San Antonio — Life science groups, city officials, and research institutes in San Antonio are organizing an effort to commercialize more scientific developments coming out of the city’s military organizations. The goal of the project is to develop an alliance between researchers at San Antonio’s numerous military medical units, the two University of Texas institutions in … Continue reading “San Antonio Makes Pact to Commercialize Military, Academic Research”
Category: New York
Bio Roundup: Little Rhody, More for Migraine, Opioid Bills & More
The U.S. Senate had a rare moment of agreement, overwhelmingly passing a package of opioid-related bills. Up the East Coast, life-science players in Rhode Island are working to bring different local factions together and boost the state’s economy. Across the country, a similar effort is underway in Los Angeles. There were also plenty of headlines … Continue reading “Bio Roundup: Little Rhody, More for Migraine, Opioid Bills & More”
Convoy Reloads With $185M For Its Freight Shipment Marketplace
Convoy, an online marketplace that connects shippers with freight truck fleets and independent drivers, announced today it raised $185 million in a Series C fundraising round led by CapitalG, the growth equity investment fund of Alphabet, Google’s parent company. With its new funding, Seattle-based Convoy plans to continue expanding its network of customers and truckers … Continue reading “Convoy Reloads With $185M For Its Freight Shipment Marketplace”
MIT Inclusive Innovation Challenge to Honor Winners at Detroit Event
Technology has been transforming the way we work for decades, and MIT believes figuring out how to leverage it to rethink jobs and community prosperity is a grand technological challenge of our time. To respond to what the university calls an “economic and moral imperative,” it created the Inclusive Innovation Challenge (IIC), which lands in … Continue reading “MIT Inclusive Innovation Challenge to Honor Winners at Detroit Event”
Elanco IPO Raises $1.5B as the Animal Health Biz Spins Off from Lilly
Elanco is now a standalone company after raising $1.5 billion in its stock market debut. Greenfield, IN-based Elanco (NYSE: [[ticker:ELAN]]) sold 62.9 million shares at $24 apiece, which topped the $20 to $23 range it had initially targeted. Investors showed their appetite for the animal health company, driving its stock price up more than 39 … Continue reading “Elanco IPO Raises $1.5B as the Animal Health Biz Spins Off from Lilly”
Rapid7 Launches Security Automation Tools to Take On IBM, FireEye
[Updated 9/20/18, 1:04 pm. See below.] Cybersecurity software firm Rapid7 is rolling out new and updated products geared toward helping customers automate more of their security processes and tie together the patchwork of defense mechanisms many of them have purchased from various vendors. The announcement fits into two big trends in security of the past … Continue reading “Rapid7 Launches Security Automation Tools to Take On IBM, FireEye”
Amicus Shells Out $100M For Celenex And Dives Into Gene Therapy
Fresh off finally winning an FDA nod for its first product, Amicus Therapeutics is getting in on the gene therapy renaissance. This morning, Cranbury, NJ-based Amicus (NASDAQ: [[ticker:FOLD]]) agreed to pay $100 million up front to buy a privately held company, Celenex, spun out of Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Ohio. The acquisition gives Amicus a … Continue reading “Amicus Shells Out $100M For Celenex And Dives Into Gene Therapy”
Real Estate Startup Bungalo Launches with $225M, Could Land $1B More
Austin—An Austin real estate investment company has launched a buyer-focused, online residential home search business called Bungalo Technologies. Amherst, a business that uses data and analytics to invest billions of dollars into public securities and residential and commercial real estate, is launching Bungalo with $225 million in funding upfront, and says it will invest another … Continue reading “Real Estate Startup Bungalo Launches with $225M, Could Land $1B More”
In Boston’s Shadow, Rhode Island Fights for Life Science Jobs, Respect
[Updated 9/19/18, 3:40 p.m. See below.] Tiny Rhode Island and its capital city Providence have always punched above their weight, for better or for worse. Better: Little Rhody’s founder Roger Williams, fleeing religious persecution in 17th-century puritanical Massachusetts, was one of America’s first abolitionists and created the concept of the separation of church and state. … Continue reading “In Boston’s Shadow, Rhode Island Fights for Life Science Jobs, Respect”
