Many Eyes Visualizations: FDA Application Approvals 2000-2008

Take a look at the FDA Application Approvals 2000-2008 visualization (created by user mktlgcs) over at IBM’s Many Eyes to get an aerial view on the US. pharmaceutical industry.

BioBlocks: outsourcing biotech, one block at a time

Friend Dan Erlanson (Co-Editor in Chief of the niche and smart Fragment-based Drug Design blog Practical Fragments) sent me this story on the recession proof business model of a biotech company called BioBlocks and his founder medical chemist Peter Pallai: Approximately one out of 5,000 compounds pass an initial screen, hit the designated biological target,…

Aquincum Institute of Technology, Budapest, IT & BT shaking hands

There is a nice initiative now in Budapest dedicated to the present and future of high technology: a new private university momentarily dubbed as Aquincum Institute of Technology (AIT) will be built near to the Graphisoft Park in Óbuda (Aquincum) concentrating on competitive information-/biotechnology (mainly bioinformatics) education and entrepreneurship. The main instigator of the project…

Do you want a startuppy job: ask CoNotes or not!

Andrew Chen, founder of CoNotes said that to my mailbox: “I’m basically trying to solve the problem that startups have in hiring the right people. A lot of it has to do with marketing (it’s hard for startups to get prominence over big named companies particularly in university settings), but also fit.“ And that is…

Patent Board science strength of biotech firms in WSJ

The Wall Street Journal Patent Board Biotechnology Scorecard was published this week in which biotech companies & private research firms are grouped by their Patent Board science strength ranking “which is based on the scale, quality, impact, and nearness to core science of a company’s patent-based intellectual property”. What I found interesting at the first…

80 is the new 50 so Carl Icahn has a blog without content.

Billionaire investor Carl Icahn (72) recently made the bloglines with his energetic position on the Microsoft – Yahoo deal. He has a blog too or at least it is coming soon since 01/31. /Having a blog for more than 3 months without any content is kinda equivalent with planning to sign up for Twitter but…

SciBX trial edition for May 22, 2008

from my mailbox: Science-Business eXchange aka SciBX is a new publication from the makers of Nature and BioCentury that aims to improve the translation of today’s science into tomorrow’s products for the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of disease.

Dear StartupSearch: Is 23andMe a web-based startup or not?

1. A start-up is a company with a limited operating history (Wikipedia). 2. Startup search “tracks the web technology ecosystem commonly referenced as “Web 2.0.” We collect facts and figures about new web products, startup companies, key startup employees, and the funding dollars powering their growth.” 3. 23andMe is a pioneering web-based, personalized genomics startup…

Biotech firm funded by Life Extension Foundation to push regmed therapies

Press release: “We at Life Extension Foundation are pleased to help finance BioTime‘s entry into the field of regenerative medicine. We believe that one of the most important applications of embryonic stem cell technology is the slowing and reversing of aging and age-related disease.

Genome Technology launches MethodShare beta!

Genome Technology, the heavy trafficked New York based biotech website (also a printed monthly magazine) just launched the beta version of MethodShare as “a place for people to discuss methods and tools, recommend methods papers to one another” according to Ciara Curtin, senior editor. The site will be coming out of beta soon. How the…

The Spittoon: the eminent corporate blog of 23andMe and Consumer Enabled Research

The personal genomics service 23andMe just launched publicly a corporate blog called The Spittoon that has been internally up for a few weeks. It is a new chapter in biotech corporate blogging. Just like the web page of 23andMe, The Spittoon’s WordPress blog platform, the concept and design is excellent: amongst others you can find…

Startup recipe: collect hair at the barber, isolate keratin, regenerate nerves

Biotech entrepreneurs and wantrepreneurs, here is a tip for Ya to launch a regmed business (and don’t forget to market the product as recycled and green) : Winston-Salem Journal: Human hair could hold key to regeneration of nerve tissue, Wake Forest research shows The study, published in the current issue of Biomaterials, found that the…

CIRM and NIH stem cell grants to the biotech industry

Different attitudes, same endeavors. 1. The folks at the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) started to offer grants for biotech companies up to $55,000 out of the 3 billion ‘hope’ dollars. San Diego Union Tribune: Industry and academia team up: For the first time in its three-year existence, the state taxpayer-funded stem cell institute…

Nature Editor-in-Chief’s changed mind on enhancement drugs for healthy people

Philip Campbell, the open editor-in-chief of Nature was asked by John Brockman under the cover of the 2008 Edge Annual Question: WHAT HAVE YOU CHANGED YOUR MIND ABOUT? WHY? Campbell writes in his thoughtful answer: “I’ve changed my mind about the use of enhancement drugs by healthy people. A year ago, if asked, I’d have…

