News

Clinicians and representatives of industry say that the requirements for conducting clinical trials in the European Union need to be altered so that the cost of doing research is reduced.

A new UK public-private partnership called Stem Cells for Safer Medicines is asking research-oriented firms to join it in an investigation of whether stem cells can be used to determine the safety of medicines under development.

Aitua Ltd, which provides seed money and early stage investments in life science companies, has invested £50,000 in ViraBiotech Ltd, a spin-out from the University of Warwick in the UK. An equal amount is being invested by the Spinner Matched Investment Fund, a partnership between Warwick and other universities in the West Midlands.

Market conditions for initial public offerings (IPOs) by biotech companies are about the same in Europe as they are in the United States, according to a survey of 200 biotech and investment executives.

Vernalis Plc and its partner Endo Pharmaceuticals Inc have been told by the US Food and Drug Administration that their proposed treatment for the prevention of menstrual migraine has not yet demonstrated a clinically meaningful benefit.

The Dutch government has decided to allocate €271 million for the second phase of a national programme that integrates genomics into several branches of science, including the development of new medicines. The programme is known as the Netherlands Genomics Initiative (NGI).

Four French biotechnology companies made initial public offerings (IPOs) of their shares in the first nine months of 2007, double the number in each of the previous two years, according to the industry association, France Biotech.

The European Investment Bank (EIB), the long-term financing arm of the European Union, has begun rolling out a new borrowing facility for research-intensive companies which might otherwise be unable to obtain capital.

The Bioprocessing Research Industry Club (BRIC) has awarded £3.5 million to researchers at seven UK universities for projects that will make the manufacture of biopharmaceuticals more efficient.

Pronova BioPharma ASA, which has a patented method of extracting and concentrating omega-3 ethyl esters from fish oil, is having its shares listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange in an initial public offering (IPO) of 105,915,432 shares at a price of between NOK 23 and NOK 29 per share.