Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Biotech / Medical : Biotransplant(BTRN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: scaram(o)uche who wrote (752)	9/27/2000 8:13:08 AM
From: sam	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1475

BioTransplant, Novartis team up on transplants By Ronald Rosenberg, Globe Staff, 9/27/2000 BioTransplant Inc. and Novartis Pharmaceuticals are forming a Boston company that will seek to commercialize the transplantation of organs from pigs to people. Under their agreement, announced yesterday, Novartis will provide $30 million in research funding over the next three years, along with its proprietary technology in human organ rejection and breeding pigs for organ transplants. Novartis, a Swiss firm, will own 67 percent of the yet-to-be-named company and retain all commercial rights. BioTransplant, which has bred miniature swine for organ transplants and has a proprietary technology for ''reeducating'' the body's immune response to allow it to tolerate foreign cells, will own 33 percent of the new company. BioTransplant, which will receive royalty payments from Novartis sales, will also provide office space at its Charlestown headquarters to incubate the new company until it finds its own offices and laboratories in Boston. The new company will begin operating Jan. 1. Its goal is to start testing pig organs in humans in 2004. Such testing, and later commercial transplants, would require approval from the Food and Drug Administration. The venture will face some major competition. Nextran, of Princeton, N.J., a subsidiary of Baxter Healthcare, is also working on transplanting pig organs to humans. Another rival is Alexiion Pharmaceuticals Inc. of New Haven. The president of the new Boston company will be Julia Greenstein, currently BioTransplant's chief scientific officer. The research director will be Henk Schuurman, the key scientist at Imutran Ltd., a Novartis subsidiary in England that has developed animal organ models for transplants. Schuurman plans to move to Boston. Greenstein said she did not know how many other Imutran employees will be asked to relocate to Boston. For nearly two decades, researchers have looked to using animal organs - hearts, kidneys, lungs, and livers - to replace failing organs in humans, a process known as xenotransplantation. Nationwide, more than 50,000 people are on waiting lists for organ transplants. Many die while waiting for an organ. Among the issues with which researchers have grappled are preventing human rejection of animal tissue and ensuring that animal organs don't transmit diseases to humans. By using their complementary technologies to create a single business - and sharing the financial risk - BioTransplant and Novartis hope to commercialize the transplanting of animal organs to humans more quickly than if they were working separately. ''By joining the two approaches together, we hope to bring forward the day when xenotransplanation will become a clinical reality,'' said Paul Herrling, head of global research for Novartis, based in Basel, Switzerland. Before yesterday's announcement, Imutran and BioTransplant had joint development projects in xenotransplantion, but there were organizational impediments to working more closely, said Elliot Lebowitz, BioTransplant's chief executive. Lebowitz will serve as a corporate director of the new venture, as will Corinne Savill, Imutran's chief operating officer. Lebowitz, who formed BioTransplant nine years ago, said scientific advances and high costs forced the company to find a partner. He the new company will be able to launch clinical trials in 2004. Organs for transplants, he explained, might come from BioTransplant's miniature swine - 250-pound pigs with human-size organs that do not produce a porcine virus that can infect human cells. The smaller pigs were bred from swine that weigh about 1,000 pounds. boston.com