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Review 1/17/07- Announced that its majority-owned subsidiary, Insert Therapeutics, had entered into a collaboration with R&D-Biopharmaceuticals GmbH to develop and commercialize conjugates of the anti-cancer compound tubulysin with Insert’s proprietary delivery system, Cyclosert™. Under the terms of the collaboration, Insert will make an upfront payment, fund research, make milestone payments upon clinical development and approvals, and pay royalties on sales. R&D-Bio will supply tubulysin technology and material and the two companies will jointly develop synthesis of the conjugate, after which Insert intends to perform preclinical testing. 1/25/07- Announced that it would sponsor the continued research of Dr. Eric Davidson, Professor of Biology at Caltech. Dr. Davidson is working to re-engineer the internal control system of cells, which could have applications in controlling differentiation of stem cells and, longer term, in treating cancer and other diseases. The company will provide $255K in annual funding for three years, and will have the exclusive right to license resultant technology for commercialization. 2/8/07- Said that its majority owned subsidiary, Unidym, had established a 7000 sq. ft. office and lab facility in Menlo Park, CA. 2/12/07- Announced that it had exclusively licensed certain of its intellectual property to privately held NanoInk, which is developing Dip Pen Nanolithography® (DPN) for applications in the life sciences and semiconductor industries. The licensed technology was developed by Dr. Patrick Collier in an Arrowhead-sponsored research program at Caltech, and relates to the use of surfactants in DPN. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. 2/26/07- Announced that its majority owned subsidiary, Aonex Technologies, had signed a collaborative agreement with Kyma Technologies, a maker of semiconductor products. Under the agreement, Aonex and Kyna will work together on the development of materials to reduce the cost of gallium nitride (GaN)-based devices including blue lasers and blue LEDs. Blue lasers are used in HD-DVD™ and Blu-Ray™ players, while blue LEDs are used as back lights for cell phones, and may one day replace incandescent and fluorescent bulbs for general lighting applications. Aonex will provide Kyna access to its proprietary A-Sapph™ wafer technology to produce large-area wafers, though financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. 3/20/07- Calando Pharmaceuticals announced that it had published the first non-human primate study on targeted, systemic delivery of siRNA. The paper, titled “Administration in non-human primates of escalating intravenous doses of targeted nanoparticles containing ribonucleotide reductase subunit M2 siRNA,” was published online in the Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The study indicates that Calando’s lead siRNA-containing nanoparticle formulation, CALAA-01, was well-tolerated in monkeys. The company plans to initiate Phase I clinical trials by the end of the year. 3/22/07- Announced that Unidym, its majority-owned subsidiary, would merge with Carbon Nanotechnologies, Inc. [CNI]. CNI was founded in 2000 by the late Richard Smalley, a Nobel Prize winner and Rice University professor who is credited with the discovery of carbon fullerenes. "CNI is the largest manufacturer of carbon nanotubes in the world and has hundreds of customers, in addition to partnerships and licensing arrangements with companies like Motorola, Sumitomo, IBM, DuPont, and Johnson Matthey," said R. Bruce Stewart, Chairman of ARWR, in the release. "We believe this deal is transformational for the industry and will enable more rapid commercialization of products incorporating nanotubes since so much of the intellectual property can now be licensed from one company." According to the agreement, all outstanding shares of CNI will be converted into Series A Preferred Stock in Unidym. ARWR will exchange $5.4M worth of its common stock for Series E preferred stock in CNI prior to closing. The parent company will accelerate $4M of future capital contributions and assign its rights and obligations under research agreements with Duke University and the University of Florida to Unidym upon closing. The combined company will operate under the name Unidym and will be headquartered in Menlo Park, CA. 3/26/07- Announced that it had formed a new subsidiary and agreed to acquire C Sixty, Inc., a company developing therapeutics based on carbon fullerene molecules. Discovered by Richard Smalley, fullerenes are composed of 60 carbon atoms joined in a soccer ball pattern. The hollow spheres measure roughly one nanometer in diameter, and can be filled and/or coated with therapeutic and targeting chemical groups in various configurations. The company will focus initially on the antioxidant activity of fullerenes, and envisions potential applications in the treatment of such conditions as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, stroke, atherosclerosis and complications of diabetes. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. Commentary |
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