vessels genetically matched to individual patients, the investigators say.
Their research results appear online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) program, an initiative of the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute (Mtech) in the A. James Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland, has awarded $3.8 million to 17 teams combining Maryland companies with university researchers to bring technology products closer to market, program officials announce today.
MIPS, a technology acceleration program, grants money matched with company funds to faculty engaged in each project.
The Maryland Technology Development Corp. (Tedco) has invested $1.1 million in 14 state startups.
The grants were made through the organization’s Technology Commercialization Fund. The money will be put toward advancing the each company’s technology and product commercialization efforts.
Johns Hopkins Hospital has reclaimed the top position on U.S. News & World Report’s 2013-2014 list of best hospitals.
The return to No. 1 comes a year after Massachusetts General Hospital edged out Hopkins for the top spot on last year’s honor roll list. Hopkins had been No. 1 since 1991.
Venture capitalists invested $318 million in young Maryland companies from April through June, an increase of 115 percent from the first quarter, according to a report released Friday by PricewaterhouseCoopers.
About half of that financing, or $150 million, went to Precision for Medicine Inc., a Chevy Chase company that provides services for medical drug discovery, the report said. That was the highest amount any business in the country raised in the quarter and was matched only by a New York e-commerce website.
The D.C. region raised $418 million in venture funding in April, May and June, according PricewaterhouseCoopers’ MoneyTree report, more than twice the total of second quarter 2012.
The “DC/Metroplex,” as defined by PWC, includes far-flung areas of Virginia and Maryland, not just the District and its suburbs. With the strong second quarter haul, the region has raised nearly as much in the first half of 2013 ($704 million) as it did all of last year ($735 million). For comparison, companies in the area raised $203 million in Q2 2012, and $286 million in the first three months of 2013.
NCATS Research & Development Day will provide the unique opportunity to showcase the projects and technologies that have been incubating in a variety of NCATS drug development programs, including Therapeutics for Rare and Neglected Diseases (TRND) and Bridging Interventional Development Gaps (BrIDGs), to an audience of biopharmaceutical companies, venture capital, angel investors, foundations, and others. The object is to connect our collaborators with strategic partners that will provide financial and technical support to bring potential novel therapeutics to patients. The event will be held:
When: Wednesday July 24, 2013 from 4:30 PM to 7:00 PM EDT
Where: Growlers 227 E Diamond Ave Gaithersburg, MD 20877
Join us for a co-hosted BioBuzz and Women In Bio event with our sponsor, Social & Scientific Systems, Inc., along with many others from the local biotech industry at another exciting BioBuzz event on July 24th from 4:30 – 7:00 p.m. in Gaithersburg. Due to an overwhelming positive response to the location, we’re continuing to holding the event this month at Growlers in Old Towne Gaithersburg. We’re excited to see all of you soon, so please register today!
This announcement encourages applications that propose to develop a point of care device for the diagnosis of sickle cell disease (SCD) in infants and young children in low-income and low-resource settings. The aim of this program is to provide rapid diagnosis of SCD to children such that appropriate therapy can be given to reduce the risk of future complications.
Monday, August 19, 2013 – Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Time: 7:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Location: Natcher Conference Center 45 Center Drive Bethesda, MD 20892
Sponsored by: Blood Diseases Program Division of Blood Diseases and Resources National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute National Institutes of Health Department of Health and Human Services
National Cancer Institute scientists have released the largest-ever database of cancer-related genetic variations, providing researchers the most comprehensive way so far to figure out how to target treatments for the disease.
Open access worldwide to the new database, based on genome studies, is expected to help researchers accelerate development of new drugs and better match patients with therapies, NCI said in a statement on Monday.
We often hear public leaders say “our diversity is our strength,” which has become somewhat a cliché over the years. While I don’t doubt their sincerity in believing what they say, I wonder how many truly understand what it means to have a large, diverse, and global population in their communities.
This past weekend, I attended the Chinese Biopharmaceutical Association’s (CBA) 18th annual conference, which attracted scientists, educators, businesses and entrepreneurs from the region as well as delegations from several cities in China. It was a high-energy conference hosted by an all-volunteer crew of local community members.
If there’s one thing everyone in healthcare can probably agree on right now, it’s that there is an awful lot of data being generated each and every day. What to do with that data, however, is another question.
As Ted Driscoll, digital health director at venture capital firm Claremont Creek Ventures, sees it, the explosion of data is a definite boon for personalized medicine. Indeed, he said recently, “Medicine is becoming synonymous with big data – the data sets are just huge, now – but we had to wait for the IT revolution to happen and mature” in order to begin to put that data to use.
The year is only half over, but one of the biggest biotech stories of 2013 is going to be the resurgence of the biotech IPO market. It’s a good news/bad news story, depending on where you stand, and how far you look out into the future.
First, the good. The IPO surge is a vote of confidence in biotech from generalist investors who have spent years ignoring the industry. It’s good news for biotech entrepreneurs and venture capitalists who back them. A lot of money will get pumped into researching and developing drugs for diseases that have been long neglected, like Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Regional innovation clusters will get a boost. Many small companies will have more negotiating leverage when they talk to Big Pharma companies about acquisitions. It might spur more much-needed venture investment in biotech startups.
Biotechnology companies can access financial and management resources through venture capitalist (VC) firms. An analysis of 1,490 VC investments shows that country-of-origin (CO) of biotech companies has an effect on the participation by VC firms in various biotech subsectors. Specifically, it is found that US biotech companies tend to have higher amount received per VC firm, greater number of VC firms investing in them and greater biotech investment experience of the investing VC firms. Asia-Pacific biotech companies have consistently less VC firms investing in them and these investing VC firms tend to have less biotech investment experience. VC firms with greater biotech investment experience are also investing in European biotech companies more than those from the Americas less US. CO also correlates with outcomes in the four of the six key biotech subsectors studied. These findings suggest a strong CO effect of VC investment in biotech companies.
“We are a team of guerrilla fundraisers who have launched a global campaign to fund research into a potential treatment for the cancer that killed Steve Jobs. The potential therapy, a cancer-busting virus, is currently sitting in a freezer in Sweden – but it can’t be tested for lack of just £2million” was iCancer’s pitch on Indiegogo, a crowdfunding portal. The company brought in more than $160,000 from this campaign.
Microryza is another crowdfunding platform exclusively for scientific research projects, available only to PhDs and professors who can attempt to raise money through this private channel instead of applying for grants. “This solution helps close the gap for potential and promising, but unfunded projects,” Bill Gates says about Microryza. With Kickstartr’s popularity, there has been an explosion of growth in crowdfunding portals, both general as well as ones targeting a specific niche.
When it comes to lending to tech startups, Silicon Valley Bank has an impressive grip on the market. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based institution has been in the D.C. area 15 years and claims half of the region’s venture-backed companies as its clients. The bank, which has $21.5 billion in assets, has grown its Tysons Corner team by 25 percent in the past year to 10 people. I caught up with Megan Scheffel, who manages the bank’s Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern U.S. regions.
Here’s another reason the dysfunctional federal budget process is bad for Americans: besides hurting the economy and hitting us in the pocketbook, partisan feuding over budget cuts could undermine our health and even shorten our lives.
That’s because House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and others in Congress have been using the budget process to target research in the behavioral and social sciences for elimination, even though they’re indispensable to understanding and improving Americans’ health.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
A total of 150 investors are vying for Maryland’s biotechnology tax credit this year, compared with 125 applicants last year.
Maryland’s Biotechnology Investment Incentive Tax Credit program gives tax credits to individuals and companies that invest in Maryland-based biotechnology startups. The program will give out $10 million in tax credits for fiscal 2014.
Kauffman Foundation FastTrac®, has joined with Montgomery College to support future and current business owners before, during, and after the startup process. Entrepreneurs will receive the information, resources, and networks necessary to start and grow successful businesses.
University of Maryland (UM) Ventures announced today a collaboration between Frank Robb, Ph.D., at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology, and Department of Microbiology & Immunology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and Rockville, Maryland-based Fina Biosolutions LLC to devise new ways to manufacture a key component used in many vaccines. The international nonprofit organization, PATH, which spurs new innovation with the goal of delivering high-impact, low-cost global health solutions such as lifesaving vaccines, will fund the partnership’s development efforts as part of its pneumococcal vaccine project.
“A new and improved vaccine production method is the goal of this public-private partnership between my lab and Fina Biosolutions,” said Dr. Robb. “It is designed to yield broader availability of an important vaccine component, which is highly effective, but prohibitively expensive for some applications, particularly in the developing world.”
Bethesda tops a list of The Most Educated Places in America
Personal finance site NerdWallet Inc. ranked cities based on high school drop out rates and the percentage of the population with associate degrees, bachelor’s degrees, master’s degrees and professional or doctoral degrees.
QIAGEN N.V. (NASDAQ: QGEN; Frankfurt Prime Standard: QIA) today announced it has received approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to market the therascreen EGFR test as a companion diagnostic to guide the use of Boehringer Ingelheim’s new targeted therapy, GILOTRIFTM (afatinib), for treatment of metastatic NSCLC in patients whose tumors have certain EGFR gene mutations. More than 200,000 new lung cancer cases are diagnosed every year in the United States, with NSCLC accounting for approximately 85% of cases, leading to an estimated 160,000 deaths.
The therascreen EGFR test enables doctors to identify EGFR mutation-positive patients eligible for treatment with GILOTRIFTM (afatinib). The FDA approval of the therascreen EGFR test marks a further milestone in the global expansion of QIAGEN’s Personalized Healthcare franchise – and adds a third FDA-approved or cleared diagnostic kit to run on QIAGEN’s efficient Rotor-Gene Q MDx. Approximately 120,000 metastatic NSCLC patients each year in the U.S. could benefit from testing for EGFR mutations, a total potential testing market of about $35 million, according to QIAGEN estimates.
The Partnering Agreements with United Therapeutics 2005-2013 report provides an in-depth insight into the partnering interests and activites of one of the worlds leading biopharma companies.
This report provides all the information you require to better understand United Therapeutics and its partnering interests and activities over the past seven years.
On demand company reports are prepared upon purchase to ensure inclusion of the most up to date deal and company data.
Topic: “EIRs, SBIRs, and more with BioHealth Innovation, Inc.”
Presenters:
Richard Bendis, President and CEO
Ethan Byler, Director, Innovation Programs
Todd Chappell, Entrepreneur-in-Residence, NIH-OTT
Dr. Ken Malone, Entrepreneur-in-Residence, UMD Ventures
Ram Aiyar, Entrepreneur-in-Residence, NHLBI
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI) is a regional innovation intermediary that accelerates and facilitates technology transfer and commercialization of market-relevant research in federal labs, universities, and biohealth companies in the Region. It is a private-public partnership that connects the Region’s innovation assets to provide integrated technical knowledge, financial means, and entrepreneurial/managerial expertise to turn promise into prosperity for the region while advancing human health.
BHI’s Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) program is designed to be an active partner with research institutions to source, fund, and grow high-potential, early-stage products through project-focused companies. The entrepreneurs in the program support the formation of new companies based upon innovative discoveries in the areas of drugs, vaccines, therapeutics, diagnostics, and medical devices from the intramural research programs at the NIH and Food and Drug Administration (FDA), as well as from universities and businesses.
BHI’s Commercial Relevance Program (CRP) offers biohealth companies support in preparing applications for federal funding inclusive of SBIRs, STTRs, and other federal government awards. Companies submit their federal funding concepts and receive pre-proposal feedback to help troubleshoot and strengthen your application. Further support from professional consultants and service providers is available to assist in improving your application.
BHI recently published the Central Maryland BioHealth Entrepreneur’s Resource and Finance Guide 2013. The Guide serves as a compendium of resources to biohealth innovators and entrepreneurs working to start and grow new companies and technologies in the region.
Lower overall costs of occupancy — coupled with academic resources and an educated work force — have made clusters outside the nation’s largest metro areas more attractive to multinational pharmaceutical companies focusing on right-sizing and R&D productivity. In the Midwest, Chicago remains an emerging cluster, while Minneapolis is holding steady as a top-10 cluster for the second year in a row. JLL’s second annual life sciences cluster report ranks top-10 cities for life sciences companies in 2013.
The head of the nation’s medical research agency and leaders of Johns Hopkins hospital and medical school warned Monday that progress in fighting diseases could be slowed, jobs lost and scientists driven overseas unless across-the-board federal funding cuts are reversed.
Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, joined Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski, Hopkins executives and a stroke survivor at Hopkins’ Children’s Center to appeal for restoration of $1.5 billion in NIH funding cuts as part of the budget “sequester” approved last winter by Congress.
Renee M. Winsky of Davidsonville has been named president and CEO of Leadership Maryland, a statewide leadership development program.
She replaces Nancy Minieri, who founded the organization in 1992. Minieri announced in March that she will retire at the end of this year.
Winsky is a 2005 graduate of Leadership Maryland. In the yearlong program, participants learn about problems and opportunities facing the state. More than 900 people have taken the course, including elected officials, business executives, educators and nonprofit directors.
Innovation is a vague word and is too overused today, in the words of Bryan Sivak.
That was kind of a bold statement to make at a conference focused on, well, innovation.
In his keynote address at CONVERGE, the chief technology officer for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said the department’s philosophy is that innovation happens as a direct result of the freedom to experiment, a much more descriptive and meaningful phrase.
Microryza.com (not the catchiest of names) is a crowdfunding platform for research that raises money over the Internet from individuals who are willing to donate small amounts to fund a specific project. The average donation according to Microryza is $92.
In return for a 5 percent cut of funds raised and a 3 percent credit card processing fee, Microryza provides researchers access to a website where they can solicit money from the public to fund their research. Crowdfunding is typically an all-or-nothing deal, where donors only have to pay their pledged support if the project is fully funded within a defined period of time.
CMS has proposed a policy change that would expand payments for telehealth services under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule for 2014, Modern Physician reports.
Details of the Proposal
The proposed change would affect locations identified as rural “health professional shortage areas.”
Indiana University scientists have transformed mouse embryonic stem cells into key structures of the inner ear. The discovery provides new insights into the sensory organ’s developmental process and sets the stage for laboratory models of disease, drug discovery and potential treatments for hearing loss and balance disorders.