The Regeneration Station – a biotech blog by Aastrom’s Jon Rowley

Jon Rowley is a senior manager at Aastrom Biosciences with a long experience in the not too old Regenerative Medicine field. I am pleased to introduce here his new blog The Regeneration Station as one of the first biotech – regmed blog written by an industrial expert who will share with us his insights on…

Web entrepreneurs and biotech: strangers from distant lands

Elrond: Strangers from distant lands, friends of old you have been summoned here to answer the threat of Mordor. Middle Earth stands upon the brink of destruction, none can escape it. You will unite or you will fall. Each race is bound to this fate, this one doom. Bring forth the ring, Frodo. [Frodo puts…

23andMe: “official launch” webcast by co-founders Avey and Wojcicki

From the press release: The co-founders of 23andMe, the first, web-based personal genome service, Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki will hold a webcast media briefing on Monday, November 19, 2007 at 11:00 am PST/2:00 pm EST. (via The Genetic Genealogist)

The new faces of Silicon Valley: biotech-savvy co-founders Avey-Wojcicki

After Jobs-Wozniak, Yang-Filo, Brin-Page, it’s time to memorize the names of the co-founders of 23andMe, the first personalized genome service, who are turning the tech establishment into a biotech mode. The new faces of Silicon Valley: the age of Blue Jeans/Black T-Shirt co-founder computer nerds is over, welcome to the era of stylish, well-dressed genetics-savvy…

Collect and FedEx menstrual stem cells with the C’elle kit: the next flow

It is a somewhat very positive idea that human tissues previously considered as waste products (after filling their essential role in the human body) like the placenta and the umbilical cord are radically reinterpreted as valuable sources of prospective therapies due to the current results of stem cell research and regenerative medicine. Exactly this reinterpretation…

The busy life of a stem cell (biotech) startup founder

If you ever thought of launching a biotech startup… the following blogterview is for you. Jim Hardy is a long time insighful commenter of Pimm and he shared with me his brand new experience as the founder of a biotech startup in the much hyped field of regenerative medicine. The transparency of the interview makes…

Lanza up, West down at Advanced Cell Technology

Robert Lanza is now the Chief Scientific Officer of Advanced Cell Technology, while Michael West is voluntarily stepping down as the company’s President and Chief Scientific Officer and jumps into the CEO seat of BioTime Inc.. Lanza and West are 2 legendary figures in the biotech industry, and here are 2 interesting things concerning them:…

SENS3: The stem cell marketplace by Linda Powers, Tucan Capital (slides)

Linda Powers is the managing director and co-founder of Toucan Capital Corp, a $120 million venture capital fund (SBIC) focused on seed and early-stage life science and advanced technology investments (the fund markets itself as the The Leading US Investor in Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine). Out of here insights and facts presented on the…

The iPhone case: the hackers may have the law on their side!

I’ve activated my iPhone in a prepaid mode exactly for the reason of being flexible and switch to another network provider ASAP. So I do not have a 2 year contract with AT&T and I am happy to say that. The AT&T network and coverage is almost non exisiting in the 2 crucial places of…

Nanodrop video ad from the Brown iGEM team

Imagine a world where grad students and postdocs are well paid by manufacturers and companies by doing ads like the following one. The Brown iGEM Team shows off the Nanodrop Spectrophotometer and compares it to regular spectrophotometers in a funny, easy to catch way. (They were not paid by this.) And how the disclaimers would…

Industry and career focused stem cell report in the current Nature volume

Positively tuned (for the most part) report on stem cell science by Ricki Lewis: The hard cell Nature 447, 748-749 (June 2007) Excerpts, emphasis added by me: research in the field is thriving globally. At least 500 companies and collaborations have sprung up, 100 of them in the past year alone… A solid background for…

Are we really in the age of Regenerative Medicine 2.0? A comparison by Chris Mason

In the age of compelling technology analogies and nomenclatures it was unavoidable that somebody at last identifies enough differences in the history of industrial regenerative medicine to tell Regenerative Medicine 1.0 from 2.0. The man behind is Chris Mason, Group Leader of Stem Cell + Regenerative Medicine Bioprocessing Unit, University College London and cofounder and…

20 medical enterprises out of 100 fastest growing tech companies in 2007

Check out Business 2.0’s 100 fastest growing tech companies and read the excellent little summaries on the first 25 out of which 5 are medical related. In regenerative medicine LifeCell has a high position with competitors like Genentech (here think about the recent 23andMe story), Amgen Inc, Gilead Sciences.

