Featured companies: Ablynx, Bind Biosciences, Maas Biolab, Oriel Therapeutics, ThromboVision, Xcellerex
(UPDATED: See below.)
Contract biomanufacturer Xcellerex pulls in $31M — Marlborough, Mass.-based Xcellerex, a startup that provides contract “bioprocess” development and manufacturing, raised $31 million in a third funding round. Investors included VantagePoint Venture Partners, Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, and SCG Investments.
Xcellerex develops modular “turnkey” manufacturing systems for complex biomolecules such as the proteins, peptides, antibodies and nucleic acids used in biotech drugs and vaccines. The company doesn’t, however, appear to name any of the corporate partners for which it is presumably providing these services.
Maas Biolab receives $2.1M grant for potential Lou Gehrig’s treatment — Maas Biolab, an Albuquerque, N.M., company focused on turning the older immunosuppressive drug cyclosporine into a treatment for Lou Gehrig’s disease, received a $2.1 million grant to further its work. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke provided the funding.
Maas believes that cyclosporine is a neuroprotective drug and says that it extends the lives of mice with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, the technical name for Lou Gehrig’s disease. The company’s experimental drug Mitogard is a proprietary form of cyclosporine specifically intended for adminstration into cerebrospinal fluid. It’s not clear from the Maas Web site if it developed Mitogard or licensed it from elsewhere. The drug is not yet in clinical trials; Maas says the drug will undergo “dose escalation” and “pharmacokinetics” studies — that is, work to ascertain its dose-effectiveness and the way it is distributed and then broken down and eliminated by the body — in order to enable an application for human tests.
Nanopartical startup Bind Biosciences hooks $2M award for targeted drugs — Bind Biosciences, a Cambridge, Mass., biotech developing nanoparticles capable of ferrying drugs to specific locations in the body, received a $2 million grant to further its work. NIST provided the funding.
Bind Biosciences is one of several startups hoping to tailor the biological, physical and chemical properties of nanoparticles in ways that will cause them to hone in on particular tissues or protein targets. By attaching drug molecules to these nanoparticles, it should theoretically be possible to turn them into a new version of “smart-bomb” targeted therapies. Other startups at work in this space that we’ve written about include Tempo Pharmaceuticals and Carigent Therapeutics (see our coverage here and here).
Oriel Therapeutics raises undisclosed sum for new drug inhaler — Oriel Therapeutics, a Research Triangle Park, N.C., device maker focused on a new form of inhaler, raised an undisclosed sum in a third funding round, VentureWire reports (subscription required). The investment was lead by New Leaf Venture Partners; the company declined to disclose other investors or the amount. Oriel claims to be developing a new type of “active” inhaler for drugs for asthma or lung disease.
OTHER HEADLINES OF NOTE:
- Houston’s ThromboVision gets $1.5M grant for personalized-medicine diagnostics (Houston Business Journal)
- Infusion-services firm Critical Homecare Solutions files for $125M IPO (Edgar)
- Belgium’s Ablynx, maker of mini-antibodies from llamas, plans IPO later this year (Reuters)
UPDATE: Expanded items on Xcellerex, Maas Biolab, Bind Biosciences, and Oriel Therapeutics.