A research team led by Eri Hashino, Ph.D., Ruth C. Holton Professor of Otolaryngology at Indiana University School of Medicine, reported that by using a three-dimensional cell culture method, they were able to coax stem cells to develop into inner-ear sensory epithelia — containing hair cells, supporting cells and neurons — that detect sound, head movements and gravity. The research was reportedly online Wednesday in the journal Nature.
This week, Healthbox launched a new accelerator program in partnership with BlueCross BlueShield in Nashville, Tennessee. Other Healthbox locations include Chicago, Boston, London and most recently, Jacksonville, Florida. Healthbox typically partners with the local Blue health plan in each of its locations.
Nashville, home to 31 hospitals and more than 250 healthcare companies is “the Silicon Valley of healthcare,” according to Healthbox Founder and CEO Nina Nashif. In 2011, Nashville’s venture capital community invested $104 million in healthcare services and HIT startups. The accelerator also partnered with the Nashville Healthcare Council, an initiative of the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce to establish Nashville’s position as the nation’s healthcare industry capital. According to the Nashville Healthcare Council, in 2008, one in eight Nashville workers were employed by a healthcare provider.
Eleven second-quarter biotech initial public offerings totaling $1 billion — the strongest quarterly biotech market for venture-backed IPOs since third-quarter 2000 — fueled an overall surge in IPOs, according to the National Venture Capital Association and news and data company Thomson Reuters.
Even as the White House has backed off on a few of its deadlines for administering the Affordable Care Act, the Obama Administration is staying the course on its efforts to transition paper files to electronic health records in doctor’s offices.
President Barack Obama met with several chief executives of health-care technology companies, government leaders and nonprofit public-service organizations on Monday for a conversation on how technology, big data and innovation can be used to bring down the costs and improve the quality of health care in the U.S., according to a statement from the White House.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
BioHealth Innovation, Inc., (BHI) a non-profit organization which strives to facilitate the development of commercially viable health IT products and companies by connecting market relevant research assets to appropriate funding, management and markets, is seeking interns as part of the BHI Internship Program.
POSITION DESCRIPTION – BHI Intern
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI), a regional private-public partnership focusing on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Central Maryland, is seeking highly motivated and dynamic individuals to fill internship positions at the Rockville, MD headquarters. The BHI Internship Program offers essential experience for IT, Business, and Biohealth students in the region. By offering a variety of projects and responsibilities to students, BHI aims to prepare interns for professional careers in the business, life sciences, healthcare and IT industries.
Montgomery County’s top biotechnology firms will open their doors and their state-of-the-art laboratories next week to local middle school students interested in the life sciences. In a partnership with MdBio Foundation, Inc., and Montgomery College, preeminent local scientists and executives from MedImmune, Qiagen and Emergent BioSolutions will share their expertise and career stories with students from the Young Science Explorers Program (YSEP), a weeklong science workshop for rising seventh and eighth grade students.
Dressed in lab coats and safety glasses, students will get once in a lifetime exposure to local companies and scientists on the leading edge of medical breakthroughs. Topics will range from microbiology and vaccine research to lab safety and potential career paths for science students.
Registration for the fall semester of Technology Transfer Classes at the FAES Graduate School at NIH is now open. For the semester beginning on September 9th there will be 12 courses offered in the technology transfer program:
· TECH 506 – Research Commercialization Webinar Course: The Essentials
· TECH 513A Introduction to Technology Transfer — Issues and Processes (given by the Technology Transfer Society)
· TECH 521 – Tools for Technology Transfer
· TECH 565 – Biomedical Business Development for Scientists
· TECH 567 – International Strategic Partnering and Business Development
· TECH 579 – Introduction to Negotiation
· TECH 575 – Business Finance & Accounting Principles for Scientists
· TECH 583 – Patent Research for Non-Legal Practioners
· TECH 587 – Strategic Consulting for Tech Companies
· TECH 607 – Capstone Course in Technology Transfer
· PHAR 328 – FDA Perspective on Drug Development
· PHAR 500 – Principles of Clinical Pharmacology
More details can be found in the new 2013 course catalog (www.faes.org) with enrollment open to the general community. All classes are part of the “Advanced Studies in Technology Transfer” certificate program and can be fully transferred as a block into various MBA & MS degree programs at the University of Maryland University College (UMUC) Graduate School.
There will also be an open house for the FAES Graduate School on Tuesday, August 20th from 4-7pm at the new FAES Classroom & Bookstore complex in Building 10.
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) SAI +0.46% , Maryland’s Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED), and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) announced the third annual 2013 statewide cyber competition, the Maryland Cyber Challenge(TM), will be held October 8 through October 9 at the Baltimore Convention Center in Baltimore, Maryland. Registration is now open for aspiring cyber warriors from around the nation to compete at the Maryland event, located in the growing epicenter for the cybersecurity industry.
The Maryland Cyber Challenge(TM) is designed to attract more students and young professionals to pursue careers in cybersecurity and is held in conjunction with the CyberMaryland2013 Conference and Cyber Hall of Fame. It is the premier statewide cyber competition showcasing today’s students and tomorrow’s technologists with three levels of competition: high school, college and professional. Teams will have the opportunity to develop and improve their cybersecurity skills in a real-world environment. Founders of the event include SAIC, UMBC, DBED, the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA), and the Tech Council of Maryland (TCM).
Due to the many changes that will result from the SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act, NIH has set up a new website to keep the small business research community informed.
Applicants and grantees interested in the SBIR program can visit the website as well as the SBIR listserv and Twitter feed for news as the implementation plan rolls out.
1776, the D.C. startup hub that launched earlier this year with District funding, plans to pull together a seed fund that will allow it to make equity investments in early-stage tech companies.
The creation of a fund would turn 1776 into a bona fide “accelerator.” The 1133 15th St. NW space, run by Startup DC’s Evan Burfield and Donna Harris, is now primarily a co-working operation (some say incubator), with additional programs layered on top of it, like the recently announced Challenge Cup international startup tournament.
It’s good to have friends in high places. Especially friends who can leverage more than 30 years of experience in technology and business to nurture and foster your startup seed.
1776, a new startup incubator based in Washington, D.C., just announced a brand-new partnership with Microsoft, in which leaders from the company will collaborate with startups to guide them from a technical and business standpoint.
“[Microsoft] will help startups to leverage platforms upon which they can build innovative apps with the ability to scale rapidly and efficiently,” says 1776 co-founder Donna Harris. “Through 1776, they’re also providing mentorships for architects who can ensure that startups are maximizing the potential of these tools and platforms.”
As investments in life science companies have dipped over the past few years, some investors have scaled back investments or walked away from the sector all together. But based on a tally by investment research firm PitchBook in its 2013 Venture Capital Healthcare Report, several firms have made 10 or more investments in pharmaceutical, medical device or health IT companies in the last year and a half.
Creating a new medical device is not an inexpensive exercise. There are development costs, clinical trial expenses, and the lengthy process of getting a piece of new equipment approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
Those hurdles are a leading reason why most medical innovations come out of universities or established research firms.
Funding for digital health startups is continuing to grow at a steady pace, but is beginning to stabilize.
Health accelerator Rock Health’s midyear report, released today, found that digital health funding for the first half of 2013 represents 11 percent growth in investment and 24 percent growth in deals year over year. In short, it’s still growing, but not as fast as in previous years.
It’s been a slow year for startup fundraising—the investments doled out by venture firms in the first quarter dropped 6 percent compared with the same period of 2012. But at least a couple of sectors have been defying that trend. One is software, where funding for the first half of 2012 was up 38 percent over 2012 levels, and another is digital health, up 12 percent.
In a report issued yesterday (slides embedded below), San Francisco-based digital health accelerator Rock Health delved into the details behind that 12 percent number.
When health IT startups say they’re making a new technology platform for physicians, John Sung Kim has an immediate follow-up question – for what specialty?
That’s a question he learned was critical as he began building and trying to sell the platform developed by his first health startup, DoctorBase. It’s been a series of hits and misses, which Kim isn’t afraid to talk candidly about. In a recent interview, he explained to MedCity News one of the most surprising things he learned when he set out to build a mobile platform that would let doctors, administrators and patients communicate without having to pick up the phone.
Five years ago I built a biotechnology innovation index and I have been using it since tracking global biotechnology innovation in Scientific American’s Worldview. It has been a very rewarding project, and I have enjoyed the opportunity to present my research data at international conferences, business schools, and even National Defense University.
Now, Worldview’s editor Mike May has compared my innovation scores with the Venture Capital and Private Equity Country Attractiveness (VCPECA) index. I was quite pleased to see a relatively strong correlation between my innovation index and the VCPECA index.
We knew that biotech companies were lighting up the stock market this year. Today, the National Venture Capital Association has fresh numbers illustrating Wall Street’s love affair with life sciences entrepreneurs—and the corresponding cold shower awaiting their counterparts in the tech sector.
The new report, comparing venture-backed IPOs with merger-and-acquisition deals, shows life sciences companies accounting for 13 of the 21 public stock listings in the second quarter.
Revolution Ventures, the early-stage venture capital arm of Steve Case’s Revolution LLC, has filed paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a planned $150 million fund. Named in the SEC filing are Case and managing partners Tige Savage and David Golden. Revolution Ventures II LP, as it’s named in the filing, follows the formation in 2011of Revolution Growth, which invests in more mature, later-stage companies. Revolution Growth, led by Case, Donn Davis and Ted Leonsis, is operated separately from the venture unit.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
BioHealth Innovation, Inc., (BHI) a non-profit organization which strives to facilitate the development of commercially viable health IT products and companies by connecting market relevant research assets to appropriate funding, management and markets, is seeking interns as part of the BHI Internship Program.
POSITION DESCRIPTION – BHI Intern
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI), a regional private-public partnership focusing on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Central Maryland, is seeking highly motivated and dynamic individuals to fill internship positions at the Rockville, MD headquarters. The BHI Internship Program offers essential experience for IT, Business, and Biohealth students in the region. By offering a variety of projects and responsibilities to students, BHI aims to prepare interns for professional careers in the business, life sciences, healthcare and IT industries.
Gaithersburg’s largest private employer will add some 110 new jobs to its local and Frederick offices and seeks to take its revenues to unprecedented heights by 2020, a official told the Gaithersburg mayor and City Council Monday.
MedImmune’s Gaithersburg headquarters currently house 2,300 employees, approximately 66 percent of the company’s international jobs, MedImmune Executive Vice President of Operations Andy Skibo said, including the addition of 830 jobs over the past five years.
“Virtually all of MedImmune is practically here in Gaithersburg or just up the road in Frederick,” Skibo said, but the biotech company continues to expand.
Johns Hopkins Montgomery County has received the 2013 Visionary Award from the Montgomery County Chamber of Commerce.
Before an audience of hundreds at the Chamber’s Annual Awards Dinner, Campus Executive Elaine Amir thanked the Chamber for the recognition, thanked Montgomery County for having the foresight to establish the campus in 1985 and applauded County Executive Ike Leggett for his encouragement and support.
The University of Maryland has named Brian Darmody associate vice president for corporate and foundation relations. In this newly-created role, Darmody is charged with leading essential university-wide efforts to develop strategic partnerships between the University of Maryland and the corporate and foundation community.
“Throughout Brian’s 30-year career with the university, he has proven to be the perfect candidate to lead this new charge,” says UMD Vice President for University Relations Peter Weiler. “His unparalleled ability to develop and nurture mutually beneficial relationships for the university has been integral over the years, and we look forward to the leadership he will bring to this new role.”
The following funding opportunity announcements from the NHLBI or other components of the National Institutes of Health, might be of interest:
NIH Guide Notice:
NOT-EB-13-002: Notice To Extend PAR-10-234 Bioengineering Research Partnerships (BRP) (R01) The purpose of this notice is to extend PAR-10-234 “Bioengineering Research Partnerships (BRP) (R01),” which supports partnerships for basic, applied, and translational multi-disciplinary research that addresses important biological, clinical or biomedical research problems. The new expiration date is January 8, 2014.
RFA-CA-13-008: Person-Centered Outcomes Research Resource (U2C) The purpose of this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is to support the creation of a research resource infrastructure for the administration of research investigations using person-centered health outcomes, further referred to as the Person-Centered Outcomes Research Resource (PCORR).
RFA-OD-13-010: Tobacco Control Regulatory Research (R21) The purpose of this FOA is to encourage biomedical, behavioral, and social science research that will inform the development and evaluation of regulations on tobacco product manufacturing, distribution, and marketing.
RFA-OD-13-011: Tobacco Control Regulatory Research (R01) The purpose of this FOA is to encourage biomedical, behavioral, and social science research that will inform the development and evaluation of regulations on tobacco product manufacturing, distribution, and marketing.
RFA-OD-13-012: Tobacco Control Regulatory Research (R03) The purpose of this FOA is to encourage biomedical, behavioral, and social science research that will inform the development and evaluation of regulations on tobacco product manufacturing, distribution, and marketing.
Governor Martin O’Malley announced today that the State, through the BioMaryland Center, has awarded nearly $1 million to five innovative life sciences companies through its Biotechnology Development Awards program. The companies, which received up to $200,000 each, will use the funding to advance the early detection of Alzheimer’s disease, create a less-invasive treatment for tachycardia patients, enhance animal analgesics, control traumatic bleeds and develop high-quality gluten and allergen-free kosher food products.
“These companies are developing products that are changing the way we feed, fuel and heal our planet and have the potential to impact millions of patients around the world,” said Governor O’Malley. “These awards are critical to ensuring that the life-saving research being done here in Maryland has the opportunity to move to the commercial marketplace.”
Health and Human Services (HHS) Deputy Secretary Bill Corr announced today that the Department is seeking innovators and entrepreneurs to apply for the HHSentrepreneurs Program. Launched last year, HHSentrepreneurs connects private sector innovators and entrepreneurs with teams of federal employees working on projects that address some of the biggest challenges in health, health care and human services.
The first individuals hired last October through HHSentrepreneurs are working on critical projects including the Affordable Care Act, health resilience technology, and the nation’s organ transplant system.
“By bringing the best in the public and private sectors together, HHSentrepreneurs is creating an environment in HHS that fosters innovative solutions to new and old challenges,” Deputy Secretary Corr said.
