VentureBeat

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Luminous Medical raises $24M for automated glucose monitoring (release)
• Alimera Sciences gets $30M for eye-disease drug (release)
• Vaccine maker LigoCyte draws $28M (release)
• Heartbeat tracker CardioNet trims IPO, aims for listing today (IPOhome)
• Axial Biotech takes in $6M for spinal diagnostics (release)
• Insulin bioengineer enGene receives $6.4M (release)
• GlucoLight raises funding for, well, glucose monitoring (release)
• Germany’s InflaRx gets seed funding for sepsis work (release)
• Cell imager Amnis pulls in $3.5M (VentureWire)
• Korea Bone Bank gets funding for bone transplants (release)

Luminous Medical raises $24M for automated glucose monitoring – Carlsbad, Calif.-based Luminous Medical, a medical-device maker, raised $23.5 million in a second funding round. Investors included Adams Street Partners, RiverVest Venture Partners, Finistere Ventures, De Novo Ventures and Latterell Venture Partners.

Luminous is developing an automated blood-sugar sensor for diabetic patients being treated in hospital intensive-care units and operating rooms. According to the company, keeping a tight rein on blood-glucose levels, which can soar or crash unexpectedly in diabetics, helps prevent complications while shortening hospital stays and reducing the risk of death.

Measuring such tight control, however, typically requires manually checking blood-glucose levels every 30 to 60 minutes, the company says. The Luminous device, by contrast, uses infrared spectroscopy — a technique that identifies particular molecules by measuring which wavelengths of light they absorb — to measure glucose and other blood chemicals non-invasively.

The company licensed its technology from InLight Solutions of Albuquerque, N.M., which previously invested $60 million in the technology. The device has not been approved by the FDA.

Axial Biotech takes in $6M for spinal diagnostics – Axial Biotech, a Salt Lake City diagnostic-test maker, raised $6 million as part of its second funding round. Investors included Johnson & Johnson Development, vSpring Capital and Ohio Biotech Group.

Axial, founded in 2002 by a group of spinal surgeons and geneticists, is an odd hybrid of biotech and devices. The company aims to produce tests that will predict and measure the severity of spinal problems such as scoliosis, as well as unspecified “motion-preserving technologies” — presumably an alternative to the stigmatizing back braces that orthopedists have long inflicted on children with the condition.

Insulin bioengineer enGene receives $6.4M – Canada’s enGene, a Vancouver biotech looking for ways to jump-start natural insulin production in diabetics, raised $6.4 million in a first round of funding. Investors included Saad Investments, Masa Life Science Ventures and private investors.

EnGene has an audacious — which is to say, of course, also quite chancy — approach to diabetes, in which the immune system attacks and kills insulin-producing “beta cells” in the pancreas (type 1 diabetes) or the body grows desensitized to insulin and requires higher levels (type 2 diabetes). In either case, patients often require insulin shots to maintain blood-sugar levels necessary or proper metabolism.

EnGene proposes to engineer cells in the small intestine — known as “K cells” — to produce insulin themselves. The advantage of this technique lies in the fact that K cells, like beta cells, respond to sugar levels in the gut, although they normally secrete a separate molecule. Once bioengineered to produce insulin as well, these cells could help regulate blood sugar automatically much the way beta cells normally do.

Of course, gene therapy has, in general, been a great disappointment so far, so there’s no shortage of uncertainty associated with this sort of technique. EnGene has tested its technique in mice, but not yet in humans. The startup plans to seek a second round of funding in the second half.

Alimera Sciences gets $30M for eye-disease drug – Alimera Sciences, an Alpharetta, Ga., drug developer with a focus on eye disease, raised $30 million in a third funding round. The company will now take a majority stake in its drug for diabetic macular edema, a vision-degrading complication of diabetes, which Alimera is developing with its partner pSividia.

We’ve written before about Alimera, which is presumably still contemplating an IPO this fall. All five of the company’s existing VC backers participated in the round: BA Venture Partners, Domain Associates, Intersouth Partners, Polaris Venture Partners and Venrock Associates.

Vaccine maker LigoCyte draws $28M – LigoCyte Pharmaceuticals, a Bozeman, Mont., biotech focused on new vaccines against infectious disease, raised $28 million in a third funding round. Investors included Forward Ventures, JAFCO, Novartis Venture Fund, Fidelity Biosciences, MedImmune Ventures, Athenian Venture Partners and MC Life Sciences Ventures.

