The biopharmaceutical company Oryzon Genomics, member of CataloniaBio, has received an injection of capital of 18.2 million euros from a group of international investors, mostly from the US. The capital increase will be mainly used to finance its research and development of clinical  pipeline candidates. As Oryzon's CEO Carlos Buesa explains: "The positive evolution of our clinical trials and this additional funding strengthens the company to further advance the achievement of significant milestones in the development of our drugs”.

With this capital increase the laboratory also wants to join international institutional investors, specialized in the pharmaceutical industry, as a ...

Vytrus Biotech, a company specialising in plant stem cells and a member of CataloniaBio, has won the international Beauty Industry Awards, with the product Capilia Longa PPF, which reduces hair loss and boosts hair density. The Beauty Industry Awards, organised by CosmeticsDesign, recognise the most significant innovations in the field of cosmetics. This time, 250 products from around the world were submitted to the awards and the judges put special emphasis on the functionality, competitive advantages, ease of formulation, cost-effectiveness and environmental attributes of the product.

This is the first international award a Vytrus Biotech ingredient has won. The company ...

Reig Jofre has inaugurated a new analytical laboratory for development and quality control with the latest technology designed to incorporate rapid microbiology techniques with wich to shorten response time, increase efficiency and reduce costs.

Thanks to this investment, the company will undertake larger scale biotech projects and address the major entry challenges of demanding markets as Japan, Korea, Brazil or USA. The new facilities, located in Sant Joan Despí (Barcelona), has a surface of 1,200 square meters, has meant an investment of 4 million and have 110 workers from the 330 that work in the same place.

This week ...

www.bioingenium.net is the new website Bioingenium has just launched to boost its international presence as a protein-expression specialist. The new site clearly and attractively explains about Bioingenium, the services and products it offers and how it can help pharmaceutical, biotechnology and cosmetic companies to expand and develop bioprocesses to manufacture therapeutic proteins and vaccines for human and animal health. The company currently has laboratories equipped with three platforms: bacterial expression, mammalian expression i yeast expression.

On the new site, Bioingenium explains the values of the company and its team, which focus mainly on communication, quality and customer-orientated service ...

The start-up Made of Genes, linked to ESADE Business School and associated with CataloniaBio, has been the first company in Spain selected, from more than 1000 worldwide, to join the 2nd edition of the Dubai Future Accelerators program, an initiative of the Dubai Future Foundation. For Oscar Flores, CEO of Made of Genes, "this is an important recognition and convert Middle East in a crucial region for the internationalization of the company".

The Dubai Future Accelerators program partners with ground-breaking companies from around the world and gives them the opportunity to find and test new solutions to real-life challenges using ...

Bionure exceeded the one million euros initially expected in its crowdfunding campaign and plans to allocate these resources to the development of BN201, an innovative drug against multiple sclerosis that has the potential to stop the advance of the disease (El Periódico). Multiple sclerosis, which is currently incurable, affects 2.5 million people worldwide, 600,000 in Europe and 47,000 in Spain.

Bionure has granted Spiral Therapeutics a license to develop BN201 and BN119 (for the treatment of the inner ear disorders). Spiral Therapeutics, founded by Hugo Peris in San Francisco (Silicon Valley), will soon start a feasibility assessment ...

Capital Cell, a crowdfunding platform that finances new companies in the life sciences field, has received authorisation from the Financial Conduct Authority and €580,000 from seven British investors to launch the operation in London next 26 April (La Vanguardia). The company has signed a collaboration agreement with Angels in MedCity, a specialised network of 3,500 private investors from London, Oxford and Cambridge that is considered one of the biggest in Europe, and will soon present its first six investment projects in London.

Photo: Daniel Oliver, CEO of Capital Cell. 

A disruptive device surgery for herniated discs, developed under the AR-TEX European project led by the company Neos Surgery, associated with CataloniaBio, has won the category Innovators of tomorrow in the Eureka Innovation awards. The aim now is to launch the new restful invertebral ring device which acts as a buffer between the affected area and nearby nerves. This creates a barrier strong enough to prevent re-herniation.

Every year more than one million patients in Europe undergo surgery to repair herniated discs in the lower lumbar. It is a painful process, expensive and sometimes risky (10% of patients require a ...

In 2017, CataloniaBio is launching a new activity: the CataloniaBio Council. This is geared exclusively towards the CEOs, founding partners and board of directors at member companies. Its goal is twofold: to create a tight-knit group of executives that represent the present and future of the sector and to give them the chance to network and share in the knowledge of top-notch guest speakers.

The first event, held on 23 March at the Barcelona Science Park (PCB), was attended by fifteeen executives of CataloniaBio. TiGenix CEO Eduardo Bravo was present to explain the milestones his company has achieved since it ...

Minoryx Therapeutics announces that it has successfully completed its phase 1 trial with MIN-102. MIN-102 targets X-linked adrenoleukodystrophy (X-ALD), a rare and chronically debilitating life threatening neurodegenerative disease. There are two main clinical phenotypes of X-ALD: adrenomyeloneuropathy (AMN), characterized by progressive motor dysfunction, and inflammatory cerebral ALD (cALD), characterized by severe neuroinflammation leading to early death. There are currently no pharmacological treatments for X-ALD. MIN-102 is the only product in development for potential use across all the main phenotypes.

The phase 1 trial was a combined single- and multiple-ascending dose study with the aim of assessing pharmacokinetics, safety and tolerability ...