Research universities and start-up companies receive funds to further develop technologies in the fields of therapeutic, software, medical, mobile and online technologies
The Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII), which accelerates commercialization and technology transfer from university labs to start-up companies, announced it has awarded $2,960,466 to 29 research projects. Funds were awarded to nine start-up companies and 20 university projects – three of these projects include a partnership between two universities working together on technology development. Awards were given across a variety of industries, including therapeutic, software, medical, mobile and online technologies. MII is administered by the Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO).
“Maryland has some of the best research universities in the nation and an incredible entrepreneurial spirit, which is evident in the awards granted through the Maryland Innovation Initiative,” said Dominick Murray, Secretary of the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development. “With a progressive approach to university research and technology development, Maryland is well positioned to build on our history of discovery, innovation and invention.”
Sources inform “Globes” that AstraZeneca plc (NYSE; LSE; OMX: AZN) has teamed with Israeli real estate company Minrav Holdings Ltd. (TASE: MNRV) to bid in the Office of the Chief Scientist’s biotechnology incubator tender. AstraZeneca will handle the consortium’s professional side, and Minrav will be responsible for financing.
The AstraZeneca-Minrav consortium is bidding against a consortium of OrbiMed Israel and the venture capital arms of Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) and Japan’s Takeda Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd. (TSE: 4502).
New Enterprise Associates has increased its focus on companies developing drugs for rare disease, an effort that’s paying off. Portfolio company Prosensa Holding BV, which it backed last year, has just gone public on Nasdaq. The company develops therapies for rare conditions such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy, myotonic dystrophy and Huntington’s disease.
UMBC recently earned accolades in three college ranking reports.
The Online College Database recognized the high salaries of UMBC graduates in its list of most affordable colleges. The website used data from the ”2012-2013 PayScale College Salary Report” to rank UMBC as having the second-highest post-graduation starting salary of colleges in Maryland with annual tuition under $20,000. According to the report, the average starting salary of a UMBC graduate is $50,300.
Taking the helm of EFPIA, Viehbacher says R&D and innovation are the keys to rescuing Europe from its economic slump, but more harmonization across the pharmaceutical sector will be needed too.
Baltimore City’s Emerging Technology Centers (ETC) is pleased to announce that two of its client companies were recently honored at the 13th Annual 2013 Maryland Incubator Company of the Year (ICOY) Awards. Curiosityville was chosen “Best Education Technology Company” and ADASHI was chosen “Best New Incubator Company” by the judging panel of venture capitalists, government officials and business leaders.
“The Curiosityville team is thrilled to have been selected for this award,” said Susan Magsamen, CEO of Curiosityville. “Part of the credit must go to our affiliation with the ETC their assistance has helped allow us to focus on building the business.”
“Research for research’s sake” is not a refrain you’ll hear from Johns Hopkins Whiting School of Engineering Dean Nicholas Jones.
Universities have been working on increasing the amount of their research being used for commercially available products and services, but in Maryland the process has been somewhat slow. While Hopkins is the most highly funded university by the National Institutes of Health, it lags behind its peers in terms of patents, new companies and other measures of commercialization.
This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) invites Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant applications from small business concerns (SBCs) that propose to implement investigator-initiated clinical trials related to the research mission of the NIAID. This program will utilize the cooperative agreement mechanism (U44) to enable support for hypothesis-driven, milestone-driven clinical trials. Although clinical trials not considered high-risk may be proposed, this program encourages high-risk clinical studies. High-risk does not imply human subject or patient risk, but rather defines a study that contains one or more of the following unique features: involves non-routine interventions, administration of an unlicensed product, or administration of a licensed product for an unapproved indication. Mechanistic studies are also encouraged and can be proposed under this program. However, not more than one clinical trial should be proposed within each grant application. The NIAID has a robust infrastructure for conducting clinical studies that includes independently managed resources provided through grants and contracts, as well as resources that are integrated within existing NIAID-supported clinical trial networks. Proposed clinical trials may use NIAIDs independent infrastructure for clinical studies, however, support will not be provided for studies that propose to use dedicated resources that are part of a NIAID-supported clinical trial network. A Commercialization Plan must be included that details plans for promoting further commercialization of the intervention/product/technology to be derived from or associated with the proposed clinical trial, including plans for promoting and establishing partnerships between the SBIR Phase II awardee and third-party investors and/or strategic partners.
Startup Maryland (www.startupmd.org), an initiative of the UpGlobal consortium (www.up.co), today announced that UNDER ARMOUR® Founder and CEO Kevin Plank will participate as the first instructor for Raise Your Game™.
Raise Your Game is Startup Maryland’s bootcamp initiative developed to provide the entrepreneurial community with a structured educational program and to help startup CEOs and founders understand and employ the building blocks of strong startups and startup communities. The new twist for this bootcamp is that the sessions will be proctored/taught by experienced (often serial) entrepreneurs who are very well-recognized and respected.
Ernst & Young unveiled its Entrepreneur of the Year Maryland winners on Wednesday night to a packed ballroom at the Marriott Waterfront Hotel in Baltimore, with honors going to former Advertising.com CEO Scott Ferber, the entire Kelly clan and longtime Living Classrooms head James Piper Bond.
A total of 10 awards were given out during a black-tie affair. The awards program recognizes high-growth entrepreneurs who demonstrate excellence and success in such areas as innovation, financial performance and personal commitment to their businesses and communities. The finalists and winners were selected by a panel of independent judges.
MyBodyCount® (MBC), a health and wellness platform that enables individuals to track their lifestyle-based health risk, today introduced the first-ever clinical health score available to the public. The MBC Health Score was developed using actuarial science working in conjunction with Dr. Hunter Young, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (JHUSOM) and Dr. Dhananjay Vaidya, Associate Professor of Medicine at JHUSOM.
The score is based on a panel of biomarkers, referred to as the BodyCount8™, that are predictors of the risk of health events and conditions related to heart, kidney and lung diseases and diabetes. The biomarkers can be affected by modifying behaviors including: eating, exercising, smoking and medication adherence. The score enables consumers to understand their lifestyle-based risk relative to their age group and gender.
A new report on sea level rise recommends that the State of Maryland should plan for a rise in sea level of as much as 2 feet by 2050. Led by the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, the report was prepared by a panel of scientific experts in response to Governor Martin O’Malley’s Executive Order on Climate Change and “Coast Smart” Construction. The projections are based on an assessment of the latest climate change science and federal guidelines.
“The State of Maryland is committed to taking the necessary actions to adapt to the rising sea and guard against the impacts of extreme storms,” said Governor Martin O’Malley. “In doing so, we must stay abreast of the latest climate science to ensure that we have a sound understanding of our vulnerability and are making informed decisions about how best to protect our land, infrastructure, and most importantly, the citizens of Maryland.”
Venture capital-backed initial public offerings more than doubled during the second quarter from the previous quarter and rose 90% from a year earlier, with 21 companies raising a combined $2.2 billion during their stock-market debuts, driven by the highest number of biotech venture-backed IPOs in nearly 13 years, according to Thomson Reuters Corp. (TRI, TRI.T) and the National Venture Capital Association.
During the quarter, 13 of the offerings were in the life-sciences sector, representing 62% of the total. Biotech offerings, at 11 deals, marked the highest level since the third quarter of 2000, when 13 companies went public.
The venture capital industry is getting rightsized, with less capital raised and deployed, smaller funds, fewer active venture capital firms, and more regulation. The exit climate has picked up, but is still not at the level required. And valuations are overall more rational, with some exceptions at the later stages or in consumer-facing momentum companies.
However, with the confluence of not one but four big market drivers (discussed below), and the rise of a new technology cycle, we think this is still a great time to be a venture capitalist or entrepreneur.
Integrated BioTherapeutics (IBT) and Stanford University have been jointly awarded a $300,000 Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health. The goal of the grant is to develop a highly effective immunotherapeutic to prevent Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) reinfection in liver transplant patients based on antibodies that limit the ability of the virus to escape treatment via mutations.
Up to 170 million people worldwide are chronically infected with HCV, putting infected individuals at significant risk for cirrhosis, liver failure, and liver cancer. Chronic infection is poorly controlled by current antiviral treatments though there is new optimism with two recent FDA-approved direct acting antivirals, telaprevir and boceprevir. These drugs, however, are not recommended in the transplant setting due to likely adverse drug-drug interactions.
A commercialization program to match up provider, payer and pharma technology needs with willing and able healthcare startups has announced its 10 finalists. Each will receive $100,000 tied to meeting certain performance milestones. They have three to six months to work with the healthcare group they’re matched with, depending on the complexity of the program.
PILOT Health Tech NYC, developed by the New York City Economic Development Corporation and Health 2.0, is holding its demo day today at Blueprint Health’s NYC digs. The program is also supported by StartUp Health.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
As our next receipt date is approximately 6 weeks away, we wanted to send a reminder to all new (and returning) HHS applicants about the required registrations needed before you can submit your SBIR/STTR grant to grants.gov. This includes the new requirement to register with the SBA Company Registry. It is never too early to start the registration process, even if you are thinking about submitting for December 5th or beyond, but especially for August 5th!
Applicant Organizations
Applicant organizations must complete and maintain the following registrations as described in the SF 424 (R&R) Application Guide to be eligible to apply for or receive an award. All registrations must be completed prior to the application being submitted. Registration can take 6 weeks or more, so applicants should begin the registration process as soon as possible. The NIH Policy on Late Submission of Grant Applications states that failure to complete registrations in advance of a due date is not a valid reason for a late submission.
Request for Information (RFI): Input on Administration of the NIH-Industry Pilot Program Discovering The goal of this Request for Information (RFI) is to collect feedback from the biomedical research community, pharmaceutical companies, and other members of the public about the “NIH-Industry Pilot Program: Discovering New Therapeutic Uses for Existing Molecules” initiative and the application process. NCATS is interested in feedback from researchers and institutions that submitted an application, considered submitting an application but did not, and/or would be interested in submitting an application in the future. NCATS is also interested in feedback from existing and potential pharmaceutical partners.
Higher education is becoming big business as more students head off to college, but they’re also about developing businesses, and the state is turning research and development into new business ventures.
Maryland leads the nation in how much it spends on research but the University System of Maryland — which includes 13 colleges and universities — is trying to take research to a new level by creating more small businesses off campus. The goal so far is to try and create more than 300 new businesses over the next decade.
Montgomery College has become a certified affiliate of the Kauffman Foundation and its FastTrac series of courses intended to support future and current business owners before, during, and after the start-up process.
The course schedule is now available in the attachment below.
FastTrac courses provide entrepreneurs the information, resources, and networks necessary to start and grow successful businesses.
Johns Hopkins University is seeing strong interest for the university’s first business accelerator — a faster than expected response from what director John Fini had projected.
“It’s like we’re tapping into something,” said Fini, who also leads the Office of Intellectual Property and Technology Commercialization on the university’s Homewood campus. “The palate was there. They just didn’t have an outlet.”
The accelerator, called FastForward, opened in January to Hopkins faculty members and students interested in pursuing business ideas with their research. The university is holding an official grand opening for the accelerator June 27.
Silicon Valley has long been the epicenter of venture capital-financed high-technology, but a new report shows D.C. is climbing the ranks of best metropolitan areas for venture capital, according to The Atlantic Cities.
Martin Prosperity Institute’s figures for venture capital in 2012 show than the San Francisco-Oakland area has in fact overtaken it as the nation’s leading center for venture capital, with investments reaching more than $6.8 million.
Last fall, the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer introduced an improved Available Technologies search tool that made it faster and easier to search for federal laboratory inventions available transfer to business partners. This tool reduces the time, effort and guesswork in finding opportunities that meet industry’s needs. Instead of sifting through agency or lab records, users can now do single keyword searches for available technologies. Since the search is based on Google search technologies, users can utilize standard Boolean search engine language to perform their searches. Searches return a powerful set of data, including:
description of the invention
application and benefits
current development and patent status
name of inventor
federal laboratory contact person who will facilitate the technology transfer opportunity.
Johns Hopkins student-built devices—a blood clot detection system and a concealable, hands-free breast pump—have won two of the top three awards in a national contest that recognizes innovative biomedical engineering designs that have high commercial potential and social impact.
The honors were announced June 19 in Philadelphia by the National Collegiate Inventors and Innovators Alliance (NCIIA), as it concluded its annual Biomedical Engineering Innovations, Design, and Entrepreneurship Awards (BMEidea) competition. Johns Hopkins student teams previously earned first-place in this competition in 2012, 2010 and 2007.
A tiny, tin-coated piece of wood could one day be used as a high capacity and environmentally benign battery.
A team of researchers at the University of Maryland constructed a nano-scale, sodium-ion battery from a sliver of wood more than 1,000 times thinner than paper.
“The inspiration behind the idea comes from the trees,” said Liangbing Hu, an assistant professor of materials science, in a press release. “Wood fibers that make up a tree once held mineral-rich water, and so are ideal for storing liquid electrolytes, making them not only the base but an active part of the battery.”
iVantage Health Analytics, a leading provider of health care informatics and business analytics solutions that transform complex data into actionable business intelligence, announced it has raised $10 million in growth equity from Great Point Partners (GPP). The equity investment will fund expanded sales and marketing efforts, additional investment in technology infrastructure and personnel expansion.
SC&H Capital, an investment banking and advisory firm focused on middle market and growth companies, served as the sole placement agent to iVantage Health Analytics in connection with the transaction.
The NIH has been faced with considerable difficulties as of late in terms of finding the required means to continue moving science forward at the early stage. However, the group recently announced a commitment of $12.7 million to a novel project – funding further research on assets that have been cast-off by big pharma in key indication areas that represent a significant unmet medical need (e.g. Alzheimers, Duchenne, etc.). The initiative has been fittingly named Discovering New Therapeutic Uses for Existing Molecules, and it may be a groundbreaking solution to several problems facing drug development today. These include reducing time to market, alleviating early stage investment risk, and creating even more incentive for research scientists to orient themselves towards commercialization of research.
The Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland will offer an online MBA program beginning in January 2014. Designed to accommodate working professionals, the flexible online program allows students to earn an MBA degree largely on their own time with minimal on-campus requirements. The program courses are taught by the same top faculty and adhere to the academic rigor of the Smith School’s other top MBA programs.