UiPath Snags $225M To Expand Robotic Workforce for Businesses
Top venture capital firms continue to pour money into software robotics companies that promise to automate monotonous business operations, like processing mortgage applications, that are often performed by humans. New York-based UiPath is the latest such company to score a haul, announcing Tuesday it raised $225 million in a Series C funding round co-led by … Continue reading “UiPath Snags $225M To Expand Robotic Workforce for Businesses”
Viking Liver Drug Shows Promise for NASH, Shares Soar on Study Data
[Updated, 2:45 pm ET, see below] There is another update today in the competitive race to treat nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), an increasingly common liver disease with no FDA-approved therapies. Viking Therapeutics released preliminary results from a Phase 2 study suggesting its experimental drug might impact some of the disease’s many dangerous effects on the liver. … Continue reading “Viking Liver Drug Shows Promise for NASH, Shares Soar on Study Data”
Emplify Bags $7.5M to Give Employers Better Staff Engagement Data
Emplify, the Fishers, IN-based startup focused on software to improve employee engagement, today announced that it has raised a $7.5 million Series A funding round. Since it was spun out of Bluebridge in 2016, co-founder and CEO Santiago Jaramillo says Emplify has experienced swift growth—customers include Harley-Davidson and Terminus—and now has 65 employees. “We’re bigger … Continue reading “Emplify Bags $7.5M to Give Employers Better Staff Engagement Data”
Zapata Teaming With IBM, Google to Push Quantum Tech Into Next Phase
Christopher Savoie says he was skeptical when former Harvard researcher Alán Aspuru-Guzik pitched Savoie last year on joining the quantum computing software venture he was planning to form. Quantum computing technology is at least a decade away from commercial feasibility, responded Savoie, a tech developer and attorney who previously founded startups in machine learning, pharmaceuticals, … Continue reading “Zapata Teaming With IBM, Google to Push Quantum Tech Into Next Phase”
Fidelity CEO Hints at Crypto Products as Sector Aims for Mainstream
Fidelity Investments is cooking up more blockchain and cryptocurrency-related products and services, with a goal of rolling some of them out in the next few months, CEO Abigail Johnson said Friday morning. Johnson made the comments during an event held at the financial services giant’s downtown Boston headquarters—one of a series of events that were … Continue reading “Fidelity CEO Hints at Crypto Products as Sector Aims for Mainstream”
Allogene Files for IPO to Fund Cancer Cell Therapy Clinical Trials
Allogene Therapeutics, a biotech developing a cell therapy made from donor cells, is laying out IPO plans to finance more tests of its experimental cancer treatment. South San Francisco, CA-based Allogene made waves this year when it launched with a huge $300 million Series A round. It has now set a preliminary $100 million IPO … Continue reading “Allogene Files for IPO to Fund Cancer Cell Therapy Clinical Trials”
The Rise of Robocalls and Cell Scams—and How to Stop Them
[Updated 9:15 a.m., see below.] Jen King was in a hurry to get out the door of her Bay Area home on a recent morning, and she missed a call to her cell phone because of it. The phone number that called her, she later discovered, was startling. “It was my home phone calling me, … Continue reading “The Rise of Robocalls and Cell Scams—and How to Stop Them”
Bio Roundup: CRISPR Ruling, “America’s Nobels,” IPOs & More
The long-running patent feud over CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing appears to be over, just as U.S. biotech companies gear up for the first human tests of the landmark technology. This week, a federal appeals court upheld a previous ruling handing a CRISPR-Cas9 patent to the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. The decision by the three-judge … Continue reading “Bio Roundup: CRISPR Ruling, “America’s Nobels,” IPOs & More”
Epic Sciences Raises $52M to Expand Cancer Diagnostic Portfolio
Oncology diagnostics company Epic Sciences, which last year launched what it describes as the only test that can help guide treatment for patients with advanced prostate cancer, has raised $52 million in a financing led by New York private equity firm Blue Ox Healthcare Partners to develop tests to address more types of cancer. The … Continue reading “Epic Sciences Raises $52M to Expand Cancer Diagnostic Portfolio”
With Cornershop, Walmart Expands On-Demand Delivery to Latin America
