TORONTO – Vancouver, British Columbia-based Izotropic Corp. has inked a deal with Victoria, British Columbia-based based Starfish Medical Inc. to commercialize a CT scanner Izotropic CEO Robert Thast said will be a major disruptor of the breast imaging industry. Izotropic has spent approximately $20 million over the past 15 years to develop the system and is counting on Starfish to help translate this into a market-ready 3D breast CT imager by the end of 2020.
Within a month of disclosing a CA$175.6 million (US$124.7 million) award from the Canadian government to use its antibody discovery platform for the analysis of patients who have recovered from COVID-19, Abcellera Biologics Inc. closed a $105 million series B financing aimed at expanding its capacity and investing in new technologies that complement its antibody discovery engine.
TORONTO – How confident is Canada’s government that Abcellera Biologics Inc. can identify viral antibodies to help stop COVID-19 in its tracks and build the manufacturing infrastructure for antibody therapies against future pandemic threats? Enough to award the Vancouver, British Columbia-based biotech CA$175.6 million (US$124.7 million) for the application of its antibody discovery platform to the analysis of patients who have recovered from COVID-19.
TORONTO – The Toraymyxin (PMX) hemoperfusion cartridge developed by Toronto’s Spectral Medical Inc. and used successfully to treat patients during the avian and swine flu pandemics is being eyed to help COVID-19 patients in Canada. Specifically, an emergency interim order from Health Canada expands its use to include treatment of COVID-19 patients with high levels of endotoxin in their blood and in acute respiratory failure.
TORONTO – Within a week of completing clinical trials the chest radiography AI tool developed by Vancouver, B.C.-based 1Qbit Inc. has been given the all-clear from Health Canada for deployment across the country. The XrAI was originally developed to better identify patients with respiratory illness including SARS, pneumonia and tuberculosis (TB), but then in February was tested on a publicly available data set of COVID-19 X-ray images.
TORONTO – A portable DNA-based test kit developed by Ottawa-based Spartan Bioscience Inc. has received Health Canada approval for COVID-19 testing – this at a time when hospitals are under enormous pressure to meet increased testing demand.
Within two weeks of a public challenge to design user-friendly, easily built ventilators, Montreal-based CAE Inc., formerly Canadian Aviation Electronics, began gearing up to distribute 10,000 units of its newly created ventilator over the next three months.
TORONTO – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has yet to rule out following U.S. President Donald Trump’s lead by invoking his nation's wartime Defense Procurement Act compelling manufacturers to begin making ventilators to combat COVID-19. For now, Ottawa has signed contracts or letters of intent with eight equipment makers.
TORONTO – The Government of Canada is fast tracking importation of two U.S. manufactured test kits for COVID-19, issuing an interim order for sale of the Cobas SARS-CoV-2 diagnostic test kit developed by Pleasanton, Calif.-based Roche Molecular Systems Inc. and Waltham, Mass.-based Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.’s Taqpath COVID-19 Combo Kit.
TORONTO – That old military saw “an army marches on its stomach” might just as easily apply to transport of much needed ventilators for patients suffering from the coronavirus. Mounting systems for ground and air ambulances like the Bracket Pro Serie for Ventilators launched March 5 by Quebec City-based Technimount System Inc. are the “soldiers” carrying ventilators and other medical devices for hospital bound patients, Technimount CEO Carl Bouchard told BioWorld.
