Mitelos, CataloniaBio member that develops, registers and manufactures medical devices and dietary supplements, and New Mark Medicine agree to market the therapeutic alternative for treating impacted ear wax Otiblock® in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. The product is already sold in the Spanish market since September of 2016.

Otiblock® spray helps to remove impacted ear wax from the ear canal thanks to its formulation, which is oil-free and helps the ear to maintain the proper pH. In addition to its cerumenolytic action, the product benefits patients with associated risk factors that make them more prone to otitis externa ...

Pharmacelera, a company that offers both hardware and software solutions for computer-aided drug design, based in the Pier 01 building in Barcelona, has been selected by the Centre for the Development of Industrial Technology (CDTI) as being in the top 5% of innovative companies in Spain in 2016.

Furthermore, the CDTI has awarded the company a NEOTEC grant to “accelerate the design of our solutions using molecular modelling algorithms, as well as hardware accelerators,” Pharmacelera CEO Enric Gibert explained to CataloniaBio. With this new development, the company will be able to search molecular libraries more quickly and precisely than ...

The Centre of Male Infertility and Analysis of Barcelona (CIMAB), a spin-off of the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), has closed a distribution deal with American company DxNow for its Fertile™ and Fertile Plus™ products.

Given the rise in cases of male infertility, DxNow has searched for solutions to improve the results of assisted reproduction procedures by using techniques that sort sperm with the best mobility and morphology. This way, there is no need to use centrifugation methods, which can damage sperm, and there is a boost in assisted-conception success rates.

Fertile™ and Fertile Plus™ were presented this year at ...

The Catalan government celebrated the 25th anniversary of cluster policies in Catalonia on 8 June. The event, held at the Palau de la Generalitat, was led by President Carles Puigdemont and Catalan Minister for Economy and Knowledge Jordi Baiget. Before an audience of representatives from businesses, technology centres, universities and associations, Puigdemont highlighted, "Catalonia is a global benchmark in clusters" according to Harvard Business School and the World Bank and "addressing this through a public-private partnership is the right choice, thus boosting the country’s competitiveness.” ACCIÓ is the body in charge of cluster coordination.

Specipig and Bioemprèn ...

The second annual Trifermed awards, which recognise initiatives with social impact in the healthcare arena, have gone to Fundació de la Marató de TV3, Dr Mara Dierssen of the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG), and Professor Ciril Rozman. The awards ceremony was held on 8 June at CaixaForum in Barcelona with more than 250 professionals from the sector in the audience. 

The panel of judges, chaired by Spherium Biomed CEO Luis Ruiz-Ávila, had nine members with long careers in the sector, including Reig Jofre CEO and CataloniaBio President Ignasi Biosca; Clara Campàs, head of Strategy and Development at Kern ...

Anapharm, a Contract Research Organisation (CRO) and CataloniaBio member that offers bioanalysis and scientific support services for the pharmaceutical industry, has doubled the size of its laboratory in Barcelona and presented its new corporate image as Anapharm Bioanalytics. All of this, as explains company founder and CEO Dr María Cruz, "is the result of improvements to our services and ongoing international growth in recent years."

Anapharm Bioanalytics has also added two more ABSciex 6500 LC-MS/MS/UPLC instruments to its laboratory and software updates. 

The name change does not affect the legal personality of the existing entity ...

STAT-Dx (STAT-Diagnostica & Innovation), a company that specialises in designing and marketing advanced point-of-care diagnostic systems and a CataloniaBio member, has just received a €20-million loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB) under the InnovFin programme. The company will put this capital towards co-funding a three-year project to develop a device to identify a wide range of infectious pathogens that cause diseases like meningitis or gastrointestinal and respiratory infections, among others. The company is based at the Barcelona Science Park.

STAT-Dx recently won the 2017 Biosucces of the Year Award, with Mosaic Biomedicals, which CataloniaBio grants to the best milestones ...

Biokit, a company in the Werfen Group that specialises in developing and manufacturing immunoassays and biomaterials and a member of CataloniaBio, has developed the first automatic reactive to diagnose heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT). The reactive, HemosIL HIT-Ab (PF4-H), has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and will soon hit the market in the United States. This is the first authorisation the US agency has granted for a product of these characteristics in the past ten years.

Heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) is a condition that can occur in some patients when this anti-coagulant triggers a pre-thrombotic state and means treatment ...

The Financial Times has devoted a full article to Neuroelectrics as an example of an entrepreneurial start-up. Founded by Giulio Ruffini and Ana Maiques, who is currently on the CataloniaBio Board of Directors, Neuroelectrics has offices in Barcelona and Boston where it is developing neuron-stimulation devices to monitor and improve brain health. During the interview, Maiques admitted to having learned a lot from other types of entrepreneurs: “Hearing new opinions and points of view is the best way to find business ideas and management tools.”

The company has sold more than $3 million-worth of devices in over ...

Anaconda Biomed, a medical device company focused on the development of the next generation of neuro-thrombectomy systems for the treatment of Acute Ischemic Stroke (AIS) located in Barcelona, announces it has closed a series A financing of €15-million. The leading investors include Ysios Capital, Omega Funds, Banco Sabadell as well as current investor Innogest Capital.

Dr Ofir Arad, co-Founder and CEO of Anaconda Biomed, explains this financing "provide us the capital necessary to substantially progress the development of the ANCD Brain device, including the validation and verification process, clinical studies to support the initial commercialization in Europe, and an initial ...