Walmart is taking the e-commerce delivery business south of the border. The Bentonville, AR, retailer announced Thursday it has acquired Cornershop, an on-demand online service that delivers products from supermarkets, pharmacies, and specialty shops in Mexico and Chile, for $225 million. “We are focused on making life easier for customers and associates by building strong … Continue reading “With Cornershop, Walmart Expands On-Demand Delivery to Latin America”
Detroit’s StockX Raises $44M Funding Round, Plans to Hire 1,000
StockX, the online “stock market of things” focused on sneakers and other high-demand, limited-edition products, has closed one of the largest investment rounds raised by a Detroit startup and announced yesterday that it now plans to go on a major hiring spree. The news came from StockX CEO Josh Luber during a keynote speech at the … Continue reading “Detroit’s StockX Raises $44M Funding Round, Plans to Hire 1,000”
Acorda’s Tough Week Continues as FDA Delays Parkinson’s Drug Review
Acorda Therapeutics has taken its second hit in less than a week. The FDA this morning extended its review of Acorda’s (NASDAQ: [[ticker:ACOR]]) experimental Parkinson’s disease drug Inbrija, an inhalable form of levodopa, by three months. The agency will now decide whether to approve the drug—whose success is critical to the future of the Ardsley, … Continue reading “Acorda’s Tough Week Continues as FDA Delays Parkinson’s Drug Review”
Cloud Storage Startup Wasabi Grabs $68M to Eat Amazon’s Lunch
Wasabi Technologies’ ambitious plan to challenge the giants in cloud data storage—Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and IBM—just got a $68 million boost. Wasabi announced Wednesday it closed its Series B round of venture funding. The Boston-based startup had previously raised at least $8.5 million from investors, who are betting that it can build a big business … Continue reading “Cloud Storage Startup Wasabi Grabs $68M to Eat Amazon’s Lunch”
Living on the Edge: Amazon, AT&T, Packet Pursue “Cloudlet” Computing
The word “cloud”—as in cloud computing, and cloud storage—has served as a handy shorthand term, but it has always been inherently vague and a little misleading. When businesses and consumers use a cloud service provider like Amazon Web Services or Apple’s iCloud, their data, photos, and music don’t get processed in the misty skies above … Continue reading “Living on the Edge: Amazon, AT&T, Packet Pursue “Cloudlet” Computing”
Coinbase, Circle & Others Form Blockchain Lobbying Group in DC
Amid intensifying regulatory scrutiny of cryptocurrencies and blockchain ventures, some of the sector’s leading startups and investors have formed the Blockchain Association, a lobbying group that will try to amplify their influence in Capitol Hill and around the country. The nonprofit trade association’s initial members include San Francisco-based Coinbase and its competitor, Boston-based Circle Internet … Continue reading “Coinbase, Circle & Others Form Blockchain Lobbying Group in DC”
With OneOncology, Flatiron and Cancer Docs Aim to Boost Community Care
A number of new technologies, from immunotherapy to targeted medicines and diagnostics, have all helped change cancer care the past few years. But not all cutting-edge technologies are available to patients who seek treatment at smaller clinics. OneOncology, an unusual new startup being launched this morning, aims to help cancer patients in community settings gain … Continue reading “With OneOncology, Flatiron and Cancer Docs Aim to Boost Community Care”
Kodiak Sciences Files for IPO to Fund Global AMD Eye-Drug Studies
Many patients with the more severe form of age-related macular degeneration, a type of vision loss, have trouble with the standard treatment—a once-monthly injection into the eye. Kodiak Sciences believes it can do better with an experimental drug that may require less frequent injections and the company has filed for an IPO to finance a … Continue reading “Kodiak Sciences Files for IPO to Fund Global AMD Eye-Drug Studies”
South Bend Code School Adds Revenue Stream with Code Works Dev Shop
When South Bend Code School launched in 2015, its founders were looking for a way to teach kids career skills that might enable them to find a job without a college degree. As that effort grew and gained popularity, people in the community began reaching out to SBCS seeking software development work. “As we were … Continue reading “South Bend Code School Adds Revenue Stream with Code Works Dev Shop”
PepsiCo Expands Nutrition Greenhouse Startup Program to U.S.