“This is a major step forward for the university and for business professionals who need flexible access to academic excellence,” said UMD President Wallace Loh. “The Smith School is combining a state-of-the-art online platform with the academic rigor that makes it a leader. University-wide we are exploring how best to use technology-based learning, and this is an excellent model.”
The Department of Defense last week announced the establishment of the world’s first brain tissue repository on the Walter Reed Campus to help researchers better understand traumatic brain injury (TBI).
TBI is common among veterans of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which led to the opening of The Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine Brain Tissue Repository for Traumatic Brain Injury at the Uniformed Services University on the campus.
“Don’t write that we have a cure for cancer tomorrow,” says Pascal Soriot, chief executive of AstraZeneca, “but there are some spectacular results.”
Mr Soriot was at MedImmune on Granta Park, AstraZeneca’s current toe-hold on the city and on the day that the pharma company announced its chosen site – Cambridge Biomedical Campus at Addenbrooke’s – to relocate its global HQ and UK R&D activities.
The search for the artificial pancreas continues, and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) and Becton Dickinson ($BDX) have joined forces to develop an insulin-delivery system paired with glucose monitoring for people with Type 1 diabetes.
The foundation and Becton Dickinson have agreed to a three-year partnership, an extension of existing collaborations between the two, with a focus on Type 1 diabetes, according to a release. The device, long sought-after in the industry, would mimic the functions of a human pancreas to release insulin when blood sugar levels indicate it is needed by combining the pump with a glucose-monitoring system. This minimizes the potential for human error, as the standard of care currently requires a pump with a catheter and patient-controlled glucose monitoring.
Hard to understand, slow to exit and more than enough risk to go around.
Not many investors are brave and smart enough to fund startups working to get new pharmaceuticals, medical devices and therapeutics on the market. To highlight this breed of investors, and to give healthcare entrepreneurs a way to find them, we have compiled a list of venture capital firms with a track record of healthcare investing.
Following is a list of 10 alliances announced in recent years, mostly by pharma and biotech giants with venture capital funds, ranked by total size of fund in which the biopharma(s) invested. Alliances are listed by their partners; their purpose; the role of their partners; the financial contributions of their partners, where disclosed; rights and/or options on drugs resulting from alliance activity, again where disclosed; and the date the alliance was announced. An additional two alliances did not disclose size of total investment, and therefore are included in the list without a ranking.
Significantly, five of the 12 listed alliances were formed during 2013, and another five last year, reflecting the industry’s increasing view that the alliances will offer a more efficient way of developing new drugs by requiring much less than the billions long spent up-front by biopharmas on internal R&D. While the alliances require much less capital from industry, it remains to be seen whether R&D activity will increase, and more new drugs win approval and reach the market, to justify the reduced investment.
BECTON, Dickinson and Co.’s announcement that it was about to roll out a new, easy-to-use, disposable pen injector called Vystra hardly caused a stir in October.
Although an executive for the Franklin Lakes, New Jersey-based medical technology maker said the injector, unveiled at a Las Vegas convention, would introduce “a new level of flexibility for drug manufacturers,” the announcement made few ripples outside the industry.
This is the season of inaugurations and internships, with the class of 2014 college grads starting a new chapter in life in a recovering yet still challenging job market, and with students beginning a summer of exploring what to do beyond school lives. Whether it’s a full-time job or an internship, the experience is as much about learning the knowledge and skills as it is about self discovery.
I recently met a white, middle-aged American, who is highly fluent in Mandarin and successful running a center whose work requires fluency in East Asian cultures and languages. With an impressive list of life experiences under his belt, he was obviously happy with his life and career. When asked how he got to this point in life, he insisted it was pure “dumb luck” because he couldn’t have foreseen the many opportunities related to his interests when he was a young man. I can relate to that. I am more confident and content with my work life than ever before, having finally found my ways of relating and contributing to the world around me. I wish I could say this was all by design, when in fact for the first decade in this country my life was defined by heartbreaks and headaches. As a liberal arts major and a generalist with broad interests, I was not as readily employable as those with technical such as IT and engineering, so I struggled for a long time to find my footing.
UK-based healthcare company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has announced an investment of €17.5m ($23.5m) in a French venture firm to develop new drugs that have the potential to target rare diseases in Europe.
The Kurma Biofund II fund is led by Paris-based venture capital firm Kurma Life Science Partners (KLS) and is supported by other investors namely, CDC Entreprises, Idinvest Partners and New Enterprise Associates.
BlueCross BlueShield of Louisiana and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts will provide online healthcare to their members with technology from American Well.
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana plans to leverage American Well’s telehealth platform as an added feature of its new Quality Blue Primary Care population health and quality improvement program, and will create multiple avenues to use this technology in other programs.
Venture capital firms—and the high-tech startups they support—historically concentrated in suburban office parks, such as Silicon Valley and North Carolina’s Research Triangle.
Richard Florida, co-founder and editor of The Atlantic Cities and director of the Martin Prosperity Institute, has crunched the available data and found (along with some other studies) a shift underway within the venture capital community away from the suburbs and towards urban areas.
Business, civic, and political leaders in St. Louis are coming together to raise $100 million in private funds over the next five years to support the Regional Entrepreneurial Initiative, a new effort aimed at helping emerging regional businesses grow and thrive. The project was launched with funding from the federal government and will draw on several ongoing fundraising initiatives in the community. About 80 percent of the funds will be used to provide capital support for startup businesses, with the remaining 20 percent directed toward entrepreneurial support and mentoring, according to the St. Louis Beacon.
In April 2012, the city and county of St. Louis invited stakeholders to develop a regional economic development strategy that would guide efforts to grow and retain high-growth startups. The St. Louis Regional Entrepreneurship Initative Report received financial assistance from the Economic Development Administration (EDA), the state of Missouri, and the St. Louis County Economic Council. The findings of the report suggest that the St. Louis region has a growing cluster of resources to support entrepreneurship, but that they are not of uniform quality and not distributed evenly across sectors. For example, the region’s bioscience sector is relatively well-supported through the efforts of such organizations at BioSTL, BioGenerator and the Helix Center Biotech Incubator. Information technology companies, however, have few local organizations and programs to rely on for support. Resources for the agricultural, energy and advanced manufacturing sectors remain scarce and uncoordinated.
The America Invents Act (AIA), also known as the “patent reform bill,” is designed to modernize the U.S. patent system. One provision of the new bill, that went into effect in March, converts the United States from first-to-invent to a first-inventor-to-file system. You’ve had a few months to get used to the new law, but if you’re still wondering how it could affect biotech and medical-device products you invent, you’re not alone.
The new first-inventor-to-file patent law means that the first person or company to file a patent application on an invention has the right to pursue the patent on it. While this is new in the U.S., it’s the system that’s already being used in every other country in the world. So now the United States should be in synch with the rest of the world, right? Well, not quite.
Boston Children’s Hospital stirred up some buzz this week when it said its researchers had made a breakthrough that could change the face of diabetes treatment.
On its Vector blog, the hospital called attention to a study published earlier this year in the journal Diabetes that identified a certain pathway in the body as the cause of type 1 diabetes. A team led by Dr. Paolo Fiorina from the hospital’s nephrology department studied hundreds of pathways in animals with diabetes and isolated one, ATP/P2X7R, as a trigger of T-cell attacks on the pancreas that inhibit its ability to produce insulin.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
BioHealth Innovation is working to assist relevant SBIR projects through its Commercial Relevance Program for the August 5th, 2013 NIH SBIR Deadline.
If your company is planning a submission for the August 5 deadline, BioHealth Innovation can assist with your submission. Through the BHI Commercial Relevance Program for SBIR/STTR projects select companies submit their federal funding concepts and receive pre-proposal feedback to help strengthen your application. Further support from BHI’s network of professional consultants and service providers is available to assist in improving your application. If you’re are planning a submission for the August 5 deadline contact Ethan Byler for details on possible support from BHI.
NIH SBIR Phase I Program
Companies to complete brief application describing the proposed SBIR project apply by June 18th
All companies notified of SBIR assistance by June 26th
Guidance, writing strategy, direction, and review sessions to be schedule to enable you through grant submission
Feedback and redlined comments on written drafts and proposals materials as well as final submission assistance
Join Nicholas P. Jones, Benjamin T. Rome Dean, Whiting School of Engineering to celebrate the launch of FastForward.
There are a few spots left. RSVP today! 410-516-8723 / engineering@jhu.edu
Get a preview of the innovative technologies created by Johns Hopkins faculty, postdoctoral fellows, and students in the FastForward accelerator and see examples of entrepreneurship from across the university. Learn how FastForward, a unique innovation system, can increase the probability of a startup’s success.
6/28 DEADLINE to reserve your place in line for Maryland’s FY2014 Biotechnology Investor Incentive Tax Credits.
$10M (up to $1.5M/co.) distributed first come-first served to investors in MD QMBCs*:
QMBC requirements include:
At least 1 full time employee (cash compensated, not equity) & fewer than 50employees; and
A lease or ownership oflab or office space in Maryland; and
$100,000 in capitalization (sources:equity, convertible debt, long term loans, SBIR financing); and
Evidence of innovative biotechnology research owned by the company and conducted in MD; and
BIITC participation for 10 or fewer years; or
For first time applicants: 10 or fewer years in business (12 years if in a FDA regulatory process)
If your firm qualifies for QMBC certification by Maryland’s Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED), your investors may be able to receive a 50% credit on their investments in your company.
6/28 is the deadline to apply to receive a pin number providing access to the 7/8/13 electronic line-up for FY 2014 BIITC funds.
For more information regarding the BIITC and other state funding programs and access to the BIITC investor and company application forms on the DBED web site, check online: www.Bio.Maryland.gov.
*QMBC status will not be determined until after the electronic line-up as applications are being reviewed.
**Additional funds may be available after those requested at the initial electronic line-up on 7/8/2013.
University of Maryland, Baltimore campus President Jay A. Perman, M.D., and University of Maryland School of Medicine Dean E. Albert Reece, M.D., Ph.D., M.B.A., wish to announce the establishment of a new center to unite research scientists and physicians across disciplines. The center will employ these interdisciplinary connections to enhance the use of cutting edge medical science such as genomics and personalized medicine to accelerate research discoveries and improve health care outcomes. Participants in the new University of Maryland Center for Health-Related Informatics and Bioimaging (CHIB) will collaborate with computer scientists, engineers, life scientists and others at a similar center at the University of Maryland, College Park campus, together forming a joint center supported by the M-Power Maryland initiative.
University of Maryland School of Medicine Dean E. Albert Reece, M.D., Ph.D., M.B.A., with the concurrence of President Perman, has appointed as co-director of the new center Owen White, Ph.D., Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health and Director of Bioinformatics at the University of Maryland School of Medicine Institute for Genome Sciences.
UK pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca plc (LSE:AZN) is the second bidder for the dedicated biotech incubator being set up by the Chief Scientist’s incubator program at the Ministry of the Economy, sources inform “Globes.”
The company will bid for the incubator tender against a consortium of OrbiMed venture capital fund and healthcare giant Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ).
The University of Maryland (UM) BioPark announced today that Ocular Proteomics, LLC (OPL), a startup biotechnology company leveraging a new class of biomarkers found in vitreous fluid of the eye to more accurately diagnose and treat retinal diseases, has recently relocated to Building One of the BioPark from Baltimore County. Led by world-renowned and internationally respected retinal surgeon Bert M. Glaser, M.D., OPL is a spin out of the National Retina Institute. OPL’s move to the BioPark comes on the heels of the company’s $1.2 million dollar Small Business Innovation in Research (SBIR) phase 2 grant from the National Institutes of Health. In its new space, OPL will be conducting the research phase of a multi-center clinical trial, which will include 200 patients with macular degeneration.
Said Jim Hughes, President, Research Park Corporation, University of Maryland Baltimore, “The BioPark has once again attracted an innovative and important start-up to our location. We’re pleased to welcome Dr. Glaser and Ocular Proteomics to our roster of commercial tenants. Dr. Glaser founded Ocular Proteomics to use personalized medicine to drastically change the way blinding diseases are diagnosed and treated.”
Irene Pollin, the widow of the late Washington sports team owner Abe Pollin, has donated $10 million to a Johns Hopkins University center for the prevention of heart disease.
Hopkins announced Thursday that Pollin’s gift will support the Ciccarone Center for the Prevention of Heart Disease in the division of cardiology.
AstraZeneca (STO:AZN)(LSE:AZN) today announced that MedImmune, its global biologics research and development arm, and NGM Biopharmaceuticals, Inc. have entered into an exclusive agreement to discover, develop and commercialise novel therapeutics from NGM’s enteroendocrine cell (EEC) programme for the treatment of type 2 diabetes and obesity.
EECs represent less than 1% of all gastrointestinal (GI) cells, but produce virtually all of the known GI hormones, including GLP-1. EECs are an underexplored source of novel hormones that could play a major role in the positive and negative regulation of metabolism and glucose homeostasis. NGM has established a proprietary platform capable of isolating and analysing EECs in order to identify novel secreted peptide hormones that are potentially linked to the profound metabolic effects of bariatric surgery and serve as potential targets for the treatment of metabolic diseases.
Aside from memory loss and cognitive impairments, often the most difficult aspect of caring for people with dementia is treating their disruptive changes in behavior.
With no reliable medications to treat them and limited information for caregivers regarding alternative therapies, these behavior changes are frequently the source of increased upset, stress and burden to families and often result in nursing home placement.
CoFoundersLab & Society of Physician Entrepreneurs proudly presents an educational and networking forum for entrepreneurs in healthcare and life sciences.
To make the most of your time, please browse CoFoundersLab.com and filter by “Meetup Groups – Society of Physician Entrepreneurs” before attending. If you have not created a profile on CoFoundersLab.com, please note that this is required in order for people to discover you before the event and seek you out during the networking portion of the event.
Many times when I talk with small businesses, they don’t fully understand the difference between a Federal Grant and a Federal Contract. It is important for a small business to completely understand if their government funds are coming from a grant or a contract. The terms and conditions surrounding each have somewhat unique requirements that may have implications on how the business handles the award and, in particular, the accounting related to that award.