BioTech(nically), Business 2.0’s new biotech blog

Business 2.0 Blog Beta Network‘s new blog BioTech(nically) was launched written by Marie Cannizzaro who says about herself in the intro post, March 27: “Before joining Business 2.0, I wrote for Dow Jones VentureWire and Stanford Magazine. I have a degree in Human Biology with a concentration in Biotechnology and Bioethics from Stanford University.” At…

Technological breakthroughs in Regmed according to a Global Strategic Business Report

Research and Markets has announced the addition of Regenerative Medicine – Global Strategic Business Report to their offering for EUR 3,407.00. Link “This report analyzes the worldwide markets for Regenerative Medicine in Millions of US$. The report provides separate comprehensive analytics for the US, Japan, Europe, Canada, and Asia-Pacific, and Rest of World. Annual forecasts…

Carnival of Biotechnology on Babybiotechs

The recent Carnival of Biotechnology is hosted on Babybiotechs and is rather industry and business oriented which is a good sign of a more mature industry. Check the posts and form an opinion.

80 year old Lokey’s $33 million donation for Stanford Stem Cell Labs

Such a Californian story: Lorry I. Lokey, the founder of Business Wire will give a minimum of $33 million to help build a home for Stanford’s Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine. Lokey says: “The important thing to me is that stem cells might not only extend life, but also improve the quality…

Disruptor candidate stem cell therapies

Stem cell therapies are likely to be disruptive treatments for the following medical sectors according to the Stem Cell Market Analysis Fact Sheet: What is interesting in the following list: all the target tissues are of mesodermal origin. • Total knee implants: Stem cell therapies that repair worn articular or meniscus cartilage will delay and…

All American Stem Cell Companies = 1 YouTube = $1.65 billion

Did you ever think that the market value of all public stem cell companies is $1.655 billion, which is exactly (+5 million) the amount of money Google Acquired YouTube in a stock-for-stock transaction in October, 2006? This fact sheds new light on the maturity of the information technology and biotechnology markets. Let’s make hypes into…

Stem Cell Therapy Market, US, 2005-2016: do you believe this?

This extrapolation is from the inforich and insider Stem Cell Market Analysis Fact Sheet of the 2nd Annual Stem Cell Summit, February 12-13 at San Diego, happening now. Other important facts concerning the Stem Cell Therapy Market in the U.S.:

23andMe: the early bird of web based biotech startups

23andMe is a biotech focused web startup based in Mountain View, California (yes, the Googleplex neighbourhood) self-defined as “an early stage startup developing tools and producing content to help people make sense of their genetic information. Our goal is to take advantage of new genotyping technologies and help consumers explore their genetics, informed by cutting…

Best companies to work for: IT Google and BT Genentech

According to Fortune Magazine January 22 Issue, the best 2 Amercian companies to work for are from the high tech domain and from the Bay Area: Google, the IT Lord, and Genentech, the first real biotech company founded in 1976, which is the Apple of the biotech industry. As Genentech CEO and Google board member…

Bay Area biotech prospects through BayBio Chief’s lenses

Insightful, inforich and überoptimistic interview by David Morrill with Matt Gardner on the Bay Area and the broader Northern California Biotech Cluster. Gardner is the president of BayBio, an independent, non-profit 501(c)(6) trade association serving the life science industry in Northern California. Gardner helped author BayBio: Impact 2007, a new report in which he discussed…

Valley Brats in Rolling Stone’s Tech Issue: trends in journalism (weekend off)

And now for something completely different! Sometimes life is just simply life for me without any extension. This is Life.exe. So at the weekends during the largely dead webtimes, I’ll blog about other things than stem cells, regenerative medicine, maximum life extension and biotech. This week offstory is a report, which shows the transformation of…

Kevin Dewalt’s answers: technology professional, lifestyle life extensionist

Kevin Dewalt is an American technology professional, presently working at a VC. Kevin is a strong life extension supporter. We’ve met online at Baris Karadogan’s blog. I specially liked his “happy argument” for maximum life extension on the psychological level, see answer 3. 1. What is the story of your life extension commitment? When I…

Sand Hill Road Venture Capitalist about life extension as business

There was a very interesting comment dialogue last week apropos of Aubrey de Grey‘s TED talk, and the host was Baris Karadokan’s blog called From Istanbul to Sand Hill Road subtitled High-tech, venture capital, creativity and innovation. Here are some details. Link storytelling idea source