PepsiCo is expanding its Nutrition Greenhouse program from Europe to North America, adding to its arsenal of initiatives designed to connect the global soda-maker to innovative startups in the food and beverage sector. Nutrition Greenhouse will be an accelerator for 10 startups that “are helping to transform the food and beverage industry with nutritious, natural, … Continue reading “PepsiCo Expands Nutrition Greenhouse Startup Program to U.S.”
FDA, Following EMA, Nixes Amicus’ Plans for Speedy OK of Pompe Drug
The FDA has rejected plans from Amicus Therapeutics to seek speedy approval of an experimental drug for Pompe disease, calling instead for more data the Cranbury, NJ, company hopes to accrue over the next year. The FDA told Amicus (NASDAQ: [[ticker:FOLD]]) that its “current clinical package is not sufficient” to support what’s known as accelerated … Continue reading “FDA, Following EMA, Nixes Amicus’ Plans for Speedy OK of Pompe Drug”
Robotic Kitchen Startup Spyce Grabs $21M to Open More Restaurants
[Updated 9/10/18, 4:18 pm. See below.] Spyce plans to open more restaurants along the East Coast featuring its “robotic kitchen” system, thanks to a fresh infusion of $21 million in venture capital. The Somerville, MA-based startup’s Series A funding round was led by Collaborative Fund and Maveron, according to an announcement Friday. Other investors in … Continue reading “Robotic Kitchen Startup Spyce Grabs $21M to Open More Restaurants”
Bio Roundup: A Gene Editing 1st, China Rises, Schenkein Steps Away
If you’re still recovering from a Labor Day hangover or busy searching for the identity of the anonymous writer of the anti-Trump op-ed for the New York Times, you may have missed a few biomedical firsts. This week brought the first sliver of human data from an in-body gene editing procedure, and the results were … Continue reading “Bio Roundup: A Gene Editing 1st, China Rises, Schenkein Steps Away”
SpringWorks Therapeutics Promotes Saqib Islam to CEO
Saqib Islam has been appointed CEO of SpringWorks Therapeutics. He will also join the New York company’s board of directors. Islam was previously chief financial and chief business officer of SpringWorks. Islam came to SpringWorks last year from Cambridge, MA-based Moderna Therapeutics, where he was chief business officer. Last year, SpringWorks spun out of Pfizer … Continue reading “SpringWorks Therapeutics Promotes Saqib Islam to CEO”
Sanofi’s Perfetti Joins Applied Therapeutics as Chief Medical Officer
Riccardo Perfetti has been appointed chief medical officer of Applied Therapeutics. Perfetti comes to New York-based Applied from Sanofi (NYSE: [[ticker:SNY]]), where he was senior medical officer and vice president, head of global medical affairs in the company’s diabetes and cardiovascular business. Applied develops drugs that target enzymes associated with metabolic and cardiovascular diseases. The … Continue reading “Sanofi’s Perfetti Joins Applied Therapeutics as Chief Medical Officer”
After a High-Speed Decade, Agios CEO David Schenkein to Step Aside
David Schenkein, the longtime CEO of Agios Pharmaceuticals, will step aside next year after transforming what was once a high-risk Cambridge, MA-based startup into a public biotech with over 500 employees and two drugs on the market. Schenkein’s replacement will be Jacqualyn Fouse, former president and chief operating officer of Celgene (NASDAQ: [[ticker:CELG]]) and a … Continue reading “After a High-Speed Decade, Agios CEO David Schenkein to Step Aside”
Achillion Pharma Appoints Steven Zelenkofske Chief Medical Officer
Steven Zelenkofske has joined Achillion Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: [[ticker:ACHN]]) as executive vice president and chief medical officer of the New Haven, CT, drug developer. Zelenkofske most recently worked at uniQure (NASDAQ: [[ticker:QURE]]), where he was chief medical officer. He has also held leadership positions at Regado Biosciences, AstraZeneca (NYSE: [[ticker:AZN]]), Sanofi-Aventis, Boston Scientific (NYSE: [[ticker:BSX]]), and … Continue reading “Achillion Pharma Appoints Steven Zelenkofske Chief Medical Officer”
