Sinexus gets $20M, Entellus takes $15M for sinus products

Feeling stuffy? Two sinus-focused companies, Palo Alto, Calif.-based Sinexus and Maple Grove, Minn.-based Entellus, want to help out, with fresh rounds of funding for product development.

Venture funding for ear, nose & throat (ENT) companies hasn’t been terribly common in the past, but seems to be on the rise, with companies like these two and Acclarent, which took $35 million last year, promising safer, easier treatments for common sinus conditions. Acclarent just filed for an $86.25… Continue Reading

Life sciences briefing: Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008

Life sciences briefing: Thursday, Feb. 21, 2008

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

Compact ultrasound maker Zonare Medical raises $30M (VentureWire)
TherOx raises $30M for hypersaturated-oxygen devices (peHUB)
Accumetrics, antiplatelet-drug diagnostic maker, raises $29M (release)
Population Genetics takes in £3.8M for massively parallel genome studies (GenomeWeb)
“Brain fitness” trainer Dakim raises $11M (release)
BioIQ, home-diagnostics maker, takes in $2.5M (release)
Hospital med-tracker Sabal Medical raises funds (release)
Seattle’s PharmaIN gets $400K NIH grant for nanoparticle staph drug (PDF release)
SensiGen, molecular-diagnostics developer, receives Michigan state loan (release)
Arcus Ventures aims for $50M fund, targets cancer (VentureWire)

Compact… Continue Reading

Life sciences briefing: Monday, Dec. 10, 2007

Life sciences briefing: Monday, Dec. 10, 2007

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

Fundamental Applied Biology pulls in $21M for proteins without cells (release)
Diagnostics maker Asuragen receives $19M (release)
Stroke-device maker Neurovasx raises $8.5M (release)
Cancer-vaccine maker ImmunoVaccine Tech buys Immunotope, seeks $15M (release)
Vascular imager CardioSpectra sells itself to Volcano for $25M (release)
Spinal-implant maker Altiva sells to Exactech for $25M (release)
U.S. Healthworks acquires Inland Industrial in occcupational-healthcare consolidation (release)
Private-equity group acquires American Laser Centers (release)

Diagnostics maker Asuragen receives $19M — Asuragen, an Austin, Tex., developer of molecular diagnostics for… Continue Reading

Life sciences briefing: Monday, Oct. 8, 2007

Life sciences briefing: Monday, Oct. 8, 2007

Featured companies: AirInSpace, Anacor Pharmaceuticals, Apollo Endosurgery, Ascension Health Partners, BG Medicine, CeraPedics, GlaxoSmithKline, Simplex Diabetic Supply, Zars Pharma

UPDATED: Last entry added at 2am PT on 10/8/07.

Anacor Pharma pulls in $22M from Glaxo, with hundreds of millions more on the line –Palo Alto, Calif.-based Anacor Pharmaceuticals, a biotech developing new anti-infective and anti-inflammatory drugs using boron chemistry, struck a wide-ranging partnership with GlaxoSmithKline worth up to $605 million. Anacor will receive a $12 million cash payment and… Continue Reading

Life sciences briefing: Thursday, Sept. 13, 2007

Life sciences briefing: Thursday, Sept. 13, 2007

Featured companies: Aldagen, LDR, Lyten Endoscopy, MachLabs, Permatox, TeleMedicine Clinic, ThromboVision

Spinal-implant maker LDR raises $25M — Austin, Texas-based LDR, a maker of spinal implants, raised $25 million in a third funding round. Investors included Telegraph Hill Partners, Austin Ventures, Rothschild Private Equity and PTV Sciences.

LDR sells spinal-fusion devices, artificial disks and other spine-related devices in more than 30 countries, and plans to use the funds for further expansion.

Aldagen adds $9M for adult stem-cell work — Aldagen,… Continue Reading

Medical Carbon Research recapitalizes with $32M, renames itself

Medical Carbon Research Institute, a Austin, Tex., developer of mechanical heart valves, raised $32 million in debt, revenue interest and royalty conversion in a recapitalization that the company said eliminated most of its debt. MCRI also renamed itself after its leading product candidate, and will now be known as On-X Life Technologies.

Among those contributing to the recapitalization were Paul Capital Healthcare, PTV Sciences and several existing investors.

On-X makes and sells a pure-carbon heart-valve replacement called… Continue Reading

PTV Sciences raises $190M fund for life-science investments

PTV Sciences, an Austin, Tex.-based VC firm, raised $190 million for its second venture fund. The firm backs startups in in the life and material sciences, including a variety of diagnostic, drug and device companies. See this Austin American-Statesman article for more. Here’s a brief snippet:

The new fund attracted money from big endowments and pensions. The University of Texas Investment Management Co., which manages $21 billion in higher-education endowments and other state funds, committed $50… Continue Reading