The company is developing new vaccines using “virus-like particles” — usually structural viral proteins, minus the replication machinery packed in DNA or RNA — against gastroenteritis, anthrax and flu. It is also working on antibody drugs against inflammatory disease.

Featured companies: Adnexus Therapeutics, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cellerix, Elixir Therapeutics, GenomeQuest, Intronn, JapanBridge, JenaValve, VirXsys, Ysios Capital

[NOTE: This item is a catchup daily briefing originally posted on 9/27/07. I've edited the item's timestamp to preserve the chronological order of the briefings. --D.P.H.]

Adnexus Thera cancels IPO, sells itself to Bristol-Myers for $430M — Waltham, Mass.-based Adnexus Therapeutics, a biotech pursuing drugs against cancer and other diseases, said it would cancel plans for its IPO and instead sell itself to Bristol-Myers Squibb for $430 million in cash, or a net purchase price of $415 million once adjusted for the biotech’s cash balance. Adnexus shareholders may also receive another $75 million assuming particular developmental milestones are met.

You can find our earlier coverage of Adnexus, which filed for its IPO just last month, here and here. Adnexus is the second biotech I’m aware of that’s recent chosen an acquisition offer over facing vicissitudes of the biotech IPO market. (The other was NovaCardia; you can find our coverage here.)

Elixir Pharmaceuticals seeks $86.3M IPO — Elixir Pharmaceuticals, a Cambridge, Mass., biotech focused on anti-aging, obesity and metabolic diseases, filed to raise as much as $86.3 million in an IPO. Elixir is best-known for its work with sirtuins, a class of chemicals that appear to mimic the anti-aging effects of calorie-restricted diets. A similar company founded by a competing set of researchers, Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, raised $60 million in an IPO last May. (See our coverage here.)

Neither company, however, emphasizes its work with the potentially anti-aging molecules, and instead play up their interest in treating a cluster of diseases such as diabetes, obesity and other metabolic disorders. Elixir’s two leading candidates on that front treat diabetes, and were licensed from Japan’s Kissei Pharmaceutical.

Interestingly enough, Elixir’s SEC filing also lists “healthcare reform measures” as a risk that could “hinder or prevent” the company’s success. For what it’s worth, Elixir also thinks patent reform poses a threat.

“Adult” stem-cell company Cellerix raises €27.2M — Spain’s Cellerix, a company aiming to use so-called adult stem cells as a treatment for skin regeneration and autoimmune-related defects known as fistulas, raised €27.2 million ($32 million). Investors included Life Sciences Partners, Ventech, Ysios Capital Partners, Roche Venture Fund, Novartis Venture Fund, Genetrix, Grupo A&G, Spanish investor Jose Antonio Matji and Cellerix management.

Celletrix was spun out of the Spanish biotech company Genetrix, which remains its majority shareholder. Celletrix has two products in clinical tests. One uses stem cells derived from the patient’s own fatty tissue to treat fistulas, which are abnormal connections between organs and skin or between different organs. The other treats a blistering skin condition known as epidermolysis bullosa using a combination of cells — although apparently not stem cells — from the patient and a universal donor.

Ysios Capital seeks €65M for life-science fund — Spanish venture-capital firm Ysios Capital Partners is looking to raise €65 million ($91 million) for its first life-sciences fund. (Their PDF release is here.)

The firm envisions making investments of between €500,000 and €4 million in early-to-late-stage companies in biotech, pharmaceuticals, healthcare and medical technology. Ysios plans to make the majority of its investments in Spanish companies, but expects it may devote up to 30 percent of the fund outside of Spain.

Heart-device maker JenaValve pulls in an extra €10M — Munich-based JenaValve, makers of a minimally invasive replacement for aortic heart valves, raised an additional €10 million ($14 million) in order to win European approval of the device, VentureWire reports. Investors included Edmond de Rothschild Investment Partners, NewMed Management and Atlas Venture.

The company said it hopes to begin marketing the device by mid-2009, after which it may seek U.S. approval as well. Prior to that, however, JenaValve is likely to seek potential acquirers, the company’s chief financial officer told VentureWire.

JapanBridge raises $6.5M for in-licensed cancer drugs — Tokyo’s JapanBridge, a specialty pharmaceutical company founded last year by Itochu and MPM Capital, raised $6.5 million in an additional first funding round. Investors included MPM Capital, Itochu and Kyowa Hakko.

The funding is intended for building its infrastructure and identifying two to four cancer drugs for in-licensing to Japan. Separately, JapanBridge said it struck a partnership with Kyowa Hakko to collaborate on cancer-drug development.