Bio Roundup: Pfizer’s Rare Results, U.K.’s CAR-T No, IPO Go-Go & More
Before you head out for the final summer getaway, catch up on the week’s headlines. Pfizer upped the ante in the field of transthyretin amyloidosis (ATTR) treatment, where competition to treat the rare disease has grown increasingly complex. We’ll start with what was—and wasn’t—in Pfizer’s data release Monday, top up with more ATTR news, then … Continue reading “Bio Roundup: Pfizer’s Rare Results, U.K.’s CAR-T No, IPO Go-Go & More”
Wireless Internet Firms Take On Big Telecoms in Cities and Suburbs
If you’re a city dweller, and unhappy with the big company that provides your Internet connection, chances are good there’s a scrappy little outfit that thinks it can do better for you. Metropolitan areas have become target territories for the wireless Internet service providers, or WISPs, that for a long time have been the only … Continue reading “Wireless Internet Firms Take On Big Telecoms in Cities and Suburbs”
Sutro Biopharma, Arvinas Are Latest to Tee Up Biotech IPOs
The biotech IPO train is rolling on without slowing as we head into a holiday weekend. The latest to lay the groundwork to go public are Sutro Biopharma and Arvinas, which both want Wall Street’s help to back human trials of experimental cancer drugs. South San Francisco, CA-based Sutro set a preliminary $75 million target … Continue reading “Sutro Biopharma, Arvinas Are Latest to Tee Up Biotech IPOs”
Rivaling Google, Web-Mining Diffbot Opens Its Knowledge Graph to All
Diffbot, a tech startup that continuously scours the Web to assemble a “knowledge graph” of billions of facts in context, announced today that it’s opening up the searchable resource to the public—with starter rates as low as a cable TV bill. Mountain View, CA-based Diffbot gleans unstructured data scattered across websites, ads, blog posts, videos, … Continue reading “Rivaling Google, Web-Mining Diffbot Opens Its Knowledge Graph to All”
RootPath Raises $7M to Bring Cancer Cell Therapy to Solid Tumors
The concept of turning a patient’s own immune cells into a cancer therapy has made strides, with the past year seeing FDA approvals of two such treatments for blood cancers. But these cell therapies don’t work for everyone, and they can cause dangerous side effects. They also haven’t yet worked on solid tumors. RootPath wants … Continue reading “RootPath Raises $7M to Bring Cancer Cell Therapy to Solid Tumors”
RNAi Hits Europe as EMA Follows FDA, Approves Alnylam Drug
The first medicine that uses RNA interference, a method cells employ to mute a gene before it can make a harmful protein, has made its way to Europe. Three weeks after the FDA approved patisiran (Onpattro), from Alnylam Pharmaceuticeuticals (NASDAQ: [[ticker:ALNY]]), for a rare and deadly disease called hereditary transthyretin amyloidosis (hATTR), the European Medicines … Continue reading “RNAi Hits Europe as EMA Follows FDA, Approves Alnylam Drug”
Bristol Promotes Christopher Boerner to Chief Commercial Officer
[Corrected 8/29/18, 4:41 pm. See below.] Bristol-Myers Squibb (NYSE: [[ticker:BMY]]) has promoted Christopher Boerner to chief commercial officer. Boerner, who joined the Princeton, NJ-based pharmaceutical giant in 2015, was previously head of Bristol’s U.S. commercial organization and then its head of international markets. His experience also includes positions at Seattle Genetics (NASDAQ: [[ticker:SGEN]]), Dendreon, and … Continue reading “Bristol Promotes Christopher Boerner to Chief Commercial Officer”
Puls Snags $50M to Grow On-Call Repair Service for Smartphones, IoT
