LONDON – Cell Medica Ltd. has attracted Kurt Gunter, a leader of cell therapy in the U.S., to be its chief medical officer, in one of five senior appointments that will see the London-based company scaling up to a global operation. Gunter is currently president of the International Society for Cellular Therapy and previously was involved in efforts to commercialize cell therapies at Hospira Inc., ViaCell Inc. and Transkaryotic Therapies. Before working in industry, he was acting deputy director

NeuroVive Pharmaceutical AB extended its drug pipeline by picking up a series of polyketide-based preclinical cyclophilin inhibitors from Biotica Technology Ltd., a UK pioneer of polyketide engineering, which is currently in administration. Financial terms were not disclosed, but the agreement covers a potent class of polyketides called sangamides, which are derived from a naturally occurring molecule called Sanglifehrin A, as well as technology platform assets in the form of microbial strains

LONDON – Progenitor Labs Ltd. has raised £4 million (US$5.8 million) in seed financing from the GlaxoSmithKline plc venture fund SR One, enabling the company to further develop its platform technology for screening for small molecules that promote the differentiation of endogenous adult stem cells. Progenitor is a spinout from another start-up company, Plasticell Ltd., based in London, which has developed CombiCult, a high-throughput system for the discovery of optimal protocols for

LONDON – Study of a family affected by an inherited neurological disease has helped to reveal the identity of an enzyme that could point the way to new therapies for cancer and cardiovascular disease. The existence of the enzyme, which plays a role in maintaining cell survival and DNA repair, has been predicted for at least 30 years and has even been shown to operate in cell cultures. But, until it was linked with the gene defect in the family studied, no one knew what it was. Now an

LONDON – Mesoblast Ltd. has raised A$170 million (US$174.6 million) in a private placing, bringing total cash reserves for the stem cell specialist to A$332 million and providing funding for a Phase III trial in treating degenerating spinal discs. The shares will be issued at A$6.30, a 2.2 percent discount to the closing price of A$6.44 the day before the private placing was announced on March 6. The new shares represent less than 15 percent of the shares in issue so shareholder approval was

LONDON – It was money galore for UK biotech on Monday as the government Biomedical Catalyst fund announced its second round of grants, with 51 companies bagging a total of £47.2 million (US$70.2 million). Taken with the first round of grants, that brings the amount disbursed since the £180 million fund was set up a year ago to £96 million, with 115 companies receiving funding to help technologies across the valley of death and toward the market. And this is having one of the desired effects – of

AbbVie Inc. and InterMune Inc. could derail the European Medicines Agency's (EMA) carefully timetabled introduction of a new data transparency regime on Jan. 1, 2014, by seeking court injunctions preventing the disclosure of clinical trial data for their respective principal products, Humira (adalimumab) and Esbriet (perfidenone). According to the website of the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg, InterMune has lodged an application initiating proceedings on Feb. 11, while

Without revealing much in the way of new data, TopoTarget A/S enjoyed a 45 percent bounce in its share price during early trading Tuesday, as an analysis of the final top-line results from a registration trial of belinostat in patients with relapsed or refractory peripheral T-cell lymphoma (PTCL) confirmed the drug exceeded the efficacy level defined by the study's primary endpoint, a minimum objective response rate (ORR) of 20 percent. The threshold had been agreed on with the FDA under the

LONDON – Ablynx NV raised €31.5 million (US$41 million) in a private placement, boosting cash reserves to around €90 million and allowing the company to progress development of its next-generation rheumatoid arthritis (RA) product ALX-0061 into Phase IIb, while negotiating with potential partners. The placement of 4.4 million new shares was via an accelerated book-building process, announced after the market closed on Feb. 27 and completed on Feb. 28. The shares were placed at €7.20 per share

