The Net takes a look at what’s new in Scotland and the south of France. And back in the States, the Mayo Clinic serves as a foundation for biotech hopes while an experienced bioentrepreneur is hired in Charlottesville.

• The Scotsman profiles Glasgow University spin-out Virttu Biologics, which is seeking an £8 million infusion to further develop its virus for killing cancer cells. Says new chairman Patrick: “We’ve reached an inflection point with the company. We now need to step up a big gear and have a 24-month plan to do that.” Read it here.

• Joe Panetta, head of San Diego’s biotech association Biocom, pens his thoughts on a business mission to the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region of France: Biotech from Nice to Marseille. Read it.

• Could Rochester, Minnesota, be the next biotech hotspot? The backers of Destination Medical Center hope so. Mayo Clinic Ventures chairman Jim Rogers tell startup business developers that there’s governmental backing and that Rochester “is a good place to start your business, and we’re going to do what we can to make it successful.” More details in the Post-Bulletin.

• Rochester isn’t the only place looking to build a biotech corridor off the success of Mayo Clinic. A developer plans to buy 225 acres of land near Mayo Clinic Hospital in Phoenix to develop the $1 billion Arizona Biomedical Corridor. Read by clicking.

• Finally, the University of Virginia’s newest advocate for commercializing its research discoveries brings nearly 30 years of experience in the biotech and pharma industries. UVa alumni Brian Pollok has been named the university’s first entrepreneur-in-residence. He will offer guidance, perspective and a voice on how researchers can amplify their discoveries, working with UVa Innovation and the university’s licensing and ventures group. Find out more.

In this edition of the News Net: positive news for the biotech sectors in France and the UAE, India is looking for a few good companies, and the Harlem renaissance continues.

• The Nature News Blog recaps a report on the French biotech sector showing signs of recovery. Funding was up last year, and the number of new biotech companies created rose from 24 in 2011 to 35 in 2012, while the number of closures fell from 25 to 14. Read the story here.
• India’s Department of Biotechnology is seeking proposals from companies needing R&D funding. Under its Small Business Innovation Research Initiative scheme, the DBT will support start-ups and SMEs with phase I and II funding. More details in Pharmabiz.
• The National reports on the United Arab Emirates’ first-time inclusion in the Scientific American Worldview Report and Bio-Innovation Scorecard. The UAE leads the Arab world in biotech, ranking 40th in the world behind China and just ahead of Russia. Read all about it here.
• Uptown Manhattan continues its economic rise as the Harlem Biospace opens in a converted factory building. The brainchild of Columbia University biomedical engineering professor Sam Sia, the incubator will host research facilities for up to 24 early-stage biotech companies. Full details in the NY Daily News.

News Net brings you news you may have missed in the world of bioentrepreneurism. Today, an expert’s thoughts on what makes a successful life science cluster, and two Mid-Atlantic regions stake their claim.

• Two recent reports highlight the growth of North Carolina’s life science sector—specifically the Raleigh-Durham area. Battelle ranks NC third behind California and Massachusetts, and Jones Lang LaSalle puts Raleigh-Durham area as the fourth largest life sciences cluster in the US based on employment, number of companies and the amount of VC and NIH funding. Read more here.

• Newark, New Jersey’s future biotech cluster has gained another tenant: French CRO Biotrial plans to create an estimated 100 jobs at its new North American headquarters. Biotrial will join other biomedical organizations and five universities in at the University Heights Science Park. More details here.

• Houston BizBlog asks what the secret is to a successful biotech cluster. Money, surprisingly, isn’t the answer. According to Mass Bio’s Peter Abair, the key is having institutional leaders who can wear multiple hats. “It’s really having that cadre of entrepreneurs who have the experience and … can flow freely among the different sectors of academia and hospitals and private sector.” Read his thoughts.

This edition of the News Net brings you an insider’s view of the policy gap between US and Chinese biotech, Canada’s new investment fund, a Taiwanese-Dutch connection, and what happened when a biotech CEO got an unsolicited email from Bill Gates.

• In Forbes, Acorda Therapeutics CEO Ron Cohen relates a recent visit to China and compares that government’s pro-business policies to those of the US. He concludes that the US can and should adjust tax rules to ease the financial and regulatory burdens on investors. Read his thoughts here.
• Canada’s new Venture Capital Action Plan, announced in the latest federal budget, will make $400 million available to help increase private-sector investments in the next 7 to 10 years. According to Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, “The primary focus is on young entrepreneurs and the fact that we’re losing young entrepreneurs and their businesses to American enterprises, larger enterprises.” More details here.
• BiotechEast highlights the reasons two Taiwanese life science companies, Taiwan Liposome Company and Body Organ Biomedical, chose the Leiden Bio Science Park in the Netherlands as the site for their European operations. Full story.
• Finally, a reminder to look twice before deleting that seemingly suspicious email. The Wall Street Journal reports on how start-up Foundation Medicine caught the eye of Microsoft founder and super-investor Bill Gates, here.

