Grants, Contracts And Awards To Biotech Companies:Oct. 17, 2003 - March 31, 2004
Company* (Country; Symbol) | Funding Institution | Amount (M) | Type# | Details (Date) |
Acacia Research Corp. (CBMX) | Department of Defense | $5.9 | Contract award | Acacia's Combimatrix Group was awarded the contract to develop microarray technology for detectting biological threat agents (3/8) |
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Adenosine Therapeutics LLC* | National Institutes of Health | $0.101 | Phase I SBIR grant | To fund identification of novel agonists of A2A adenosine receptors that are orally active and longer acting (12/2) |
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Adenosine Therapeutics LLC* | Department of Defense | $0.198 | Phase I SBIR grant | To fund research to develop A2A adenosine receptor agonists as adjuncts to antibiotics for treatment of anthrax septicemia (10/30) |
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Aeres Biomedical Ltd.* (UK) | National Cancer Institute | ND | Contract award | The NCI awarded Aeres a contract to design, construct and express a humanized antibody against CD-22, for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (1/21**) |
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AdipoGenix Inc.* | National Institutes of Health | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | AdipoGenix said it got a grant to discover drugs for obesity, and a grant to develop assays to identify compounds that increase fatty acid metabolism (11/17) |
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Adventrx Pharmaceuticals Inc. (OTC BB:AVRX) | National Institutes of Health | $1.3 | Grant | The M.D. Anderson Cancer Center got the grant to further develop Adventrx's EradicAide vaccine technology for HIV/AIDS (2/20) |
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Agencourt Bioscience Corp.* | National Human Genome Research Institute | $27.2 | Grant | Agencourt was awarded the money over three years as one of five centers to undertake large-scale genome sequencing projects for priority organisms designated by the NIH (11/7) |
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Affitech AS* (Norway) | National Functional Genomics program (Norway) | NOK6.2 (US$0.881) | Grant | Affitech and the Norwegian Radium Hospital got the grant to continue research on new cancer therapeutics, vaccines and diagnostics (2/18**) |
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Altor BioScience Corp.* | National Cancer Institute | $0.1 | SBIR grant | The one-year grant will support development of soluble T-cell antigen receptor reagents for tumor diagnostic applications (3/29) |
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Affymetrix Inc. (AFFX) | National Human Genome Research Institute | ND | Research grant | To support Affymetrix and academic researchers in applying GeneChip technology to the Encodeproject, the next phase of the Human Genome Project (10/22) |
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Aphios Corp.* | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | The grant will support developments of HIV drugs from Aphios' library of marine microorganisms (3/23) |
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AusAm Biotechnologies Inc.* | National Institutes of Health | ND | Contract grant | To support development of DES10, a topical microbicide, as a prophylactic ointment against HIV and other STDs (2/24) |
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Avanir Pharmaceuticals Inc. (AMEX:AVN) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $0.75 | Grant | The grant follows an initial SBIR award for further development of fully human antibodies to anthrax toxins using Avanir's Xenerex technology (3/2) |
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Biofrontera Pharmaceuticals GmbH* (Germany) | North Rhine Westphalia state government (Germany) | €4 (US$5) | Technology and Innovation Program grant | To support discovery of drug candidates for treating chronic pain and Parkinson's disease (2/18) |
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BioPort Corp.* | Department of Defense | $29.7 | Manufacturing contract | BioPort was awarded a contract for producing an anthrax vaccine; BioPort will get at least $29.7M and could get up to $245M, depending on the number of doses ordered (1/9) |
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BioSante Pharmaceuticals Inc. (AMEX:BPA) | Department of Defense (via Dynport Vaccine Co. Ltd.) | $0.658 | Joint Vaccine Acquisition Program subcontract | BioSante got a subcontract to develop alternative routes of administration for anthrax vaccines (1/7) |
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BioXell SpA* (Italy) | Italian Research Ministry | €7.3 (US$8.9) | Research grant and loan | The money will support research into treatments for inflammatory diseases; two-thirds of the funds are repayable over 10 years (3/11) |
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Blue Heron Biotechnology Inc.* | National Human Genome Research Institute | $0.143 | Phase I SBIR grant | To improve Blue Heron's gene synthesis platform, GeneMaker, by reducing the error frequency in synthetic DNA (10/28) |
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Cerus Corp. (CERS) | ND | ND | SBIR grant | Grant is related to development of the cancer antigen mesothelin (1/28) |
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Chimerix Inc.* | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $0.6 | Phase I SBIR grant | Two-year grant will support pre-clinical development of drugs for treating multidrug-resistant HIV-1 infection (3/11) |
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Coley Pharmaceutical Group Inc.* | National Institute Of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $5.8 | BioDefense Partnerships program grant | To support research and development of immunostimulatory CpG TLR9 agonists as inhalable agents to protect against bioterror agents (10/21) |
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Commonwealth Biotechnologies Inc. (CBTE) | The Department of the Army | ND | Subcontract | The company will analyze mail from the Pentagon's mail-sorting center for particular pathogens and toxins (3/24) |
