Weekly Quick Hits (BioHealth Capital Region) – Week of February 20, 2023

By Sarah Ellinwood, Alex Keown, and Mark Terry
February 23, 2023

Funding and Collaborations

Kite Completes Tmunity Acquisition

Kite, a Gilead company, initially announced the acquisition of Philly-based Tmunity at the end of 2022. Through the deal Kite will expand its in-house cell therapy research capabilities through Tmunity’s assets, platform capabilities, and strategic research and licensing agreement with UPenn. In particular, Kite now has access to Tmunity’s “armored” CAR T platform.

Quoin Pharmaceuticals Announces Pricing of $7M Public Offering

Quoin is a Virginia-based, clinical-stage companies focused on rare and orphan diseases. The company will be offering 24,750,000,000 ordinary shares represented by 4,950,000 American Depositary Shares at a purchase price of $1.00 per ADS. The closing of the offering is expected to occur today.

ATCC and US Pharmacopeia Join Forces to Support Global Quality Production of Biologics

Manassas-based ATCC and Rockville-based USP have entered into a strategic partnership to better support institutions and stakeholders that engage in biologics R&D, process development, and release. Together they will ensure their customers’ results are reproducible and accurate. Initial products from the partnership will include genomic DNA from top cell lines used in bioproduction, followed by another portfolio of products centered around detection of microbial contaminants.

Eyedea Medical wins NSF Phase II SBIR Grant

Baltimore-based Eyedea Medical, who is working on innovations in corneal transplantation and eye banking to help patients with corneal blindness, was awarded $1M from the NSF. The funds will help support development and commercialization of its two corneal tissue prep devices, DescePrep™ and DesceCleave™  

Thermo Fisher Snags Five-Year Contract to Provide Reg Affairs Support for Blueprint MedTech program

Thermo Fisher, who has offices in Maryland, will be supporting the Blueprint MedTech program, a new multi-institute/center incubator initiative at the NIH. The collaboration will help in the development of numerous neurotechnology solutions to treat nervous system diseases. 

Society for Science STEM Research Grants Program Awards $100K to 52 US Teachers

The STEM Research Grants program aims to further hands-on science learning for middle and high school students throughout the country. The grants will be used to help give classrooms access to a wider breath of resources, such as equipment and other materials.

In the Clinic

REGENXBIO Shares Interim Data from Phase I/II/III CAMPSIITE™ Trial for Hunter Syndrome

RGX-121 is a gene therapy aimed at treating MPS II (Hunter Syndrome), a rare disease where the body does not properly digest sugar molecules. Data presented at the 19th Annual WORLDSymposium™  show that RGX-121 continues to be well tolerated with no drug-related SAEs across three dose levels. Biomarker data were also encouraging, and together continue to supports plans to file a BLA in 2024 via the accelerated approval pathway.

Immunocore, with offices in Oxfordshire, England, Conshohocken, Pa., and Rockville, Md., presented the initial safety and activity data with IMC-M113V for people living with HIV. The therapy is a bispecific soluble T cell receptor (TCR) therapy built on the company’s ImmTAX technology.

Regulatory and Advocacy

BD Receives FDA Approval for Onclarity™ HPV Assay

Becton, Dickinson and Company (BD), a leading medtech company with locations in the DMV, announced that their Onclarity™ platform has received FDA market approval to be used with the ThinPrep® Pap Test. The platform is currently the only FDA-approved assay that tests for an extended set of HPV types, which in term can help better determine risk for cervical pre-cancer. 

People on the Move

Medcura Taps Rachel Hoffman as Senior VP of Clinical and Regulatory Affairs

Hoffman has over 15 years of experience working on a plethora of hemostatic devices, and with that expertise she will work to drive forward clinical studies and regulatory applications.

Delfi Diagnostics Promotes Jenn Buechnel to President and COO

Buechnel, who has been at Delfi since it’s early days, has shown tremendous dedication to building products and creating/leading strong teams. In her new role she will continue to oversee product development as well as operational activities.

Did we miss something? Reach out to us at [email protected] and we’ll add it to the list!