VentureBeat

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Antibody-discovery startup Adimab raises new funding (release)
• Lung-device maker Spiration gets $19M (release)
• Sample-prep startup Protein Discovery pulls in $10M (release)
• Inogen takes in $13M for portable oxygen device (VentureWire)
• Healthcare IT concern Medaptus raises $11M for expansion (VentureWire)
• Contract lab Synexis raises $14M (peHUB)
• Medical-device VC firm BioStar Ventures takes in $24M of $80M fund (peHUB)
• Halsa Pharma gets $250K for “natural” obesity-control treatment (release)
• Diagnostics provider Lab21 acquires NPTech (peHUB)
• Galil Medical names Martin Emerson CEO (release)

Antibody-discovery startup Adimab raises new funding – Lebanon, N.H.-based Adimab, a biotech working on new ways to discover antibody drugs, has raised a second round of funding. The company didn’t disclose the size of the round.

Adimab, which raised $6 million last July, is one of several startups looking to design new antibody drugs in bioengineered yeast cells, as we wrote at the time. (Alder Biopharmaceuticals, which raised $40 million in January, is another.) The technique promises to be much faster — and freer of patent restrictions — than current methods. When Adimab completes its current manufacturing facility in the second quarter, it claims it will be able to produce a panel of human antibodies against a particular target in just 90 days, instead of the year or more traditional methods can require.

Investors included Polaris Venture Partners and SV Life Sciences, who also invested in the company’s first round.

Lung-device maker Spiration gets $19M – Spiration, a Redmond, Wash., medical-device startup, raised $18.5 million in a seventh funding round. Investors included Versant Ventures, Olympus Medical Systems, New Enterprise Associates, New Leaf Venture Partners, InterWest Partners, Investor Growth Capital and Three Arch Partners.

Spiration has now raised a total of $97 million. It is developing a set of one-way valves for emphysema that can be implanted in the lung’s airways via a minimally invasive procedure. These valves are designed to shunt air away from diseased portions of the lung and redirect it to healthier areas. The company said the funding would support commercialization of its device in Europe and to complete studies for regulatory approval in the U.S.

Other startups working on similar technology include Emphasys Medical, Pulmonx and Broncus Technologies.

Sample-prep startup Protein Discovery pulls in $10M – Knoxville, Tenn.-based Protein Discovery, a biotech with new laboratory technology for protein identification, raised $10 million in a third funding round. Investors included Santé Ventures, Memphis Biomed Ventures, the Southern Appalachian Fund, and the Nashville Capital Network.

The startup is developing technology that aims to “simplify” the process of preparing biological samples for protein analysis. The details are probably too much for anyone who’s not a lab technician themselves, but feel free to check out the company’s explanation if you dare.)

Inogen takes in $13M for portable oxygen device – Inogen, a Goleta, Calif., medical-device maker, raised $12.6 million in its fifth funding round, VentureWire reports. Investors included Accuitive Medical Ventures, Arboretum Ventures, Avalon Ventures, Novo A/S, Numenor Ventures and Versant Ventures.

The company makes and sells portable oxygen-delivery systems for patients suffering from a lung problem called chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The product has been on the market for several years, and Inogen says it believes it might take several more before it’s in a position to be acquired or to go public.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Drug-screening tool maker IonGate Bio raises €4.6M (release)
• Protein-drug maker Molecular Partners gets $5M up front in Centocor deal (PDF release)
• ProtaGen takes in €1M for protein biochips (PDF release)
• China’s Sundia MediTech, a contract research organization raises second round (release)
• Vital-signs implant maker Transoma Medical sets IPO terms, aims for $78M (Edgar)
• UMD receives $1M grant for Baltimore biotech incubator (TechJournal South)

Drug-screening tool maker IonGate Bio raises €4.6M — IonGate Biosciences, a Frankfurt, Germany, developer of tools for drug screening, raised €4.6 million ($6.7 million) in a third funding round. Investors included Heidelberg Innovation and KfW (Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau).

IonGate, whose slogan appears to be “Measure More Membrane,” focuses on the study of proteins embedded in cell membranes, particularly “transport” proteins that move molecules of various sorts in and out of cells. The company’s tools allow drug companies to observe the activity of these proteins, apparently in order to determine whether particular drug candidates activate them in order to make their way into the cell interior.

The company plans to use the funding to expand its international operations, especially in the U.S. The company formed a U.S. subsidiary in December, and plans to build out distribution channels here in order to market its surface-protein analysis technology.

Protein-drug maker Molecular Partners gets $5M up front in Centocor deal — Zurich’s Molecular Partners, a biotech developing drugs based on a new class of binding proteins, struck a partnership with J&J’s Centocor unit (PDF link) that yielded the startup a $5 million upfront payment. The collaboration will focus on Molecular’s work with DARPins — the acronym stands for designed ankyrin repeat proteins, in case you were curious — that the company is currently developing as potential anti-inflammatory drugs.