La biotecnològica ZeClinics, associada a CataloniaBio, ha tancat un acord comercial amb l'empresa danesa Cobo Scientific per poder oferir els seus serveis al nord d'Europa. Gràcies a aquesta aliança ZeClinics podrà entrar als mercats danès, suec, noruec, finlandès i polonès.

Cobo Scientific es va fundar el gener del 2017 però el seu equip compta amb una experiència de més de 20 anys treballant com a soci comercial d'algunes de les empreses europees més destacades en l'àmbit de la recerca biomèdica i de descobriment de fàrmacs. La seu de l'empresa danesa es troba a Copenhaguen, en un dels clúsers europeus més ...

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Two companies have received the CataloniaBio 2017 BioSuccess Award in recognition of the milestones they have reached over the past year in the health and life sciences area in Catalonia: Mosaic Biomedicals, a spin-off of the Vall d'Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO) and the Vall d'Hebron Research Institute (VHIR) founded by Dr Joan Seoane, Dr Judit Anido and Dr Josep Baselga, and STAT-Diagnostica, created by engineers Jordi Carrera and Rafel Bru.

The awards ceremony took place on the 15th of March as part of the 3rd CataloniaBio Gala Dinner, held at the Maritime Museum of Barcelona ...

Pharmaceutical company Reig Jofre, a CataloniaBio member, is awaiting approval from international healthcare authorities for 100 new drug listings the company is developing over the coming three years. This news was announced by Reig Jofre CEO Ignasi Biosca in Madrid, in his presentation of the company’s results.

Photo: Ignasi Biosca, Reig Jofre CEO and president of CataloniaBio © Ara.cat

Personal genomics start-up Made of Genes, a member of CataloniaBio, and academic group SOLTI have joined forces to “create a high-potential research tool to help address scientific/clinical concerns and expand our knowledge of biology and treating breast cancer,” explained Dr Aleix Prat, coordinator of the Solti Scientific Committee.

You can extend this information to the website Made of Genes.

Photo: Dr. Oscar Flores, CEO Made of Genes. © CataloniaBio

Report of the latest "Lessons Learned"

How can Catalan companies get more funds from the European Commission’s SME Instrument? The first Lessons Learned session of 2017, held by Biocat and CataloniaBio on 21 February at the Barcelona Science Park (PCB), aimed to share the successes and failures of participating in one of the star programs of Horizon 2020, which has €3 billion earmarked through 2020.

SME Instrument funds innovation projects with great potential to help SMEs grow, develop and internationalize. From 2014 through February 2017, 117 projects in Catalonia have received funding, 20% of which are in the healthcare and ...

Gebro Pharma, held by the Austrian multinational corporation of the same name and a member of CataloniaBio, expects to post 14% growth this year for a total of €72 million in sales. This growth will be possible thanks to the launch of two new drugs, one for pain and one for rheumatology conditions, as well as the company’s increased investment in R&D in 2016. Gebro Pharma, in Austria, made the leap into R&D last year, increasing investment by 20%, which is 7% of the company’s sales in Spain.

You can extend this information to the website of Gebro Pharma.

Photo ...

Biotechnology firm Bionure, a spin-off of Hospital Clinic Barcelona-IDIBAPS and member of CataloniaBio, has got the green light from the British Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) for its protocol to begin clinical trials on BN201, a neuroprotector and myelin regenerator that curbs the progression of multiple sclerosis. The Bionure team has met with the MHRA to discuss the agency’s guidelines for preclinical results and to adjust the clinical protocol to that country’s regulations.

Photo: Albert G. Zamora, CEO of Bionure and Pablo Villoslada, CSO, at Barcelona's offices (Carlos Montañés, El Periódico).

El principal candidat a fàrmac MIN-02 de Minoryx Therapeutics ha rebut la designació de  medicament orfe de la Food and Drug Administration (FDA) d'Estats Units, per l'adrenoleucodistrofia lligada al cromosoma X (X-ALD), una malaltia del sistema nerviós central que actualment no té cap tractament. En el cas d'Estats Units l'estatus d'orfe es concedeix a medicaments que s'adrecen a malalties que afecten a menys de 200.000 persones, com és el cas del MIN-02. Aquesta designació li permetrà tenir l'exclusivitat en el mercat d'Estats Units durant els propers 7 anys i gaudir d'altres beneficis com bonificacions fiscals, assistència en protocols ...

Un consorci publicoprivat liderat per la biotecnològica Iproteos, associada a CataloniaBio, ha iniciat un projecte per validar una nova família de compostos peptidomimètics per al tractament de l'acumulació vascular de colesterol associada a l’aterosclerosi. L'objectiu és obtenir un candidat a fàrmac first-in-class per aquesta malaltia.

El projecte, en el qual participen l'Institut d'Investigacions Biomèdiques de Barcelona (IIBB-CSIC) i el Centre de Regulació Genòmica (CRG), ha rebut un ajut de 700.000 euros del Ministeri d’Economia, Indústria i Competitivitat a través de la convocatòria Retos-Colaboración 2016. "En el camp de les malalties cardiovasculars manquen tractaments per evitar l’acumulació descontrolada de ...

CataloniaBio members Xenopat and ZeClinics are participating in the European 3D-Neonet programme. This new international consortium, led by University College Dublin (UCD), has been created to accelerate development of oncology and ophthalmology therapies. The consortium will comprise 18 companies and academic institutions from seven countries.

Photo: Blood vessels in the retina of a mouse stained with isolectina - © Irish Tech News - University College Dublin.