Addex Therapeutics SA, of Geneva, and Viva Biotech Ltd., of Shanghai, China, entered a partnership to advance oral small-molecule adenosine 2A receptor (A2AR) positive allosteric modulators. The A2AR natural ligand, extracellular adenosine, is locally produced at the sites of inflammation and has been characterized for decades as a "brake for inflammation." An oral small-molecule compound targeting A2AR activation, which selectively enhances the effect of high adenosine concentration only

Privately held Concert Pharmaceuticals Inc. struck another business development high note, inking an exclusive license agreement that provides Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc with global rights to develop and commercialize deuterium-modified sodium oxybate (D-SXB) compounds, including C-10323, aimed at narcolepsy. Sodium oxybate is the active ingredient in Xyrem, which Jazz markets in the U.S. to treat the narcolepsy symptoms cataplexy and excessive daytime sleepiness. Concert's preclinical data

LONDON – The European Commission (EC) finally put some financial firepower behind its pledge to find treatments for 200 rare diseases by 2020, announcing €144 million (US$187 million) of new funding for 26 separate projects. Those projects will bring together more than 300 participants from 29 countries across Europe and the U.S., including academics, biotechs and patients' groups. A spectrum of rare diseases, ranging from cardiovascular to metabolic and immunological disorders will be covered

LONDON – A new genetic study has provided backing for the theory that inflammation in the brain is a cause of psychosis. Researchers in Sweden have discovered that a genetic variant that boosts the effects of inflammation in the brain is more common in people with bipolar disorder who experience psychotic episodes. The finding is likely to lead to exploration of new therapeutic strategies for the treatment of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, using anti-inflammatory drugs. Catharina

LONDON – Start-up BioMoti Ltd. secured its first private financing in a seed round of £150,000 (US$227,000) to advance its Oncojan platform technology, a microparticle carrier system combining targeted delivery of chemotherapy drugs with their controlled release within tumor cells. When added to £350,000 in nondilutive grant funding received to date, that will allow the London-based company to shape up the technology, develop the business plan and move to raising a Series A of up to £12 million

LONDON – Identification of a protein that orchestrates many of the changes that permit a normal cell to turn into a cancer cell will open up an entirely new field of cancer therapeutics, the researchers who made the discovery predicted. The team, from ICREA in Barcelona, Spain, also established a screening system to identify compounds that will inhibit the protein. Raùl Méndez, group leader at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine in Barcelona, told BioWorld International: "We have found

The lineaments of Ireland's new science strategy are evident in its latest round of research funding, comprising €200 million (US$261 million) of public money, which will fund seven university-industry research centers over the next six years. Industry partners will add another €100 million through a mix of cash and in-kind contributions. Although three of the seven centers are focused on life sciences – and a fourth has a significant life sciences strand – none will perform discovery research

LONDON – Biotechs registered with the SME (small- and medium-sized enterprise) Office of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) have seen consistent improvements in the success rate of applications for marketing approvals, according to a report analyzing activity in the seven years since the office was set up in 2005. In that time, 98 marketing authorization applications (MAAs) were made by SMEs, of which 26 currently are under evaluation. Of the remainder, just over half were successful. That is

4SC AG could earn up to €96 million (US$125 million) in option and milestone payments arising out of a preclinical drug development deal in inflammatory skin disease with Leo Pharma A/S, as well as double-digit royalties on eventual product sales. 4SC is getting a €1 million option fee up front and would receive another €3 million should Leo, of Ballerup, Denmark, exercise its option. Another €92 million is available in development milestones. 4SC also will receive R&D funding. The companies

Ablynx NV, of Ghent, Belgium, and Spirogen Ltd., of London, inked a research collaboration to evaluate the potential of a cancer drug conjugate combining Spirogen's cytotoxic drugs, pyrrolobenzodiazepines and associated linker technology, with Nanobodies generated using Ablynx's technology platform. Under the terms, Ablynx will provide access to Nanobodies against an undisclosed target, and Spirogen will provide access to its cytotoxic warheads and conjugation technologies. The collaboration