Genetic-search company GenomeQuest raises $4M — GenomeQuest, a Westborough, Mass., developer of a Web-based genetic search engine, raised $4 million in a second funding round. Investors included Mosaix Ventures, Cross Atlantic Partners, Milestone Venture Partners, and Société Générale Asset Management Alternative Investments.

GenomeQuest describes its service as a Web-based system that makes it possible for corporate researchers to search for genetic and biological information across a variety of public and private databases. In that sense, it sounds generally similar to the service offering by NextBio, which raised $7 million in June. See our previous coverage of that company here.

Gene-therapy company VirXsys acquires Intronn’s assets — Gaithersburg, Md.-based VirXsys, a gene-therapy company hoping to treat AIDS and genetic disease, acquired the core assets and preclinical programs of fellow Gaithersburg biotech Intronn. Terms of the all-stock deal weren’t disclosed. Intronn’s technology aims to reprogram gene expression by inserting genetic code at the RNA level to repair mutations or repair other damage.

Although I try to stay on top of events in the life sciences, announcements do sometimes manage to slip through the cracks. Some days, in fact, I end up triaging. Because the roots of this site — not to mention many of its readers — are in Silicon Valley, Bay Area events are a priority. Then come announcements from the rest of the U.S., then Asia, then Europe. Also, smaller or partial fundings tend to take a backseat.

Looking back over my notes — it’s the only way I keep anything straight — I see quite a few of these orphans have piled up. So for the sake of completeness, I’m inaugurating this occasional feature to recap the fundings, mergers and IPOs that got away from me. I’ll put all the details below the fold, so only forge ahead if you’re really interested. RSS subscribers, unfortunately, are going to get the whole thing anyway.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ablation Frontiers, a Carlsbad, Calif., developer of devices for treating irregular heartbeats known as cardiac arrythmias, raised $21.8 million in a third funding round. The Novartis Venture Fund led the round, joined by Affinity Ventures, Hexagon Investments, Trellis Health Ventures, Versant Ventures, Aberdare Ventures, and Pequot Ventures.

Ablation Frontiers apparently aims to use radio energy, directed by a catheter, to burn away malfunctioning heart tissue that contributes to arrythmia. The company’s Catheter Ablation System has been approved in Europe, but is still undergoing trials in the U.S.

Aileron Therapeutics, a Cambridge, Mass., developer of peptide-based drugs for cancer, raised $7 million in a second funding round. The company is at work on a new class of “stapled” peptides, or protein fragments, that it says can penetrate cell walls.

Proteins and peptides make attractive drug candidates because they can interact with other proteins in the body in ways that traditional small-molecule drugs cannot. Most proteins and peptides, however, are too large to enter cells, which limits their usefulness as drugs to interactions with cell-surface proteins. The ability to put peptides inside cells could open up entirely new avenues for drug development.

The round included Apple Tree Partners and the Novartis Venture Fund. With the new investment, Aileron has raised a total of $10.5 million, according to VentureWire (subscription required).

BioRelix, a New Haven, Conn., developer of new antibiotics, raised $25.75 million in a first funding round, VentureWire reports (subscription required). The round included New Leaf Venture Partners, Aisling Capital, CHL Medical Partners, Novartis Venture Fund, Elm Street Ventures and Alexandria Real Estate Equities.

BioRelix is developing antibiotics that target what the company says are common stretches of bacterial RNA that control many functions essential for bacterial survival. The funding should allow the company to push a drug candidate into human tests by late 2009 or early 2010, its interim CEO told VentureWire.

ProCertus BioPharm, a Madison, Wis., company developing drugs to minimize the side effects of radiation and chemotherapy, raised $2.3 million in a first round of financing. The company will use the money to begin human tests of products such as DermX, which is supposed to prevent radiation-therapy induced dermatitis.

The round was led by Venture Investors, a significant Midwest-based healthcare and IT venture firm. Existing investors including the Novartis Venture Fund also joined the round.

These are serious players who presumably don’t throw their money around lightly, so it’s probably not wise to draw too many conclusions from ProCertus’ kitschy Web site, which is not only outdated (it refers to clinical trials planned for 2006 that apparently haven’t yet started) but inaccurate (it states that there are no competing products for treatment or prevention of cancer-treatment induced hair loss, dermatitis, or mucositis, a claim with which the folks at Amgen would presumably take issue).

The company’s announcement is here.