Molecular will receive additional undisclosed cash for research and licensing fees, as well as royalty payments for any drugs that result from the collaboration. We covered their technology — which is interesting, but may also have serious drawbacks relative to monoclonal antibodies, which is Centocor’s specialty — in more detail here (fifth item).

ProtaGen takes in €1M for protein biochips — ProtaGen, a Dortmund, Germany, provider of protein-analysis tools, raised €1 million ($1.5 million — PDF link) in an interim financing. Investors included MIG, Co KG Beteiligungsfonds 3, S-Venture
Capital Dortmund and Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW).

The funding will allow the company to expand its development and sales of protein biochips, which enable relatively quick identification and analysis of proteins from biological samples. Such chips might one day be useful as diagnostic tools, although for now they are mostly used to find and “validate” proteins that might serve as “biomarkers” for the presence or progress of disease. ProtaGen is also working on its own diagnostics for Alzheimer’s disease and various inflammatory conditions.

China’s Sundia MediTech, a contract research organization raises second round — Sundia MediTech, a Shanghai contract-research startup founded by U.S. biopharmaceutical veterans, raised an undisclosed second funding round. Sundia didn’t disclose the identities of its investors beyond noting that first-round participant IDG Ventures was also involved in this funding.

Sundia’s press release makes for some amusing reading, and not just because it seems to have been written by someone with a relatively poor grasp of English. The statement is mostly devoted to extolling Sundia’s “excellent reputation” and “phenomenal growth,” not to mention the difficulty it has had beating investors off with a stick. For instance, there’s this:

One month later, Wuxi Pharmatech from the same city had a very successful IPO at New York Stock Exchange as the first Chinese CRO company to go public. Suddenly, CRO became a hot area for all investors to look for opportunities. ”Wuxi’s IPO definitely brought more investors to us”, the company’s CFO Dr. Beijia Yu recalled, ”We did have a difficult time to handle all requests from VCs, PEs and investment bankers for meetings to discuss investment possibility. The response to our fund raise from the investors was overwhelming.”

Maybe they deserve it — it’s difficult to say from here, and of course, it’s not as if U.S. startups don’t sometimes toot their own horn a bit loudly. Still, it’s an interesting example of the different cultural norms at play in a Chinese company.

Vital-signs implant maker Transoma Medical sets IPO terms, aims for $78M — Transoma Medical, a St. Paul, Minn., medical-device maker, set its IPO terms and now hopes to raise as much as $77.6 million. The company intends to price its shares between $14 and $16.

Transoma makes implantable devices that monitor patient vital signs. We previously covered them here.

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• MRI image-analysis firm Confirma receives $18M (release)
• Specialty pharma Zogenix raises $18M (release)
• Arcion pulls in $8.8M for topical pain gel (release)
• Bayhill Therapeutics files for $87M IPO (Edgar)
• Peakdale Molecular, chemistry-services provider, raises £1M (release)
• Radiopharmaceutical maker Cellectar draws in $13M (release)
• Critical-care drug maker Ikaria names Daniel Tasse as CEO (release)
• Noxxon Pharma appoints Frank Morich as CEO (release)

MRI image-analysis firm Confirma receives $18M –Confirma, a Bellevue, Wash., developer of automated systems for medical-image analysis, received $17.5 million in a third funding round. Investors included Telegraph Hill Partners, Fluke Venture Partners, Northwest Venture Associates, Prism Ventureworks and Versant Ventures.

The company already sells image-analysis software and associated equipment for breast-cancer detection, and is developing a similar system for prostate cancer. We previously covered the company here.

Specialty pharma Zogenix raises $18M – Zogenix, a San Diego specialty pharma, raised $18 million in a new financing round. Investors included Abingworth Management, Clarus Ventures, Domain Associates and Scale Venture Partners.

Zogenix previously raised $60 million in a first funding round back in Aug. 2006, and apparently has been quiet since then. Our coverage of them is here. Zogenix is developing a needle-free injection system for pain and CNS drugs, which it licensed from Aradigm in 2006.

Bayhill Therapeutics files for $87M IPO – Bayhill Therapeutics, a Palo Alto, Calif., biotech focused on autoimmune disease, filed to raise $86.3 million in an IPO. The company aims to restore the immune system to a state of “tolerance,” theoretically defusing particular autoimmune diseases while leaving the body’s defenses intact.

Bayhill’s approach to inducing tolerance is by using small loops of DNA, known as plasmids, that code for a specific protein antigen that appears to set off the body’s attack against itself. By introducing those plasmids in such a way that they’ll be taken up and “turned on” by the immune-system’s antigen presenting cells, the company hopes to re-educate the immune system to ignore those particular proteins.

Like most novel biotechs at this stage, Bayhill’s technology is intriguing but unproven. Its lead candidate, a drug for multiple sclerosis, has completed a mid-stage, phase II trial, but the result are complex to interpret. The company’s drug is a plasmid that codes for “myelin basic protein,” or MBP, one of the immune-system’s targets in MS. In that phase II trial, however, Bayhill only tested some patients to see if they had high levels of antibody to MBP — and the company only saw a significant reduction in MS-related brain lesions among those few patients with high MBP-antibody levels.