The Government defines the difference in fairly easy to understand terms (for the government) at the grants.gov website:
A Grant is an award of financial assistance, the principal purpose of which is to transfer a thing of value from a federal agency to a recipient to carry out a public purpose of support or stimulation authorized by a law of the United States (see 31 U.S.C. 6101(3)). A grant is distinguished from a contract, which is used to acquire property or services for the federal government’s direct benefit or use.
The NIH is one of the ‘easier’ federal agencies to apply to because every year it issues an Omnibus Solicitation, requesting investigator- initiated topics. This means that rather than telling you exactly which projects they will fund, the NIH asks you, the investigator, to come up with the ideas.
As long as these ideas are related to Human Health, have the requisite level of Technological Innovation and Commercial Potential, they may be appropriate for SBIR/STTR. However, you still need to do some homework to make sure your idea fits within the research interests of the NIH’s Institutes and Centers. So before you put a lot of work into developing your proposal, there are a few things you can do:
On May 31, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) reissued its Omnibus Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) for the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs in order to implement venture capital provisions of the SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2011.
HHS notice NOT-OD-13-071 will allow small business concerns that are majority-owned by multiple venture capital operating companies (VCOCs), hedge funds and/or private equity firms to apply for the NIH SBIR program and compete for up to 25 percent of NIH’s SBIR set-aside in the Omnibus FOA or any other NIH SBIR funding announcement issued hereafter. With this notice, NIH is the first agency to elect to use its authority under Section 5107 of the reauthorization to make awards to majority-owned firms, signaling new and significant opportunities for venture capital in the future.
The University Economic Development Association (UEDA) is currently seeking nominations for its annual Awards of Excellence program, which recognizes leading edge university-based economic development initiatives from across the country. The Awards of Excellence Program recognizes higher education institutions and their partners who are transforming their campuses into engines of economic prosperity through creative initiatives in five categories:
Community Connected Campus: initiatives that promote the physical development of quality connected campuses and their surrounding communities;
Research and Analysis: initiatives that enhance the capacity of colleges and universities to provide new forms of research and tools for community, economic and workforce development practitioners;
Leadership and Collaboration: initiatives that support the development of collaborative economic development strategies and the leaders required to implement them;
Innovation and Entrepreneurship: initiatives designed to support startups, high-growth companies and clusters within a region; and
Talent Development: initiatives that promote the development of 21st-century skills.
It’s a popular sport among startups and the mobile vendor community to figure out what physicians are willing to do on their tablets and smartphones. It has to be said that some of them have come up with some pretty compelling approaches to deepen the relationship between physicians and their mobile devices.
But what is really going on in their practices? In two studies generated from a survey by AmericanEHRPartners of 1,400 with responses from about 696 physicians and 150 allied health professionals has uncovered some interesting information. AmericanEHRPartners was formed in 2010 by formed by Cientis Technologies and the American College of Physicians to help physicians compare and implement electronic health records.
Robert Langer shares the experiences and lessons learned through his involvement with more than two dozen biotech startups.
I started my first company in 1987 because I realized it was an effective path for transforming science into life-saving and life-improving inventions. Startup companies provide one means for accomplishing ends that interested me: creating products that have a positive effect on human health. I did this first with a colleague (Box 1), but through the years I have also started many companies with students and postdocs in my MIT lab.
In the year following its groundbreaking last June, all aspects of Bioscience Connecticut have moved forward on time and on budget. Of note, the project has created about 500 construction and related jobs on the UConn Health Center campus in its first year, including higher-than-required averages for small business participation and 85 percent of all work going to Connecticut-based contractors. The number of construction jobs will rise significantly over the next three years.
“Bioscience Connecticut was an important first step in positioning Connecticut as a leader in the industry,” said Governor Dannel P. Malloy. “This investment, in conjunction with the new Bioscience Innovation Fund and our other efforts, not only creates thousands of good paying jobs with good benefits, but also highlights the commitment we have to growing this sector of our economy. Our vigorous approach to establishing long-term partnerships between our universities, medical centers, and private secto
Emory University has launched a public-private drug development enterprise that will transition scientific discoveries more rapidly and efficiently from university laboratories into the marketplace. The new venture is expected to help address worldwide drug development and commercialization needs.
Drug Innovation Ventures at Emory, LLC (DRIVE) is a not-for-profit company separate from, but wholly owned by Emory.
On Tuesday, GE Healthcare announced plans to invest $2 billion over the next five years on the development of software for health systems and applications, Healthcare IT News reports.
To develop the software, the company will work with the GE Software Center of Excellence in San Ramon, Calif., in addition to several other research and development firms across the world (Monegain, Healthcare IT News, 6/12).
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
Governor Martin O’Malley today announced that Rachel King, co-founder and CEO of GlycoMimetics in Gaithersburg, has been named chair of the Maryland Life Sciences Advisory Board (LSAB). King will replace chair H. Thomas Watkins, former President and Chief Executive Officer of Human Genome Sciences, Inc., who has served on the Board since Governor O’Malley and the Maryland General Assembly created it in 2007. As chair, Watkins led the Board through a strategic planning process that, working closely with Governor O’Malley, resulted in BioMaryland 2020, a 10-year, $1.3 billion strategy for moving Maryland’s life sciences industry forward.
The Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore (EAGB) and Maryland Department of Business of Economic Development (DBED) have announced the creation of Advance Maryland, a business program designed to support growth companies, an integral component in the prosperity and sustainability of local economies. Advance Maryland was established to provide resources targeted to second-stage companies. These companies are growth-oriented and have moved beyond the startup phase. They are at the forefront of job creation and critical to vibrant economies. In contrast to traditional business assistance which focuses on finances, business plans and operational issues,
Advance Maryland addresses strategic growth challenges, from developing new markets and refining business models, to gaining access to competitive intelligence. “Maryland has a plethora of organizations and resources devoted to the startup community, but we are limited when it comes to resources for second stage companies. The statistics show how essential it is to recognize these companies and make the necessary tools available to support their growth,” stated Jen Gunner, COO of EAGB and Co-Program Manager of Advance Maryland. Youreconomy.com states that between 1995 and 2009, second-stage companies represented eleven percent of U.S. establishments, but generated more than thirty six percent of jobs and thirty eight percent of sales.
University of Maryland (UM) Ventures and SilcsBio, LLC announced today that SilcsBio has obtained exclusive rights to a technology licensed from the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB). UM Ventures is an ambitious joint research commercialization effort of the UMB and the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP). SilcsBio is a supplier of computer-directed drug discovery software and services.
“The license, which we obtained from UMB, creates the core of our product line,” said Kelli Booth, SilcsBio’s Chief Operating Officer. “It’s great to have a university so supportive of our state’s start-up community.”
The Chinese Biopharmaceutical Association, USA (CBA) will host the 18th Annual Conference at the University of Maryland Shady Grove Conference Center on Saturday, June 15th, 2013. The theme of this year’s conference is “Global Partnership in Biopharmaceutics and Translational Medicine;” it will address the critical importance of establishing worldwide collaboration to capture the great opportunity for the advancement of modern medicine and biopharmaceuticals.
The Conference
The Conference includes five sessions:
Drug Discovery: New Strategies and Platforms
Translational Genomics and anti-cancer therapy
Opportunities in New high tech parks in China
Regulatory Compliances in Biopharmaceuticals
Collaborative Opportunities and Partnership for U.S.-China Biopharmaceuticals.
Please note that most links to RFAs, PAs, and Guide Notices will take you to the NIH Web site. RFPs will take you to FedBizOpps. Links to RFPs will not work past their proposal receipt date. Archived versions of RFPs posted on FedBizOpps can be found on the FedBizOpps site using the FedBizOpps search function. Under “Document to Search,” select Archived Documents.
The NHLBI Division of Extramural Research Activities (DERA) is pleased to announce the addition of Dr Lawrence Mahan, as the Director of the Office of Translational Alliances and Coordination (OTAC). Dr. Mahan’s professional experience spans academia, government and industry in both basic and applied biomedical research. Additionally it includes global business and strategic alliance development, strategic planning, technology evaluation, entrepreneurship guidance, and consulting on platform technology development in the life sciences.
Most recently Dr. Mahan served as Director of Innovation and Business Development for Children’s National Medical Center and its research institutes, the Children’s Research Institute and the Sheikh Zayed Institute for Pediatric Surgical Innovation, where he managed intellectual property, strategic business alliance development and the advancement of academic entrepreneurship.
The D.C. region is home to some 765,000 jobs that require knowledge in science, technology, engineering and math, representing 27 percent of the overall workforce, according to a report released Monday by the Brookings Institution. Only Silicon Valley ranked higher in percentage of STEM labor.
Greater Washington has consistently ranked near or at the top of the nation in STEM job rankings, owing largely to the federal government and the contracting industry surrounding it, which grew rapidly following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The region also boasts a substantial cluster of commercial tech companies – many of them situated along the Dulles corridor and Interstate 270 – as well as a small but growing software startup scene.
Almost a quarter of the jobs in the Baltimore-area are science, technology, engineering and math positions, according to a new report by the Brookings Institution.
A total of 281,730 local STEM jobs account for about 23 percent of workforce in the Baltimore-Towson region. Baltimore ranks eighth out of 100 metropolitan areas for its concentration of STEM jobs in the Metropolitan Policy Program study released Monday by the Washington, D.C., think tank.
Maryland is No. 1 — or is it No. 7? On third thought, it might be 41st.
Critics and champions of the Free State’s business climate and tax policy have plenty to argue about most days, and all-over-the-place business climate rankings do little to quell the conflict.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce last month rated Maryland No. 1 for entrepreneurship and innovation, piling on to an Entrepreneur Magazine ranking calling Maryland the best state in which to start a business.
Histogenics Corp., a regenerative medicine company that combines cell therapy and tissue engineering technologies to develop highly innovative products primarily for orthopedic tissue repair, today announced the appointment of Peter Greenleaf to Chief Executive Officer.
Bringing over 20 years of experience in the biotechnology industry to Histogenics, Mr. Greenleaf most recently served as President of MedImmune, the worldwide biologics arm of AstraZeneca. During his tenure, he presided over the expansion of MedImmune’s extensive growth and pipeline and spearheaded industry-leading business development and venture deals. Mr. Greenleaf also served as the President of MedImmune Ventures, overseeing more than $300 million in investments in early stage portfolio companies. Prior to becoming President, Greenleaf led the development of the company’s global marketing and portfolio organizations and managed the broader commercial, corporate development and strategy functions.
BioHealth Innovation is working to assist relevant SBIR projects through its Commercial Relevance Program for the August 5th, 2013 NIH SBIR Deadline.
If your company is planning a submission for the August 5 deadline, BioHealth Innovation can assist with your submission. Through the BHI Commercial Relevance Program for SBIR/STTR projects select companies submit their federal funding concepts and receive pre-proposal feedback to help strengthen your application. Further support from BHI’s network of professional consultants and service providers is available to assist in improving your application. If you’re are planning a submission for the August 5 deadline contact Ethan Byler for details on possible support from BHI.
NIH SBIR Phase I Program
Companies to complete brief application describing the proposed SBIR project apply by June 18th
All companies notified of SBIR assistance by June 26th
Guidance, writing strategy, direction, and review sessions to be schedule to enable you through grant submission
Feedback and redlined comments on written drafts and proposals materials as well as final submission assistance
Five to ten years. That’s how long it will be before drug reimbursement in the United States becomes as stringent as in Europe, according to a range of consultants, analysts, and health policy experts with whom I’ve spoken.
This new reimbursement environment – and the expectations leading up to it – is expected to emphasize the value of “profound” innovation, at the expense of less dramatic, incremental innovation.
In a first-of-its-kind operation in the United States, a team of doctors at Duke University Hospital helped create a bioengineered blood vessel and transplanted it into the arm of a patient with end-stage kidney disease.
The procedure, the first U.S. clinical trial to test the safety and effectiveness of the bioengineered blood vessel, is a milestone in the field of tissue engineering. The new vein is an off-the-shelf, human cell-based product with no biological properties that would cause organ rejection.
NIH has reissued its Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Omnibus Grant Solicitation announcement, which states that small businesses that are majority-owned by multiple venture capital operating companies are eligible to apply for (1) these SBIR grants and (2) any other NIH SBIR funding opportunities announced after January 28, 2013. The NIH grant solicitation announcement can be found here.
With this re-issuance, small businesses that are majority-owned by multiple venture capital operating companies (VCOCs), hedge funds and/or private equity firms are now eligibleto apply to the NIH SBIR program and compete for up to 25% of NIH’s SBIR set-aside.
Healthcare providers are taking telemedicine to new heights, with the market seeing growth of a whopping 237 percent within a five-year period, according to a new Kalorama report.
Officials say the telemedicine patient monitoring market grew from $4.2 billion in 2007 to more than $10 billion in 2012. According to the report, the market itself is considered small- to moderate in size but makes up for it with its notable number of competitors and “increasing awareness of effectiveness.”
Investing in biotechnology is a riskier bet these days. The community of life sciences venture capital firms is contracting, despite scientific advances across many fields like genomics, immunology, and diagnostics. Many promising new enterprises fail to produce marketable drugs, and even successful therapies may struggle to gain markets in an environment of health care cost cutting.
That’s exactly why Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) chose to expand its programs that nurture very early stage biotechnology and device startups in the Bay area, J&J executives said as they opened the company’s California Innovation Center in Menlo Park, CA, this week.
Pathologists and clinical laboratory professionals who regularly analyze images will be interested in the findings of a research study designed to assess how the phenomenon called “inattentional blindness” among radiologists could cause them to possibly miss things hiding in plain sight.
‘Inattentional Blindness’ Occurs Even Among Highly-trained Radiologists
In a recent study, psychological scientists from Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital found that 83% of radiologists didn’t notice an image of a gorilla embedded in a computed tomography (CT) lung scan.
Health Tech Hatch, a site launched last fall as a crowdfunding site specifically for health startups, is joining forces with one of the biggest crowdfunding platforms on the web, Indiegogo.
From the beginning, the company planned to help health startups both crowdfund and beta test their products with patients and physicians. But now, founder and CEO Patricia Salber said Health Tech Hatch plans to focus more closely on the beta testing side, while working on the crowdfunding piece through Indiegogo.