Puls Technologies, whose on-demand technicians repair broken smartphones and install connected home devices, announced today it has raised $50 million to expand its reach as a unified source of device maintenance and consumer support. San Francisco-based Puls, founded in 2015, offers to dispatch technicians quickly to a customer’s home or office to replace malfunctioning parts, … Continue reading “Puls Snags $50M to Grow On-Call Repair Service for Smartphones, IoT”
Y-mAbs Plans IPO to Advance Two Pediatric Cancer Drugs to the FDA
Neuroblastoma, a rare pediatric cancer, has no FDA-approved treatments for patients who relapse after the first line of therapies. Y-mAbs Therapeutics has developed two experimental antibody drugs for the disease and it is lining now lining up an IPO to as it readies both therapies for submission to the FDA for approval. Y-mAbs set a … Continue reading “Y-mAbs Plans IPO to Advance Two Pediatric Cancer Drugs to the FDA”
Eyeing Approval, Pfizer Touts Tafamidis Study, but Details Lacking
[Updated, 8/28/18, 1:30pm ET. See end of story.] Drug giant Pfizer (NYSE: [[ticker:PFE]]) could soon join a budding U.S. competition to treat the rare disease transthyretin amyloidosis, in which a common protein goes haywire and builds up into dangerous deposits in the heart and nerves. Pfizer today presented results from a late-stage study of its … Continue reading “Eyeing Approval, Pfizer Touts Tafamidis Study, but Details Lacking”
New Houston Biotech Magnolia Tejas Plans Trials with $20M CPRIT Grant
Houston—Magnolia Tejas, a new biotech company formed to develop drugs to treat neurological side effects from chemotherapy, has received a grant of nearly $20 million from the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas. Magnolia Tejas is a wholly owned subsidiary of Magnolia Neurosciences, which launched earlier this month with $31 million from investors to … Continue reading “New Houston Biotech Magnolia Tejas Plans Trials with $20M CPRIT Grant”
Bio Roundup: EpiPen Shortage, Bluebird’s Bet, Biotech IPOs & More
It’s back-to-school season and that means it’s time to load up on school supplies. For many students and schools, one crucial item is in high demand but hard to come by: the EpiPen. Some schools stock the epinephrine autoinjectors so they can respond quickly to a student’s allergic reaction to food. Though the autoinjectors are … Continue reading “Bio Roundup: EpiPen Shortage, Bluebird’s Bet, Biotech IPOs & More”
Meet the Startups Participating in Techstars Mobility’s Class of 2018
Detroit’s Techstars Mobility accelerator has announced its new cohort of startups working to advance technologies related to the movement of people and goods. Eleven companies are participating in the program this year, and, in a Medium post, program director Ted Serbinski said all of them have “diverse founding teams in regards to gender, ethnicity, or … Continue reading “Meet the Startups Participating in Techstars Mobility’s Class of 2018”
Eventbrite Targets $200M IPO as Tech, Biotech Markets Remain Hot
Event tech service Eventbrite is hoping to raise $200 million in an initial public offering during what has already been a busy year for IPOs. San Francisco-based Eventbrite lets users list and sell tickets to any type of event, from fundraisers to music festivals—for a fee on each ticket. The company had $201.6 million in … Continue reading “Eventbrite Targets $200M IPO as Tech, Biotech Markets Remain Hot”
Google, Dell EMC, Esther Dyson Join XCON 2018 Lineup
While the weather’s on the cool side, get ready for November. We at Xconomy are cooking up a special treat in Boston this fall: a three-day conference on technology and transformation called XCON 2018. It’s happening November 4, 5, and 6 at three different venues: Café ArtScience, the Institute of Contemporary Art, and Google’s Kendall … Continue reading “Google, Dell EMC, Esther Dyson Join XCON 2018 Lineup”