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Commonwealth Biotechnologies Inc. (CBTE) | Unnamed federal agencies and private companies | $1 | Contract awards | One deal is for identification of agents in swabs taken from mail facilities, and the other is for analysis of environmental samples for bioagents (3/9) |
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Corixa Corp. (CRXA) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $11.6 | Contract award | Corixa got a five-year contract to develop its molecules that act on the TLR4 receptor and may offer immunity to infectious agents (1/5) |
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Crucell NV (the Netherlands; CRXL) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $3.5 | Support agreement | The NIAID will provide up to $3.5M to cover preclinical costs of Crucell's AdVac-based malaria vaccine (3/30) |
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Curacyte AG* (Germany) | German state of Thuringia | €1.2 (US$1.4) | Corporate Technology Development Program grant | The company's Curacyte Chemistry GmbH subsidiary was given the grant to fund preclinical development of small-molecule inhibitors of Factor Xa (10/29) |
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CytoGenix Inc. (OTC BB:CYGX) | National Cancer Institute | ND | Research grant | To fund testing of an aerosol compound containing a single- stranded DNA expression vector coded with an anticancer gene sequence on mice with induced metastatic lung tumors (3/10) |
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Cytomatrix LLC (U.S. subsidiary of CordLife; Singapore) | Department of Defense | $1.7 | Contract award | Deal to use Cytomatrix's T-cell production technology to screen vaccine prototypes under development (1/18) |
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DeCode Genetics Inc. (Iceland; DCGN) | The Simons Foundation | $2.8 | Grant | DeCode got a grant for a population-based study of the genetics of autism and autism spectrum disorders (1/7) |
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Devgen NV (Belgium) | Flemish government | €1.9M (US$2.2M) | Promotion of scientific and technological research grant | To support work at Devgen using C. elegans-based technology to identify the mechanism of action of drugs (11/20) |
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Direvo Biotech AG* (Germany) | State government of North Rhine- Westphalia (Germany) | €3.9M (US$4.9) | Grant | Four-year grant to support development of a technology platform for the generation of novel therapeutic proteins (1/14) |
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Diversa Corp. (DVSA) | Deparment of Defense | $2.28 | Award from the DOD's Chemical and Biological Defense Initiatives Fund | Diversa will work with Agentase LLC and Life Science Research Israel Ltd. to develop an enzyme- based system capable of decontaminating chemical and biological warfare agents (1/8) |
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Encore Pharmaceuticals Inc.* | National Institutes of Health | $0.1 | Phase I SBIR grant | To further work by Encore and Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation scientists to identify natural products and molecules for use in neurological diseases (10/30) |
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Epimmune Inc. (EPMN) | National Cancer Institute | $0.6 | Phase I grant | Two-year grant will support pre- clinical work on a multi-epitope vaccine for ovarian and breast cancer; University of Washington researchers are collaborating on the project (3/31) |
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FeRx Inc.* | National Cancer Institute | $0.1 | Phase I SBIR grant | To evaluate use of FeRx's Magne-Targ for the delivery of gemcitabine in treating pancreatic cancer (10/28) |
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Galapagos Genomics NV* (Belgium) | Flemish government | €1.4 (US$1.8) | Flemish Institute for Promotion of Industrial Scientific- technological Research grant | Galapagos will build Alzheimer's disease-relevant assays using neuronal cells and will use them with its adenoviral-based target discovery platform (2/12) |
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Generex Biotechnology Corp. (GNBT) | Department of Defense | $0.525 | DOD Concept Award | Generex's Antigen Express unit will further develop its vaccine technology in prostate cancer; the basis is suppressing expression of the immunoregulatory Ii protein (1/30) |
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Genomatica Inc.* | National Human Genome Research Institute | $0.765 | Phase II SBIR grant | The two-year grant will support a program to integrate high-throughput experimental data with its computer models of cellular metabolism (11/4) |
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GenVec Inc. (GNVC) | U.S. Naval Medical Research Center | ND | Collaborative Research and Development Agreement | NMRC will provide GenVec optimized malaria genes to be used in adenovector vaccines being developed by GenVec and PATH's Malaria Vaccine Initiative (3/31) |
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GenVec Inc. (GNVC) | PATH's Malaria Vaccine Initiative | $2.5 | Collaborative research, development and supply agreement | GenVec will produce and evaluate adenovirus vectors containing genes for up to five malaria antigens (3/31) |
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GenVec Inc. (GNVC) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (via SAIC-rederick Inc.) | $1.3 | Subcontract with the NIAID's Vaccine Research Center | Expanded subcontract calls for $1.3M in potential additional funding, for nearly $30M total; GenVec will manufacture adenovector SARS vaccine for early clinical testing (2/25) |
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GenVec Inc. (GNVC) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (via SAIC-rederick Inc.) | $12 | Subcontract with the NIAID's Vaccine Research Center | Expanded subcontract calls for $12M in potential additional funding, for a total of $28M; GenVec will manufacture adenovector HIV vaccine for late-stage clinical development (1/6) |