Kern Pharma, a CataloniaBio member company, has acquired Spanish self-care pharmaceutical company Actafarma. This operation comes under the business diversification strategy for growth in Kern Pharma, which is based in Terrassa (Barcelona). “By acquiring Actafarma, we are strengthening our self-care line, as the company already has a wide range of consolidated products like Oxicol and others with great potential that have been recently launched to market,” explains CEO Raúl Díaz-Varela.

Laboratoris Actafarma was established in 1997 in Alcorcón (Madrid). In 2016, the company posted revenue of €10 million and it currently has a staff of 60 employees.  ...

Inveready, with 150 investors and a portfolio of 80 biotech and technology companies, is launching a €40-million fund, called Inveready Convertible Finance. Inveready will do so by issuing convertible bonds that can be exchanged for shares to invest in twenty newly created start-ups anywhere in the world. These start-ups must be traded on alternative markets, preferably the Spanish MAB or French Alternext.

"This fund will allow investors to make a controlled entry into a highly volatile market," explains Inveredy partner Carlos Conti. The company has already launched two debt funds and seeks to attract institutional investors, insurance companies and pension ...

InKemia IUCT Group will launch a new €10-million fund for start-ups and spin-offs in the health and life sciences. The fund, called Inkemia Fond-ICO Global, is endowed with a total of eight million euros: five from the Fond-ICO contest the company won recently and three from smaller investors.

Between the participating companies and spin-offs themselves, InKemia has 14 high-tech businesses in various sectors of the life sciences. Two of these emerging companies are based in the US and the UK, as one of the aims of this group traded on the Alternative Investment Market (MAB) is to continue growing through ...

Mind the Byte, a company focused on the computational drug discovery through its innovative platform SaaS (Software as a Service) and member of CataloniaBio, has opened a new financial round in the equity crowdfunding platform Crowdcube. With this round, the company expects to raise at least 450.000 euros with the aim to continue the expansion of its business development plan. Nowadays, Mind the Byte has offices at the Barcelona Science Park (PCB) and the Copenhagen Bioscience Park (COBIS).

In 2015 the company founded by Dr. Alfons Nonell-Canals closed its first round in Crowdcube for 235,490 euros. This investment ...

Devicare, member of CataloniaBio, especialized in innovative medical devices for home care of chronic patients under (Remote Patient Monitoring) has closed a seed round of 3 million euros. This funding will be used to consolidate the launch of clinical studies of two of Devicare's main product lines on the Spanish market: (Lit-Control®) for prevention and self-management of recurring urinary diseases and (Tao-Control®) for self-management of patients who take oral anticoagulants.

The company opened the entrance of investment holding company EMESA, and other Family Offices and Corporate partners. “This profile of investors is without a doubt a large strategic contribution ...

CataloniaBio and HealthTech Cluster have agreed to merge into one entity which is going to encompass more than 200 innovative enterprises, hospitals and knowledge institutions of the Catalan health arena. Both entities General Assemblies of Members, held on 22nd February and 4th May respectively, entrusted the start of the merging process to their executive boards. The merging process will finish, once rectified by the two extraordinary assemblies, with the call for elections at the end of 2017.

To coordinate this period of integration, a steering committee with members of both executive boards  has been created, among them, their CEO’s Ignasi ...

Gebro Spain Pharma, member of CataloniaBio, will promote the creation of new start-ups in pain and autoimmune diseases through an immersion program of Richi Social Entrepreneurs in Boston.

The entrepreneurs interested can submit their applications before June 28th 2017. Those who are selected will take part in a three-week experience that takes place in Boston from 30 October to 17 November 2017, in one of the most innovative and international ecosystems. Start-ups will be able to interact with local experts from various areas, and that will allow them to promote their business projects.

The program value is $ 10,000 ...

Specipig has obtained a certificate of compliance with the principles of Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) from the Department of Health (Government of Catalonia) for conducting trials of toxicity, tolerance and biocompatibility in drugs for human use and healthcare devices.

"This recognition of quality is a step forward in the company's internationalisation process. In 2017 we hope to move into markets such as the United Kingdom and Italy" explains Jaume Amat, CEO of Specipig and member of the board of CataloniaBio.

This certification has been awarded as the result of implementing a wider quality assurance system, allowing the company to ...

Anaconda BioMed, focused on the development of next generation neuro-thrombectomy systems for the treatment of Acute Ischemic Stroke (AIS) has appointed Creganna Medical to develop, test and manufacture its ANCD Brain device. Creganna Medical works for the development of minimally invasive devices and now is enrolled in colaboration with Anaconda BioMed in the final stages of development of the neurovascular device for the company's forthcoming clinical trial to obtain CE approval.

"This is another important step for Anaconda Biomed to secure our path to commercialize our 3rd generation thrombectomy device," said the CEO of Anaconda BioMed, Dr. Ofir Arad ...

Eignapharma, member of CataloniaBio based in TecnoCampus Mataró (Barcelona), is going to offer its counsulting services at the portuguese market. Eignapharma was founded in 2010 and gives suppport to biopharmaceutical companies to start and increase the value of their strategic operations in the areas of regulatory and medical affairs, business development and market access. 

The company is intended to expand its geographical presence to more countries, considering that's an important step forward within its plan of growth. In addition to Portugal, they currently they also have an office in India.

We recommend you to see this CataloniaBio's videointerview of ...