San Francisco digital health accelerator Rock Health is kicking off its fifth program next week, and it has some unique startups in the mix.
Bound to be the most talked about is Augmedix, which is developing a healthcare app for Google Glass. Co-founders Ian Shakil and Pelu Tran haven’t said much about exactly what kind of app they’re working on, but it apparently will leverage Glass’s augmented reality and voice activation to help doctors keep their focus on patients. Augmedix has already raised $55,000 from 32 Upstart backers.
More than 60 companies showed off their health data applications at Datapalooza IV this week and Krishna Yeshwant, a partner at Google Ventures, was the MC for a demo session on Tuesday afternoon.
As one of the presenters was fighting with his PowerPoint demonstration and the projection system, Yeshwant answered a few questions about opportunities for healthcare startups with the search company’s investment group. He said that the outlook has changed for healthcare IT startups now that Obamacare is here to stay.
Through collaboration between Johnson & Johnson Innovation and the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3), Janssen will create a 5,000-square-foot lab space within QB3’s 24,000-square-foot incubator space in San Francisco.
The company said that the new Bay Area incubator will use the San Diego model for its innovation space.
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius opens Health Datapalooza IV with an emphatic introduction speech asking those in attendance to continue driving more ideas and innovation in data and information exchange to improve the future of the US health system.
ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND, June 4, 2013 – BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI), a regional private-public partnership focusing on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Central Maryland, is proud to announce the publication of the Central Maryland BioHealth Entrepreneur’s Resource and Finance Guide 2013. The Guide was developed by BHI, the Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore and the Montgomery County Department of Economic Development, in collaboration with the Baltimore Business Journal.
The Guide serves as a compendium of resources to biohealth innovators and entrepreneurs working to start and grow new companies and technologies in the region. This essential entrepreneurial resource includes a compilation of information on financial resources, university facilities and programs, economic development programs, and existing federal laboratory facilities and programs, as well as how to work with these assets. The Guide is one of the many projects BHI is developing to successfully transform the regional environment for biohealth startups through harnessing Central Maryland’s biohealth assets and establishing an entrepreneurial ecosystem.
The Guide has been distributed through the Baltimore and Washington business journal subscribers, and is being distributed to all regional partners. For your copy of the guide please download here or contact BioHealth Innovation for details on how to receive a hard copy.
CoFoundersLab & Society of Physician Entrepreneurs proudly presents an educational and networking forum for entrepreneurs in healthcare and life sciences.
To make the most of your time, please browse CoFoundersLab.com and filter by “Meetup Groups – Society of Physician Entrepreneurs” before attending. If you have not created a profile on CoFoundersLab.com, please note that this is required in order for people to discover you before the event and seek you out during the networking portion of the event.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
ROCKVILLE, MARYLAND, June 4, 2013 – BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI), a regional private-public partnership focusing on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Central Maryland, is proud to announce the publication of the Central Maryland BioHealth Entrepreneur’s Resource and Finance Guide 2013. The Guide was developed by BHI, the Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore and the Montgomery County Department of Economic Development, in collaboration with the Baltimore Business Journal.
The Guide serves as a compendium of resources to biohealth innovators and entrepreneurs working to start and grow new companies and technologies in the region. This essential entrepreneurial resource includes a compilation of information on financial resources, university facilities and programs, economic development programs, and existing federal laboratory facilities and programs, as well as how to work with these assets. The Guide is one of the many projects BHI is developing to successfully transform the regional environment for biohealth startups through harnessing Central Maryland’s biohealth assets and establishing an entrepreneurial ecosystem.
The Guide has been distributed through the Baltimore and Washington business journal subscribers, and is being distributed to all regional partners. For your copy of the guide please download here or contact BioHealth Innovation for details on how to receive a hard copy.
BioHealth Innovation is working to assist relevant SBIR projects through its Commercial Relevance Program for the August 5th, 2013 NIH SBIR Deadline.
If your company is planning a submission for the August 5 deadline, BioHealth Innovation can assist with your submission. Through the BHI Commercial Relevance Program for SBIR/STTR projects select companies submit their federal funding concepts and receive pre-proposal feedback to help strengthen your application. Further support from BHI’s network of professional consultants and service providers is available to assist in improving your application. If you’re are planning a submission for the August 5 deadline contact Ethan Byler for details on possible support from BHI.
NIH SBIR Phase I Program
Companies to complete brief application describing the proposed SBIR project apply by June 18th
All companies notified of SBIR assistance by June 26th
Guidance, writing strategy, direction, and review sessions to be schedule to enable you through grant submission
Feedback and redlined comments on written drafts and proposals materials as well as final submission assistance
BioHeaIth Innovation aims to transform Central Maryland into a commercialization hub by building an entrepreneurial ecosystem using the research, funding, networks and business development resources available in the region.
The market for Health Information Technology concepts and new products are moving at a rapid pace. Since the signing of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH) by President Obama in 2009 that allocated $36 billion to aid investments in healthcare IT and spurring new initiatives like the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) the environment and funding available to test new products significantly escalated.
Fast forward four years—there remains to be enormous untapped market opportunity with many new products being brought to fruition and highly innovative new concepts under development by the private and public sectors.
Maryland, a significant center of the health care industry nationally and home to the National Institutes of Health, Food and Drug Administration, Johns Hopkins University, the University System of Maryland, and a robust private sector has emerging opportunities within the Health IT industry sector from telemedicine and remote monitoring to electronic medical records and mobile health.
RFA-TW-13-002: Research on the Role of Epigenetics in Social, Behavioral, Environmental and Biological Relationships, throughout the Life-Span and across Generations (R21) This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) encourages exploratory and developmental grant applications to lay the foundation for innovative and collaborative basic research on the role of epigenetics in social, behavioral, environmental and biological relationships, throughout the life-span and across generations. Research plans that are responsive to this FOA will use existing bio-psycho-social and environmental data from human cohorts or animal studies that have biospecimens available for epigenetic profiling.
RFA-HL-14-015: Clinical Coordinating Center (CCC) for the NHLBI Prevention and Early Treatment of Acute Lung Injury (PETAL) Clinical Trials Network (U01) This funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is for a Clinical Coordinating Center (CCC) for a new National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) Clinical Trials Network for the Prevention and Early Treatment of Acute Lung Injury (ALI) (PETAL Network). The Network will develop and conduct randomized controlled clinical trials to prevent, treat, and/or improve the outcome of adult patients with, or at risk, for ALI or the Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS). This FOA solicits applications for a CCC and runs parallel with a separate FOA for the CCs (RFA-HL-14-014).
RFA-HL-14-014: Clinical Centers (CC) for the NHLBI Prevention and Early Treatment of Acute Lung Injury (PETAL) Clinical Trials Network (U01) This funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is for Clinical Centers (CC) for a new National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) Clinical Trials Network for the Prevention and Early Treatment of Acute Lung Injury (ALI) (PETAL Network). The Network will develop and conduct at least 3-5 randomized controlled clinical trials to prevent, treat, and/or improve the outcome of adult patients with, or at risk for, ALI or the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). This FOA solicits applications for CCs and runs parallel with a separate FOA for the CCC (RFA-HL-14-015).
Please note that most links to RFAs, PAs, and Guide Notices will take you to the NIH Web site. RFPs will take you to FedBizOpps. Links to RFPs will not work past their proposal receipt date. Archived versions of RFPs posted on FedBizOpps can be found on the FedBizOpps site using the FedBizOpps search function. Under “Document to Search,” select Archived Documents.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) has entered into a collaborative agreement with Glaxo Smith Kline (GSK) to evaluate the efficacy and safety of the company’s portfolio of clinical stage antibacterial assets for treating hospital and biothreat infections.
The contract is unique in that it is the first in which BARDA has taken a portfolio approach to funding drug development with industry.
Through new agreements with the Canadian BC Cancer Agency and Columbia University, the company now has access to biomarkers for lymphoma, glioblastoma, and several other cancers. These biomarkers will be developed into diagnostic assays that can assist physicians in choosing targeted treatments, Qiagen says.
The company’s glioblastoma cancer biomarker, acquired from Columbia University, detects the presence of FGFR-TACC fusion genes. The lymphoma biomarker, acquired from BC Cancer Agency, detects the Y641 EZH2 gene mutation. This type of lymphoma is targeted by pharmaceutical manufacturers like Epizyme and Constellation.
Partner companies Theravance and the GlaxoSmithKline have received Food and Drug Administration clearance for their new drug for the treatment of COPD, Breo Ellipta. COPD encompasses what used to be known as emphysema and chronic bronchitis – the new drug should be an improvement on current treatment options which can ease the symptoms of this disease. COPD, which is strongly linked to smoking, is the third most significant cause of death in America.
Curtis Rosebraugh, director of FDA Office of Drug Evaluation II, commented that this new long-term maintenance treatment for COPD will provide new care options for the millions of people in the USA who suffer from the condition. The companies have stated that the drug should be available during the third quarter of 2013. Breo Ellipta, which requires a single dose per day, should surpass existing treatments which require two doses.
COPD
COPD stands for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, a progressive condition (one which continually worsens) which causes breathing problems in those who suffer from it. The symptoms are coughing and the associated overproduction of mucus, shortness of breath especially during exercise and tightness of chest. COPD is also associated with a greater susceptibility to chest-infections. Doctors used to refer to ’emphysema’ and ‘chronic bronchitis’, though these are now officially grouped under this general condition.
A disease which is currently under-diagnosed, this condition refers to the inflammation and subsequent damage to the interior of the lungs, and results in lower efficiency in taking on oxygen and in problems with the mechanics of breathing. Smoking is the top cause of COPD, though a genetic predisposition can cause it in some people. While the damage which it causes cannot be repaired, sufferers who subsequently quit smoking can slow down the progress of the disease.
QIAGEN N.V. (NASDAQ: QGEN; Frankfurt Prime Standard: QIA) today announced two agreements adding promising new biomarkers involving glioblastoma, lymphoma and other cancers to QIAGEN’s expanding portfolio of potential companion diagnostics that is being developed to help doctors use a patient’s genomic information to guide treatment decisions.
In the glioblastoma project, QIAGEN has entered into an exclusive worldwide licensing option on FGFR-TACC fusion genes with Columbia University in New York. QIAGEN intends to develop this biomarker into a diagnostic test for routine use in diagnostic workups, which may enable doctors to identify glioblastoma patients who could benefit from targeted treatments now under development. Glioblastoma is the most common and aggressive form of primary brain tumor, a serious unmet medical need because the disease is generally fatal despite aggressive therapy. Fusions between members of the FGFR and TACC gene families also have been identified recently as present in several other malignancies, including bladder cancers.
The Greater Washington Board of Trade is forming a joint task force with the Greater Baltimore Committee and the Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore to promote the region as a global hotbed for the cybersecurity industry.
The Baltimore-Washington Cyber Task Force plans to work with both public and private sector groups to develop a strategy for cyber industry growth around the new U.S. Cyber Command at the Army’s Fort Meade, located halfway between Washington and Baltimore.
React Labs, an early stage company commercializing a comprehensive mobile technology platform for real-time polling, has been awarded $100,000 in funding from the Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII), company officials announce today.
Founded by University of Maryland Professor Philip Resnik, who holds joint appointments in the Department of Linguistics and at the Institute for Advanced Computer Studies (UMIACS), React Labs offers a mobile application that allows a very large numbers of participants to register their moment-by-moment reactions to live and televised events, providing a highly engaging user experience and producing rich, detailed data for analysis.
A team of students at the Johns Hopkins University’s Whiting School of Engineering has designed for NASA a new stethoscope that delivers accurate heart- and body-sounds to medics who are trying to assess astronauts’ health on long missions in noisy spacecraft.
Space is serene, because no air means no sound. But inside the average spacecraft, with its whirring fans, humming computers and buzzing instruments, is about as raucous as a party filled with laughing, talking people.
Maryland was recently named the top state in the nation for entrepreneurship and innovation. The state has the second highest concentration of STEM employment and adds STEM jobs faster than all but five other states.
With Maryland’s commitment to growth in science, technology, engineering and math, UMBC continues to develop and expand its professional programs to meet the needs of the state’s STEM-centric workforce.
The board of GenVec Inc. has voted to liquidate and dissolve the struggling Gaithersburg biotech, it announced Tuesday in a securities filing.
The move follows a string of setbacks for GenVec, which three years ago saw its lead pancreatic cancer drug candidate, TNFerade, fail in late-stage trials. In 2011, longtime CEO Paul Fischer announced his retirement from the company.
Please join us for an exclusive, invitation-only event to be held in conjunction with PwC and the Technology Council of Maryland.
This event has been designed especially with you in mind. You’ll have the opportunity to network with your peers in an intimate setting and learn what it took companies within your industry to grow and become $1 billion market leaders. Presenter Brian Williams is a successful life sciences entrepreneur. Now consulting for PwC, Brian will present a roadmap other life science companies have followed to experience explosive growth in a dynamic and demanding environment.
Amid the volatile blend of opportunity and challenge that characterize the global life sciences industry, only a few small companies have managed to catapult their revenue over the $1 billion mark over the past two decades. Whether they chose to expand their focus and product portfolios, enter new geographies, or grow their core business, these aspiring giants pursued three distinct strategies to jump start growth:
Leveraging core product/technology capabilities to launch differentiated products
Using mergers & acquisitions and partnerships to gain new products and/or expand geographic presence
Building a strong, stable leadership team armed with a compelling vision and relentless drive
We hope you can join us to explore these topics and discuss their applicability to you and your company.
When: Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Time: 8:00 – 8:30 am – Registration and networking 8:30 – 10:30 am – Program
Location: The Universities at Shady Grove Conference Center 9630 Gudelsky Drive Building II, Room 11-1042 Rockville, Maryland
If you have any questions regarding the event, please Deana Mary at deana.mary@us.pwc.com or 703.918.3631<
QIAGEN N.V. (NASDAQ: QGEN; Frankfurt Prime Standard: QIA) and SIP Biotech Development Co., Ltd. (BioBAY) today announced the opening of QIAGEN (Suzhou) Translational Medicine Center, a translational medicine R&D Corporation which aims to accelerate the discovery and validation of biomarkers, and to create companion diagnostics for the Chinese market. QIAGEN (Suzhou) is a joint venture of QIAGEN and BioBAY, the innovative life sciences cluster in Suzhou Industrial Park near Shanghai. The companies announced the launch of QIAGEN (Suzhou) today in an opening ceremony on the BioBAY campus, which currently hosts more than 330 companies and research groups.