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GenVec Inc. (GNVC) | National Eye Institute | $0.2 | SBIR grants | Two awards to enhance research using pigment epithelium-derived factor for treating eye diseases (12/9) |
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Hawaii Biotech Inc.* | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $5.6 | Phase II SBIR grant (from Small Business Biodefense Program) | The focus is on optimizing compounds to inhibit the toxin secreted by anthrax bacteria (2/17) |
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HMGene Inc.* | National Institutes of Health | $0.739 | Phase II SBIR grant | The two-year grant will support work to identify and validate drug targets for obesity using HMGene's Adiposense technology (12/16) |
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HGT Inc.* | National Cancer Institute | $0.5 | Grant | Two-year grant for HTG to identify and validate sets of genes for toxicity studies and develop a new array product (3/16) |
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Ingenium Pharmaceuticals AG* (Germany) | Europe | €11.7 (US$14.5) | European Community Sixth Framework grant | Ingenium, the University of Cambridge and a number of institutions are part of a consortium to discover genetic targets in obesity (1/8) |
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Isis Pharmaceuticals Inc. (ISIS) | Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency | $19.5 | Contract | Isis' Ibis program got a two-year contract to further develop its Tiger biosensor to identify infectious agents in biological warfare attacks (3/2) |
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Lipid Sciences Inc. (LIPD) | National Institutes of Health | $0.1 | STTR grant | The one-year grant will fund work using delipidation technology to develop a preventive vaccine against SARS (3/25) |
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Lynx Therapeutics Inc. (LYNX) | National Institutes of Health (via SAIC-Frederick Inc.) | ND | Services agreement | Lynx will characterize gene expression patterns in tissues from the mouse to build a reference transcriptome database; it said it was a multimillion-dollar deal (2/26) |
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MacroPore Biosurgery Inc. (FSE:XMP) | National Institutes of Health | ND | Phase I/II SBIR grant | MacroPore will study the role of adipose-derived regenerative cells in treating myocardial infarction; the work will be done with researchers at UCLA (1/15) |
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Merrimack Pharmaceuticals Inc.* | National Cancer Institute | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | The grant supports development of antibodies using yeast display technology for use in microarrays, for applications in cancer and autoimmune diseases (3/25) |
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Merrimack Pharmaceuticals Inc.* | National Cancer Institute | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | The grant supports development of Merrimack's microarray-based Network Biology platform in apoptosis and cancer (1/29) |
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Microbiotix Inc.* | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | ND | Phase II SBIR grant | Two-year grant to support development of MBX-300 for treating respiratory syncytial virus infections (3/18) |
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MycoLogics Inc.* | Department of Health and Human Services | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | MycoLogics will work with the California Institute for Medical Research to develop a vaccine against Aspergillus fumigatus, a fungus that causes multiple diseases (3/15) |
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MycoLogics Inc.* | Department of Health and Human Services | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | MycoLogics will work to isolate a new class of compounds to treat fungal disease by disrupting beta(1,6)-glucan synthesis (3/1) |
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MycoLogics Inc.* | Department of Health and Human Services | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | Company will work to derive a novel vaccine against San Joaquin Valley fever (2/5) |
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NanoBio Corp.* | Department of Defense | $3.2 | Contract award | NanoBio will use the award in the area of infectious diseases (12/16) |
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NanoCure Corp.* | Michigan Economic Development Corp. | $0.187 | Contract award | NanoCure is getting $187,000 over three years to develop a drug delivery platform based on dendrimer technology (1/27) |
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NaPro BioTherapeutics Inc. (NPRO) | National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke | ND | SBIR grant | To use its gene editing techno- logy to address inherited mutations in animal models of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (12/4) |
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Neurome Inc.* | National Institutes of Health | ND | Phase I SBIR grant | To develop better predictive test systems along with specific biological markers for drug target expression patterns; Neurome is working with PsychoGenics Inc. to develop the screening platforms (2/25) |
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NewLink Geneitcs Inc.* | Iowa Department of Economic Development | $6 | Iowa Values Fund Board award | NewLink was among companies that received state-incentive funding; the money will support NewLink's work in cancer (2/19) |
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NovaScreen Biosciences Corp. | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $12.95 | Contract award | The contract, "Innate Immune Receptors and Adjuvant Discovery," focuses on establishing a pipeline of drug candidates that stimulate the innate immune system (1/15) |
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Oncosis LLC* | National Science Foundation | ND | Phase II SBIR grant | To further develop its method of cell loading, Laserfect, on the Laser-Enabled Analysis and Processing platform (11/13) |
