New Health IT Startup Targets Military Programs, Allylix Sniffs New Market for Nootkatone, Biocept Builds Team, & More San Diego Life Sciences News

Much of the local biotech news over the past week was focused on several early stage companies, which are busily raising money and building their leadership teams. We have the latest news for you here.

—A new San Diego health IT startup, Cognitive Medical Systems, recruited a veteran software CEO to serve as president and employee No. 4. Douglas Burke joins founder Mary Lacroix, a longtime health IT executive, as the company develops services for military health IT programs that include consulting, program administration, project management, software engineering, and database design.

—San Diego’s Allylix, which is using the tools of industrial biotechnology to make complex chemicals for the flavor and fragrance market, stands to benefit from a push by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to develop nootkatone as a natural insect repellent. Allylix CEO Carolyn Frtiz told me her company is one of two with exclusive rights to a CDC patent on the use of nootkatone as a repellent. Allylix is already making nootkatone for the food industry. So you can rub it on or drink it! Nootkatone works wonders!

—If the college of engineering at the University of Washington is any guide, students who graduate with a degree in computer science have a better chance of landing a high-paying job than those with a degree in bioengineering. Luke discusses biotech career prospects in his BioBeat column.

—Vertex Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: [[ticker:VRTX]]) has given a trade name to telaprevir, the Cambridge, MA-based company’s three times a day pill for treating hepatitis C. It is Incivek (pronounced in-see-veck). Vertex is expected to win FDA approval on its new drug application by May 23.

—One of San Diego’s hottest life sciences startups is NeuroVigil, which has developed a wireless sensor and related technology to analyze human brainwave patterns. The company announced its first round of seed-stage financing, but wouldn’t disclose the amount of funding or investors.

—San Diego’s Biocept, which is developing advanced technologies for diagnosing cancer, is rapidly building its leadership. The company, which plans to launch a diagnostic test for breast cancer later this year, recruited Hybritech veterans Ivor Royston as a board member and David Hale as executive chairman. Biocept also named Lyle Arnold as a senior vice president and Chief Scientific Officer and Michael Dunn as the senior vice president for corporate development.

—On a tragic note, Christina Donaghy, the communications director for San Diego’s Optimer Pharmaceuticals, was killed in a car wreck about 25 miles north of San Diego Sunday.

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.