QIAGEN (Suzhou) will provide services and consulting with state-of-the-art QIAGEN molecular technologies for international and Chinese pharmaceutical companies, as well as research institutes to enable translational medicine, the multidisciplinary process of advancing discoveries from laboratory bench to the patient’s bedside. The center will work with partners located at BioBAY and elsewhere in China to provide fully integrated biomarker solutions to accelerate drug development, as well as to commercialize companion diagnostics. The four key service sections include biobanking, pharmacogenetics, next generation sequencing (NGS) and pharmacogenomics. This innovative alliance builds on QIAGEN’s leading global position in Personalized Healthcare, using genomic information to produce individualized treatment decisions for patients. QIAGEN (Suzhou) is expected to grow to about 50 employees within three years.
It’s tough to move the needle on a multi-billion-dollar venture fund. That’s one reason New Enterprise Associates, which has managed mega-funds about as long as anyone in the business, makes a habit of taking large stakes in portfolio companies.
That strategy can pay off well in the event of a big exit – which is what happened last week with the IPO of data analysis provider Tableau Software. NEA, a backer in all of Tableau’s venture funding rounds, was the largest shareholder at the time of the offering. And as Tableau shares soared post-debut, NEA’s stake did as well. The firm sold 1 million shares in the offering for $31 million, and its remaining 18.6 million shares were worth more than $900 million as of last week.
If you’re a medical intern, most of what you need to do your job can be pulled off a computer screen: Blood test results. Paged messages. Orders to start a medication. All but, of course, how sick a patient is.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland, suspecting that more and more of an intern’s time is spent in front of a computer, looked into just how today’s intern spends her working hours on an inpatient ward. They asked trained college students to shadow 29 internal medicine interns from two different Baltimore teaching hospitals and document how much time they spent talking to patients, eating lunch, reading charts, and the like — over the course of three weeks. Their recently published results confirm a trend that old-timers nostalgically lament and that those of us in training know to be all too true: Only a small percentage of our time is spent in direct patient care.
Remember Plexxikon? The Berkeley, CA-based company had a lot of talent for structural biology-based drug design, an impressive new treatment for melanoma, and a strong management team.
Two years ago, nobody on Wall Street cared one whit. Plexxikon flirted with the idea of going public, found little interest, and sold itself off to Japan-based Daiichi Sankyo for a more than 10-fold return on investment. It was a poster child for how dead the biotech IPO market was in 2010 and 2011.
Five top Japanese drug companies are to open their “libraries” of experimental compounds to scrutiny by scientists hunting new treatments for malaria, tuberculosis and other diseases affecting the world’s poor.
The initiative, announced on Thursday, is the first project under a new $100 million partnership between the drugmakers, the Japanese government and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to fund research into neglected tropical diseases.
This week, U.S. Chief Technology Officer Todd Park and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius posted separate entries on the White House Blog touting the effect of federal initiatives on health IT adoption and health industry innovation, FierceHealthIT reports.
The posts were written in response to a New York Times commentary published by columnist Thomas Friedman last week about health industry innovation related to the Affordable Care Act and other federal initiatives.
The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and participating Institutes invite grant applications for research on the development of safe, real-time, non-invasive (or minimally invasive), in vivo methods to assess the development and function of the human placenta.
Background
The placenta is essential for the maintenance of pregnancy. The prominent function of the placenta is in the transfer of nutrients, gases and waste products between the mother and fetus. It is effectively the lung, gut, and kidney of the fetus. Abnormalities of placental development and function are known to underlie many major pathologies of pregnancy including spontaneous preterm birth, fetal growth restriction, and preeclampsia. Most information on placental biology is obtained studying placental tissue obtained from pathological pregnancies, such as a preterm deliveries occurring predominately in the third trimester, or from term deliveries in which placental development has already crested. Hence, there is a paucity of information obtained earlier in gestation, a period of time when many of the pregnancy pathologies are believed to have their origins, as well as very limited information gleaned throughout gestation from normal pregnancies. The development of real-time, non-invasive (or minimally invasive) methods to assess the development and functionality of the placenta in vivo throughout gestation would serve as valuable research tools to enhance our understanding of placental biology and rooted pathologies. The development of these tools could lead to the identification of markers and predictors of pregnancy outcome, and provide a future foundation for better pregnancy monitoring in the clinical setting.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
BioHeaIth Innovation aims to transform Central Maryland into a commercialization hub by building an entrepreneurial ecosystem using the research, funding, networks and business development resources available in the region.
The market for Health Information Technology concepts and new products are moving at a rapid pace. Since the signing of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH) by President Obama in 2009 that allocated $36 billion to aid investments in healthcare IT and spurring new initiatives like the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) the environment and funding available to test new products significantly escalated.
Fast forward four years—there remains to be enormous untapped market opportunity with many new products being brought to fruition and highly innovative new concepts under development by the private and public sectors.
Maryland, a significant center of the health care industry nationally and home to the National Institutes of Health, Food and Drug Administration, Johns Hopkins University, the University System of Maryland, and a robust private sector has emerging opportunities within the Health IT industry sector from telemedicine and remote monitoring to electronic medical records and mobile health.
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI), a regional private-public partnership focusing on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Central Maryland, today announced its selection of Ram Aiyar, Ph.D., M.B.A., as the first Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) for BHI at the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI). Dr. Aiyar will help advance fundamental research discoveries to new therapeutics, diagnostics and devices that can be used clinically and commercially.
“We’re pleased to add Dr. Aiyar to our roster of Entrepreneurs-in-Residence,” said Rich Bendis, BHI President and CEO. “He is now our third EIR – joining Todd Chappell, who is EIR at NIH, and Ken Malone, our EIR working with the University of Maryland Ventures. The growth of this program will be a benefit to BHI and our partner organizations for years to come, and will result in transitioning more early-stage biomedical technologies to commercial potential. ”
Hall of Fame award underlines long history of commitment to Maryland technology community
The Tech Council of Maryland honored Lockheed Martin with the 2013 Hall of Fame Award at its 25th annual Tech Awards Celebration, held at the Bethesda North Marriot Hotel and Conference Center in Bethesda, Md.
The Tech Awards Celebration is the mid-Atlantic region’s largest and most prestigious awards ceremony that recognizes leaders and innovators in the technology and life science communities from Maryland and the surrounding regions.
Doug Doerfler, CEO of Gaithersburg-based MaxCyte Inc., was this month named the Tech Council of Maryland’s new chairman. He steps into the position with a wealth of TCM experience under his belt, having spent three years as chairman of the trade group’s biotech division. I caught up with Doerfler on his plans for TCM, the interplay between its IT and bio contingents and the search for a new full-time CEO.
The threshold for reporting on marketing stunts is a high one, and United Therapeutics Corp. has just cleared it.
Reaching us by mail today is the Silver Spring biotech’s 2012 annual report, written as a spoof of a children’s book and called “Good Year UTHR.” UTHR, of course, is the ticker symbol for United Therapeutics, which has a history of doing this sort of thing.
Medical technology pioneer AstraZeneca has chosen the Cambridge Biomedical Campus at the Addenbrooke’s Hospital site in Cambridge UK for its new global headquarters.
It will make a formal announcement in June. The Biomedical Campus has been chosen over Granta Park where AZ’s biologics division MedImmune has massively grown its presence. None of the parties involved are making any comment. The decision is a major boost for the Biomedical Campus where The Queen today officially opened the MRC’s Laboratory of Molecular Biology.
In a unique program called Preparing the Future (PTF), 334 students have completed classroom and hands-on training to equip them to address the HIV epidemic, according to Alexandra “Allie” Reitz, the programýs coordinator for the JACQUES Initiative (JI) of the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
The PTF at the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) is designed as a model for the nation and is supported by a grant from Gilead Sciencesý HIV FOCUS Program, for the JACQUES Initiative (JI). By participating, UMB students “gain invaluable communication skills through the PTF’s interprofessional approach,” says Reitz.
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) plc and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), have agreed to a first of its kind collaboration that will support the development of several antibiotics to fight antibiotic resistance and bioterrorism.
This public-private agreement marks the first time that HHS has taken a “portfolio approach” to funding drug development with a private sector company. This unique collaboration provides flexibility to move funding around GSK’s antibacterial portfolio, rather than focusing on just one drug candidate and allow medicines to be studied for the potential treatment of both conventional and biothreat pathogens.
GlaxoSmithKline has created a contest for academic researchers that it hopes will accelerate the speed by which academic research can be turned into novel therapies.
The London pharmaceutical company, which has large operations in the Philadelphia region, on Tuesday launched a competition program it is calling Discovery Fast Track.
The StartRight! Women’s Business Plan Competition was founded in 2003 by Rockville Economic Development Inc. (REDI) to encourage and support women’s entrepreneurship. Currently in its tenth year, StartRight! awards prizes for winning business plans annually. The women who join our competition receive more than the opportunity to win a top prize of $5,000 – they also receive valuable coaching and feedback on their business plan!
There are 3 Prize Categories – Total of $15,000 in prizes with a top prize of $5,000! You select the category in which you wish you plan to be entered.
Technology
General Business
Life Science
If you have additional questions or need assistance, contact alicia@marylandwbc.org or call us at 301-315-8096.
Biotech has never quite taken flight in Northern Virginia. Whether that’s due to the lack of a big corporate anchor or blue-chip research university, the dearth of wet labs, the attraction of a stronger scene in Montgomery County or pure dumb happenstance is anyone’s guess.
But on this side of the D.C. suburbs, the life sciences are not thriving. The story of Virginia biotech right now has much more to do with Charlottesville than it does with Fairfax.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013 8:00 AM – 10:00 AM Bethesda Country Club
We often hear that capital formation is among the most difficult challenges faced by biotechnology companies. Please join us on June 12th for an MdBio breakfast program to hear from four seasoned local venture capital investors, all to discuss investment trends, strategies and opportunities in Maryland. The event will offer a great platform to hear and have dialogue about the broader dynamics in investment, what has changed and where the capital opportunities are.
Speakers:
David Mott, General Partner, NEA
Lars Hanan, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, BroadOak
Brian Carney, Principal, Herbert Venture Partners
Kyp Sirinakis, Managing Partner, Rock Spring Ventures
The Maryland Stem Cell Research Commission (Commission) has completed its review of the 171 applications received in response to its FY 2013 Requests for Applications (RFAs). The board of directors of the Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO) approved the Commission’s recommendation to fund 31 new proposals with the Maryland Stem Cell Research Fund’s (MSCRF) $10.4 million FY2013 budget. These projects, which include pre-clinical research and a clinical trial, will advance the field of regenerative medicine.
“These awards are critical to ensuring that the groundbreaking research being done has the opportunity to move to the commercial marketplace,” said Governor Martin O’Malley. “I congratulate this year’s grant recipients and look forward to the contributions they make to the improved health and wellbeing of our citizens.”
Would it surprise you to learn that Fast Company magazine just ranked Maryland the third-most innovative state in the nation? Or that Maryland took the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s No. 1 spot for both innovation and entrepreneurship? It’s a fact: In our state’s dynamic mix of world-class universities and professional schools, institutes for advanced research, teaching hospitals, think tanks, hubs for start-up businesses and more, there exists this mysterious, economically essential activity known as innovation.
So if we are as innovative as Fast Company and the leaders of free enterprise say we are — and I believe it’s true — we have to ask ourselves a couple of questions: How did it happen? And how can we keep it going?
Poor maternal, infant, and child health as well as inadequate coverage of family planning remain significant global health problems facing low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) today. Despite a 47% reduction since 1990, nearly 300,000 women still die annually from causes directly related to pregnancy. The majority of these deaths are attributed to preventable obstetric complications prior to, during, and following delivery, with developing countries carrying the vast majority (99%) of the burden. Additionally, although mortality for children under five years of age has decreased from 12 million annually at the beginning of the last century (in 1900), to 6.9 million annually in 2011, the burden of these deaths now falls primarily in LMICs, with most of these deaths also due to preventable causes. In these same countries mobile phone coverage and access has become nearly ubiquitous, with the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) estimating in 2013 that the number of mobile phone subscriptions (6.8 billion) is nearly equal to the human population of 7.1 billion. The opportunity this represents is one that has not been lost on the global health community.
There is a critical unmet need in the U.S. and around the world for the development of pediatric medical devices, with support coming only from a scarce number of available grants and some private investments and philanthropy. The testing and marketing of new devices for children raise unique challenges as well. Finally, there has been much controversy around the 510(k) process for device approvals, which leads to additional need for new innovative approaches that improve the regulatory pathways for medical device development.
As we shift to a value-based healthcare system, regulatory bodies, innovators, and manufacturers must find the right balance between two noble goals: encouraging and enabling innovative medical advancements and ensuring that patients receive treatment that is as safe and effective as possible.
Please join us on June 13, 2013, for a day long symposium with leaders from the FDA, NIH, IOM, and industry, as well as policymakers, clinicians, lawyers, scientists, and bioethicists from around the world to discuss these critical issues in pediatric surgical innovation and device development.
Their ability to innovate, to inspire others, to power a business along the difficult journey from start-up to market leader is truly extraordinary. The Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year Award celebrates these special people who have created many of the world’s most dynamic and successful companies. We invite you to join us in celebrating their success at the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year 2013 Maryland Awards Gala.
Wednesday, June 26, 2013 Baltimore Marriott Waterfront 700 Aliceanna Street | Baltimore, MD 21202 6:00 p.m. — Cocktail reception 7:00 p.m. — Dinner and awards ceremony Black tie
Today is Demo Day for Techstars Boston. I love Techstars Demo Days for many reasons, not the least of which is the amazing community that gathers to hear the brief, well-rehearsed pitches from the various start-ups who have spent months planning for this big event.
As accelerators like Techstars gain in popularity, many entrepreneurs wonder whether they should be applying and, if admitted, joining an accelerator and when they shouldn’t. I get this question a lot from my students, particularly as they’re graduating and scrambling to figure out where they should start their company, how to raise capital and whether an accelerator is right for them. Here are a few guidelines that I would think about if I were an entrepreneur making such a decisions.