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Oragenics Inc. (OTC BB:OGEN) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $0.1 | Phase I SBIR grant | The grant supports development of technology to identify genes of M. tuberculosis that are specifically induced during human infections (3/4) |
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Origen Therapeutics Inc.* | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $0.34 | Phase I SBIR grant | The grant supports work on generating human polyclonal antibodies in chicken eggs for use as passive immunotherapy to combat pathogens and toxins (2/18) |
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Oxford BioMedcia plc (UK; LSE:OXB) | Department of Health (UK) | £0.5 (US$0.915) | Award | The award will support development of LentiVector technology for use in treating single-gene inherited disorders, with a focus on hemophilia A (3/29) |
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Ozgene Pty. Ltd.* (Australia) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $8.5 | Contract award | Ozgene will supply genetically modified mice to institute researchers (3/3) |
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Paratek Pharmaceuticals Inc.* | Medicines for Malaria Venture | ND | Grant | To support investigation of tetracycline derivatives that may be active against the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum (2/24) |
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Peregrine Pharmaceuticals Inc. (PPHM) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $1.68 | Research grant | Researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center got the grant to study Peregrine antibodies against Lassa fever (11/3) |
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Phytodyne Inc.* | Iowa Department of Economic Development | $5 | Iowa Values Fund Board award | Three-year award to support the company's work in agricultural biotechnology (2/19) |
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Prana Biotechnology Ltd. (Australia; PRAN) | Australian government | A$1.35 (US$1.04) | R&D Start grant | To take Prana's candidate for Alzheimer's disease drug, PBT-2, through safety testing and Phase I clinical trials (2/18) |
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Proneuron Biotechnologies Inc.* | The Marcus Foundation | $3.2 | Financing commitment | Proneuron and the Shepherd Center will use the money to establish a cell-processing center in Atlanta and support Shepherd's participation in Proneuron's Phase II study of ProCord for acute spinal cord injury (3/9) |
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Proteome Sciences plc* (UK) | European Commission | €0.438 (US$0.544) | Sixth Framework grant | Proteome is participating in a three-year program in pharmacogenomics for prediction of therapeutic response to antidepressants (2/13) |
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Proteome Sciences plc* (UK) | UK goverment | £0.419 (US$0.775) | DTI-Link grant | Proteome and King's College, London, will work to improve the early detection of Alzheimer's disease and to discover new targets for therapy (2/9) |
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Ribonomics Inc.* | North Carolina Biotechnology Center | $0.15 | Research grant | The grant will be used to complete development of the Ribonomics Analysis System, a functional clustering technology (2/3) |
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Solexa Ltd.* (UK) | UK Department of Trade and Industry and the Medical Research Council | £0.7 (US$1.26) | LINK grant | The grant supports a genomics effort by Solexa, the European Bioinformatics Institute, Imperial College London and Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (3/2) |
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Surromed Inc.* | National Institutes of Health | ND | SBIR grant | To support development of a modified version of recombinant human annexin V for cardiovascular indications (10/23) |
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Vical Inc. (VICL) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $1 | Phase I SBIR grant and research grant | The grants will support development of Vical's plasmid DNA vaccine against cytomegalovirus (3/8) |
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Vical Inc. (VICL) | National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases | $6 | Subcontract awards from SAIC-Frederick Inc. | Vical got the money awarded in a May 2003 contract from the NIAID's Vaccine Research Center for production of DNA vaccines (2/9) |
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V.I. Technologies Inc. (VITX) | National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NIH) | $0.885 | Phase I and II Fast Track grant | Two-year grant related to Vitex's Inactine system for advancing the transfusion safety of blood (2/9) |
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Xcellsyz Ltd.* (UK) | Department of Trade and Industry (UK) | £0.75 (US$1.26) | Grant | The grant will be used to test the company's cell-based approach to discovery through development of the XD4000 compound series (10/31) |
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Zivena Inc.* | State of Ohio | $8 | Research grant | Zivena is part of a team that got a grant to develop Zivena's Resmycin (inhaled doxorubicin) for lung cancer; others are Ohio State University, Batelle Memorial Institute and Siemens; they also got $13.5M in financial commitment (11/11) |
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Notes: | ||||
* Indicates a privately held company. | ||||
** Denotes the date the item ran in BioWorld International. | ||||
Currency conversions reflect values at the time of a deal's announcement. | ||||
# SBIR = Small Business Innovation Research; STTR =Small Business Technology Transfer. | ||||
Unless otherwise indicated, symbols listed are on the Nasdaq market. | ||||
AMEX = American Stock Exchange; FSE = Frankfurt Stock Exchange; LSE = London Stock Exchange; OTC BB = Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board. | ||||