BioWorld International Correspondent

Anecova SA unveiled a new, in vivo approach to assisted human reproduction, based on the use of an encapsulation technique that allows fertilization to take place within the uterus, instead of in a test tube. The Geneva-based company aims to launch the procedure in Europe in 2008, and to commence its first U.S. trials in the second half of 2007.

Anecova began clinical trials of the procedure under the direction of Paul Devroey at the Brussels Free University Hospital in Brussels, Belgium, in June 2006. Seventeen women have undergone the procedure already, Anecova co-founder, President and CEO Martin Velasco told BioWorld International, and three more will do so shortly. The company then plans to commence a larger clinical trial to provide statistical significance of safety and efficacy.

"We don't have statistical data yet," said Velasco, who is one of Switzerland's best known business angels. But studies indicate the method "is equal to and it could be better" than in vitro fertilization (IVF), he said.

Anecova's other co-founder is Pascal Monk, a physician and researcher based at the Clinique des Grangettes, a private maternity hospital in Geneva. He developed the idea in 2000 and demonstrated proof of concept in mice. He obtained the first patent on the technology in 2001.

Instead of allowing fertilization of harvested eggs to occur in the laboratory, the eggs and sperm are placed in a permeable, inert tube - about 2 centimeters long and less than 1 millimeter in diameter - which is then implanted in the mother's womb to allow fertilization to take place in the uterine environment.

The company has developed its encapsulation platform with the help of a collaboration with Patrick Aebischer, president of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne. He also is a founding scientist of two companies that previously specialized in cell encapsulation, CytoTherapeutics Inc., of Lincoln, R.I. (now StemCells Inc., of Palo Alto, Calif.), and its one-time partially owned Swiss subsidiary Lausanne-based Modex Therapeutiques SA (now part of Lausanne-based IsoTis SA).

Nicolas Bouche from Aebischer's group at the EPFL is joining Anecova as chief technology officer in January, Velasco said.

The Anecova device has hundreds of micrometer-scale apertures that allow chemical communication between the gametes and the external environment. After two to five days, the tube is recovered, and the fertilized eggs are morphologically examined - as is the case with IVF at present - and selected for re-implantation. "The beauty of it is the capsule is essentially doing nothing. It simply allows communication," Velasco said. The capsule has been designed to be compatible with the transfer catheters currently used in IVF.

Half of the eggs taken from each trial participant are subjected to normal IVF and half are subjected to the encapsulation-based procedure to ensure that each woman's opportunity of becoming pregnant is not compromised by the new procedure.

Regardless of the method involved, the embryos that score the highest on morphological examination are selected for implantation.

Although the Anecova process requires additional procedures for recovery of the device and re-implantation of the selected embryos, it has gained a positive reaction from trial participants, Velasco said, because the fertilization step is more natural than current IVF treatments.

The company has not yet calculated whether it will be cheaper or more expensive than current methods. "The value is not in cost impact. We offer a more natural approach to IVF and embryo development," he said. Moreover, although extra procedures are involved, the laboratory-based incubation and maintenance steps are eliminated, Velasco said.

Anecova is funded by a group of private investors, Velasco said, and has enough cash to break even.