This week in the Net: bioentrepreneurism gets a boost from initiatives in Dubai and Cuba; and an incubator hatches in Moscow. Happy weekend reading.

• The government of Dubai’s ongoing efforts to become the major biotech hub in the Middle East is spotlighted in GEN. Among the 120 companies now installed at DuBiotech and taking advantage of its 22 million square feet of space and “purpose-built” features are Pfizer, Bristol Meyer Squib, CHR Hansen and Firmenich.
• Cuba’s government has created a new biotech-pharma combine made up of 38 companies. The group, called BioCubaFarma, will be guided by “business principles” in line with recent reforms enacted by Cuba’s Communist Party to update the country’s socialist model. The reforms also include broadening the scope for private business and plans to lay off 500,000 state employees through 2015. Read the story from FOX News here.
• The Moscow Times reports on Formula BIO, the first Russian biotechnology incubation program designed to boost innovation and commercialization in the sector. Set up jointly with the Russian Venture Co., Formula BIO is focused on helping medical and biotech startups. Read the full article here.

Today’s News Net brings you required weekend reading for bioentrepreneurs. This week: Australian biotechs under the microscope; New Jersey failing to foster growth; and good news (finally) on the venture front.

Continue reading →

The Net returns from an extended summer vacation, bringing news and opinion of interest to bioentrepreneurs around the world. This week, things are looking up in Taipei and San Antonio; the FDA gets tough; and is this biotech Big Pharma’s next big buy?

• Frank Glatz, managing director of Melbourne-based Cardia Bioplastics, tells the Australian small business site StartupSmart that biotech start-ups looking to go stateside should prepare for a long approval process. “It takes much longer [to receive FDA approval than it used to] and therefore you need a very good kind of offering,” Glatz says. Anything that used to take a year to get approved could now take two years or longer, and the FDA is “an important part of that process.” Read more here.
• Forbes profiles rumored takeover target Spectrum Pharmaceuticals. With two cancer drug approvals already under its belt, Spectrum’s market cap has risen from $2 million at start-up 10 years ago to $900 million in 2012.Read the full article.
•  San Antonio, Texas is the latest US city to pin its hopes on biotech. In 2010, it invested $6 million in California-based InCube Labs’ incubator, which expanded to San Antonio with three early-stage biotech companies. And last year, City Council approved a $3.3 million investment the University of Texas Health Science Center’s South Texas Research Facility. More details here.
• Taipei leads South Korea and Singapore in the Asian biotech boom, according to legislative speaker Wang Jin-pyng. Around eight new drugs developed in Taiwan will be approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in two or three years, surpassing its neighbors’ output. Read the article in Focus Taiwan.
• Finally, OneMedPlace’s handy blogpost lists the most “distinguished, pointed, successful (and oftentimes hilarious) biotech investors” on Twitter, based on their life science focus and tweet frequency. Quite an impressive group, we say.

In this week’s News Net, a biotech analyst talks sector trends and the rewards of microcap investing, a VC breaks down just exactly what “early stage” means, and an entrepreneur looks back at a decade of starting successful companies in an unlikely spot.

• The International Business Times interviews Rahul Jasuja, managing director and senior biotechnology analyst at Noble Financial Capital Markets. Jasuja thinks gout and targeted oncology plays, among others, are ripe for investing, and considers strong management to be crucial for microcaps to get on his radar. Read much more here.
• More than half of biotech venture financings are early-stage deals, according to VC Bruce Booth. But what exactly does “early stage” mean. Bruce breaks it down.
• Finally, New Hampshire Public Radio visits Lebanon-based Adimab and talks to the company’s founder and CEO, Tillman Gerngross, about his role in the growth of the biotech industry in the state over the past decade. Read and listen to the repost here.

It’s time once again for your weekend reading. In this week’s News Net, we start small and work our way up—from the emergence of DIY biotech, to a startup in an out-of-the-way corner of Canada, and finally to a green biotech that’s found funding success.

• Last month’s TEDGlobal conference in Edinburgh showcased the fast-growing trend of DIY molecular biology. Ellen Jorgensen, co-founder of Genspace, the world’s first community biotech lab says the possibilities are endless. “It’s impossible for me, as a mainstream scientist, to imagine what an artist, an architect or even a lawyer may come up with when they get their hands on this technology.” Read the Guardian article.
• The Vancouver Sun profiles Soricimed, founded in 2005 in Sackville, New Brunswick, to exploit the pain relief and cancer-fighting potential of soricidin, a paralytic peptide found in the venom of the northern short-tailed shrew. Founder Jack Stewart says small biotech companies like his are filling the void left by Canadian big pharma’s retreat from early R&D. Read more here.
• Finally, Mumbai-based Hanjer Biotech Energies, which transforms municipal solid waste into green products (though its website isn’t clear on exactly how), has raised $40 million from European funds, including German investment and development company DEG and France’s Proparco. Hanjer plans to set up multiple municipal solid waste processing plants with a capacity of 5,000 tons per day. India’s Economic Times reports.