There are lots of myths about venture capital and biotech in particular, as noted previously on this blog. Many of these myths are deeply held beliefs about returns, what works and what doesn’t, and the state of the industry. Told often enough, these beliefs are presumed to be true by many observers, including practitioners in the field, Limited Partners, and pundits.
Surprisingly, data exists to address lots of these points, and I’ve attempted here to summarize (and link to) a number of prior posts aimed at debunking these myths and sharing a few observations on them.
The Public Health Service Act indicates that the purpose of the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) is to advance translational sciences by coordinating and developing resources that leverage basic research in support of translational science; and by developing partnerships and working cooperatively to foster synergy in ways that do not create duplication, redundancy and competition with industry activities.
The Affordable Care Act, aka health care reform, aka Obamacare, is spurring a massive creation of new business opportunities.
So says Bryan Sivak, the chief technical officer and entrepreneur-in-residence at the Department of Health and Human Services, the cabinet-level agency that regulates the $2.8 trillion U.S. health care market. Sivak joined VentureBeat’s HealthBeat conference today via a video conference (see photo above).
Just one of the areas that’s becoming fertile ground for entrepreneurial innovation: the health insurance exchanges mandated by the law.
More than half of all eligible providers nationwide have received federal incentive payments for demonstrating meaningful use of electronic health records, rates that have more than doubled since last year alone, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced Wednesday.
Sebelius says HHS has met and exceeded its goal for 50 percent of doctor offices and 80 percent of eligible hospitals to have adopted EHRs by 2013’s end.
Zina Moukheiber said the New York Digital Health Accelerator Is a Model to Emulate at the beginning of the program. With the proliferation of accelerators, I thought I’d share an insider’s perspective on what it was like to be in the program now that it is complete. I’ll also share some ideas on how can take it to the next level building off of their already-strong foundation.
Zina described the program as follows:
One of the toughest hurdles for health IT start-ups is getting in front of customers. Doctors are reluctant to pay, and sales cycles at hospitals can take months. Entrepreneurs often inspired by a negative personal experience, and moved to fix the problem, find later that their product doesn’t fit the hospital’s “workflow,” or offers no incentive for doctors to adopt it.
Optimistic and confident in their abilities, a diverse and growing percentage of U.S. citizens engage in entrepreneurship, according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM).
U.S. entrepreneurship rates climbed to the highest level in more than a decade according to the 2012 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) U.S. Report issued today by Babson College and Baruch College. In 2012, the average Total Early-Stage Entrepreneurial Activity rate (TEA) increased to nearly 13 percent, an all-time high since GEM first began tracking entrepreneurship rates in 1999.
“Despite a sluggish economy, 2012 was marked by U.S. entrepreneurs reporting greater optimism and confidence in their abilities to start new businesses,” commented the GEM Report’s lead author, Donna J. Kelley, Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship at Babson College. “In fact, nearly 13 percent of the U.S. adult population was engaged in entrepreneurship with the vast majority starting businesses to pursue an opportunity rather than out of necessity. On the downside, Americans closing businesses were twice as likely as those in other innovation-driven economies to cite difficulties financing their ventures.”
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
The information contained in this website and newsletters is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by BioHealth Innovation via its newsletters, but not written or endorsed in any way by BioHealth Innovation unless otherwise noted. While we endeavor to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
BioHealth Innovation, Inc. (BHI), a regional private-public partnership focusing on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Central Maryland, today announced its selection of Ram Aiyar, Ph.D., M.B.A., as the first Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) for BHI at the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI). Dr. Aiyar will help advance fundamental research discoveries to new therapeutics, diagnostics and devices that can be used clinically and commercially.
“We’re pleased to add Dr. Aiyar to our roster of Entrepreneurs-in-Residence,” said Rich Bendis, BHI President and CEO. “He is now our third EIR – joining Todd Chappell, who is EIR at NIH, and Ken Malone, our EIR working with the University of Maryland Ventures. The growth of this program will be a benefit to BHI and our partner organizations for years to come, and will result in transitioning more early-stage biomedical technologies to commercial potential. ”
POSITION DESCRIPTION – Health IT Entrepreneur-in-Residence The Health IT Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) will lead in the evaluation of early-stage health IT technologies, advise BHI on opportunities for new ventures, and build a portfolio commercially relevant health IT opportunities. The Health IT EIR influences the BHI organization by managing and providing information, intelligence and insights that drive critical business decisions. The Health IT EIR will work with early stage companies to launch and validate those companies while providing recommendations and insights on the direction of potential technologies. The Health IT EIR has the potential to also serve in a co-management role in a health IT accelerator.
The award luncheon will provide countless opportunities to show your appreciation for the estimated 33,000 small businesses of Montgomery County—businesses that contribute directly to the strength of the area’s economy. Eight awards will be presented to eight distinct companies.
Registration and networking with exhibits will begin at 11:00 AM, followed by the program at 12:00 PM./p>
America urgently needs a national, research-based effort to empower all undergraduates and help more of them, particularly underrepresented minorities, graduate with science and engineering degrees, said Freeman Hrabowski, III, president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) during the 2013 William D. Carey lecture.
Hrabowski addressed the 38th Annual AAAS Forum on Science and Technology Policy on 2 May 2013—fifty years to the day after he had participated in the historic Birmingham Children’s March, which was inspired by the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. “I wanted a better education,” Hrabowski said of his participation in that 1963 event. “All children really do want to be well-educated.”
The Economic Alliance of Greater Baltimore and the Maryland Department of Business of Economic Development announced Monday that they created a new program to help companies that have moved beyond the start-up phase to continue to grow.
Advance Maryland is designed to assist these companies with developing markets, fine-tuning their business models and boosting growth with the help of a research specialist. Similar models have been adopted in other states, the groups said.
Please join us for an exclusive MedTech networking event hosted by QIAGEN. Learn more about AdvaMed 2013: The MedTech Conference and discover your local MedTech community.
The Tech Council of Maryland (TCM), the state’s largest technology trade association with more than 400 biotechnology and technology members employing more than 200,000 in the region, announced at its 25th annual Dinner and Awards Celebration last night that Doug Doerfler was elected as chairman of TCM’s board. Doerfler was the association’s vice chairman and succeeds Larry Letow, who has served as chairman since 2010. TCM also named four current board members to executive leadership positions.
“I am honored to continue serving TCM at such an important and promising time,” said Doerfler. “Our members have become the catalysts of Maryland’s dynamic economy, creating new, high-paying jobs and discovering breakthrough technologies that can change our world. We may come from diverse backgrounds, but a single mission unifies us: creating a healthier, safer world with game-changing innovations right here in Maryland. I especially thank Larry Letow for his outstanding board leadership these past three years. He has positioned TCM, our membership and Maryland for a very bright future.”
The Tech Council of Maryland (TCM), Maryland’s largest technology trade association with more than 400 biotechnology and technology members employing more than 200,000 in the region, last night announced the winners of its 2013 TCM Awards. The 25th annual celebration was attended by more than 750 technology and business leaders from around the state.
“Maryland is ripe with innovative companies – from ones focused on high tech and IT solutions that make businesses and governments run smoothly and securely, to biotech companies that are developing cutting-edge cures for serious diseases,” said Doug Doerfler, chairman of TCM’s Board and founding president and CEO of MaxCyte, Inc. “Winners of the 2013 Tech Awards exemplify this broad cross section of individuals and companies that make up the Tech Council membership and are key to driving advances in all aspects of technology.”
As a follow up to a $1 billion initiative last year that funded projects across the nation designed to improve outcomes and save money in the healthcare system, the Centers for Medicaid & Medicare Services today announced a second, $1 billion round of Health Care Innovation Awards.
According to CMS, funding will be awarded to provider groups, health systems, payers, states, public-private partnerships, for-profit organizations or any other parties that have developed innovative payment and delivery models to improve population health, quality of care and cost efficiency.
Fifty years ago this month, I chanced to hear the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. I was a mild-mannered kid with a speech impediment and a love of math. That day, I was focused on solving math problems, not issues of justice and equal rights. But King broke through to me when he said this: If the children of Birmingham march, Americans will see that what they are asking for is a better education. They will see that even the very young know the difference between right and wrong.
I chose to march, and found myself among hundreds of children jailed for five terrifying days. Mind you, I was not a brave child. But even at 12 years old, I believed and hoped that my participation could make a difference.
A District advisory committee OK’d bids from Johns Hopkins Medicine and MedStar Health to build costly proton therapy centers on Thursday, leaving both just one step from final approval to proceed on the high-tech cancer treatment programs.
It wasn’t, however, a clean victory for either. The committee rejected a key part of Hopkins’ plan and asked for additional details about both nonprofit system’s outreach to under-served neighborhoods.
Having recently stressed that oncology is a core therapy area for its research, AstraZeneca is moving three of its cancer compounds into Phase III trials.
First up, MedImmune, AstraZeneca’s biologics R&D arm, has enrolled the first patient in a late-stage study of moxetumomab pasudotox. It is sponsored by the Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program at the US National Cancer Institute (NCI), and will evaluate the CD22 immunotoxin as a potential treatment in adults with hairy cell leukaemia who have not responded to or relapsed after standard therapy.
Entrepreneur Magazine has named Maryland the No. 1 state to start a new business, with neighboring Virginia following close behind at No. 3.
The California-based magazine cited the state’s Maryland Entrepreneurs Resource List — which connects experts with startups — and the University of Maryland Baltimore County’s initiative to find and train female entrepreneurs in choosing the state for the top position.
Last week, the Baltimore BioPark played host to the Innovation Working Group, which consists of executives from the U.S.-Russia Bilateral Presidential Commission. The commission was founded as a joint venture between President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
The highly anticipated event is an opportunity for the United States and Russia to find new ways to collaborate on projects in the fields of biotech and science. Members of the group were given a tour of the University of Maryland, College Park and Baltimore BioPark. The event was led by Oleg Fomichev, the Russian Deputy Minister of Economy, and Lorraine Hariton, Special Representative for Business and Commerce of the U.S. Department of State. Among those that joined the three day tour were chief executives of biotech companies from both Maryland and Russia, as well as leaders from the Pushchino BioTech Cluster.
Telehealth holds enormous potential for transforming healthcare, but, to telemedicine pioneer Dr. Jay Sanders, the primary barrier is not financial. Instead, physician and patient attitudes about healthcare and health itself must change, said Sanders, who often has been called the father of telemedicine.
“The critical issue is really not telemedicine,” Sanders said in an interview with MobiHealthNews, noting that the term can include telehealth, mobile health, digital health and other forms of e-health. “What’s important is the needs of the healthcare delivery system.”
Would you like to highlight your city and your university research park by hosting AURP’s 2015 International Conference? As the host park, you’ll be recognized as a leader in the field and attract worldwide attention to the exciting progress and success of your region. Find out more about the requirements at AURP.net/hostrfp.
To be considered, submit your proposal, electronically, to VickiePalmer@AURP.net.
Chevy Chase-based New Enterprise Associates stands to reap a fortune from Tableau Software Inc.’s newly public stock, which is up about 60 percent in its first day of trading on the New York Stock Exchange Friday.
NEA is the single biggest venture backer of the Seattle-based data analytics company (NYSE: DATA). The firm sold 1 million shares of Tableau stock in the offering, and is holding on to another 18.5 million shares, or about 37 percent of the company. With Friday’s pop, that stake is valued at more than $900 million.
“Transformation” is the best description of what is happening in health care right now. We are seeing historic changes in how health care is administered in the United States—with increased focus on quality of care versus just paying for a service. We are seeing changes in how people can enroll in health insurance—with the upcoming establishment of a new market place that will help more people get insured in this country than ever before. And, we are seeing changes in how people understand and make decisions about their own health—with an increasing number of tools and services becoming available to help individuals access health information and manage their own personal health data.
BioHealth Innovation (BHI) is a regionally-oriented, private-public partnership functioning as an innovation intermediary focused on commercializing market-relevant biohealth innovations and increasing access to early-stage funding in Maryland.
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Kauffman Foundation FastTrac®, has joined with Montgomery College to support future and current business owners before, during, and after the startup process. Entrepreneurs will receive the information, resources, and networks necessary to start and grow successful businesses.
t’s good to have friends in high places. Especially friends who can leverage more than 30 years of experience in technology and business to nurture and foster your startup seed.
ntegrated BioTherapeutics (IBT) and Stanford University have been jointly awarded a $300,000 Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the National Institutes of Health. The goal of the grant is to develop a highly effective immunotherapeutic to prevent Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) reinfection in liver transplant patients based on antibodies that limit the ability of the virus to escape treatment via mutations.
enomics, immunology, and diagnostics. Many promising new enterprises fail to produce marketable drugs, and even successful therapies may struggle to gain markets in an environment of health care cost cutting.
collaborative agreement with Glaxo Smith Kline (GSK) to evaluate the efficacy and safety of the company’s portfolio of clinical stage antibacterial assets for treating hospital and biothreat infections. 
Through new agreements with the Canadian BC Cancer Agency and Columbia University, the company now has access to biomarkers for lymphoma, glioblastoma, and several other cancers. These biomarkers will be developed into diagnostic assays that can assist physicians in choosing targeted treatments, Qiagen says.
Alexandra “Allie” Reitz, the programýs coordinator for the JACQUES Initiative (JI) of the Institute of Human Virology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
oday is Demo Day for Techstars Boston. I love Techstars Demo Days for many reasons, not the least of which is the amazing community that gathers to hear the brief, well-rehearsed pitches from the various start-ups who have spent months planning for this big event.
he Affordable Care Act, aka health care reform, aka Obamacare, is spurring a massive creation of new business opportunities.
ptimistic and confident in their abilities, a diverse and growing percentage of U.S. citizens engage in entrepreneurship, according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM).
The award luncheon will provide countless opportunities to show your appreciation for the estimated 33,000 small businesses of Montgomery County—businesses that contribute directly to the strength of the area’s economy. Eight awards will be presented to eight distinct companies.
Please join us for an exclusive MedTech networking event hosted by QIAGEN. Learn more about AdvaMed 2013: The MedTech Conference and discover your local MedTech community.
