Peter L. Hoang

🧬 This week's Austin Bio & Health Roundup brings early-stage funding, new partnerships, and action across the Texas Bio Triangle 🧬 💰 Funding & Capital Signals Lumaegis raised $200K in pre-seed funding to advance FDA De Novo certification of its faster, energy-efficient sterilization technology. 🤝 Partnerships & M&A HumanN, a cardiovascular supplement company, signed a wide-ranging sponsorship with UT, reported as one of the largest in college sports. A strong example of the Austin flywheel. Wenzel Spine sold its Vertebral Motion Technologies portfolio to Driving Force, sharpening its focus on next-generation spine solutions. 🤠 Texas Bio Triangle Houston: Coya Therapeutics received FDA acceptance of its IND application for COYA 302 for ALS. Houston: Rice Biotech Launch secured investment from Houston-based Modi Ventures, who will now get a seat on the board, to strengthen its translational biotech initiatives. What’s Next? 🤠 🚀 🦾 🧬

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NAYA Therapeutics Partners With IONETIX to Build a US Production & Supply Network for Astatine-211 Targeted Alpha Therapies We're thrilled to partner with the wonderful team at Ionetix and their proven isotope production expertise in our quest to unlock broad patient access to astatine-211 targeted alpha therapies, which show great potential to address challenges in residual & metastatic cancer. Read more about the partnership here: https://lnkd.in/gGYzauCP David Eve Thuy A. Tran Milton Lönnroth Manmeet Ahluwalia, MD, MBA, FASCO Ely Benaim Rahul Singhvi Rachit N. Pascal Touchon Marc-Olivier Turgeon Olivier Madar 🎗️ 🧡 Amy Liu C. Ola Landgren, M.D., Ph.D. Stephen Nimer Aman Singh Chauhan Prakash Raman Laurent F. Chemla Romain Afflelou Eric de La Fortelle Etienne Gillard Eugenio Briales Gomez-Tarragona SABELA RINCON VAZQUEZ Corine Busson-Benhammou Henry Gazay Edouard Cukierman Laurent Audoly Laurent Choppe Melissa Fensterstock Thomas Horn Iman Ghavami Luc Dochez Josh Sharan Vidisha Mohad Lyn Falconio Raquel Cabo David Setboun, Pharm.D., MBA Yutian Feng Chris Nowers Magdalena Leszczyniecka, PhD MBA C. Ola Landgren, M.D., Ph.D. #astatine211 #211at #targetedalphatherapy #radiopharmaceuticals #gpc3 #hepatocellularcarcinoma #hcc

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Doma Perpetual's 5.7% Stake in Pacira Biosciences: A Catalyst for Governance Change or Strategic Alignment? Doma Perpetual acquires 5.7% stake in Pacira, aiming to influence governance and strategy through board nominations. Investment includes $67.8M spent and three director nominees to enhance governance, aligning with Pacira's 5x30 growth plan. #shareholdervalue #corporategovernance #boardsofdirectors #activistinvesting https://lnkd.in/gfgu3Uw2

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✋ It wasn't us - honest truth! It was not by AMS's design or request that an article (p16) that promotes a legacy technology for removing carcinogenic hexavalent chromium but that includes both an image of the trucks that would be required to transport weekly thousands of gallons toxic waste from dozens of local communities to specialized treatment sites and also a 'health warning' from Ecolab that the technology may also generate radioactive waste was placed alongside a fact-based article (page 19) that compares competing treatment technologies. That article systematically addresses why these legacy technologies are not fit for pupose. This also calls into serious question why some leading consulting engineers continue to promote these legacy technologies rather than offering Californian communities the option of an approved and proven solution that has a 40% lower lifetime cost. Thank you CA-NV AWWA for giving us a voice to address this situation which risks imposing unacceptable and avoidable costs on 5 million Californian consumers, many of whom live in underserved communities and who depend on water contaminated by hexavalent chromium. #gatekeepers #barrierstoinnovation #safedrinkingwater https://lnkd.in/gdr_Xjub

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Incredibly proud to officially launch Sentinel BioTherapeutics — the first clinical-stage company from RBL LLC, our venture creation studio focused on advanced therapies. Sentinel’s mission is deeply personal and scientifically ambitious: to enable localized immune priming in cancer types where systemic immunotherapies have fallen short. Our lead program, SENT001, is already showing promise in platinum-resistant ovarian cancer — and this is just the beginning. Grateful to be building this with the phenomenal teams at RBL and Sentinel. More to come. Omid Veiseh Paul W., Heidi Hagen, Ravi Ghanta, Amir Jazaeri, Zelanna Goldberg, M.D., M.A.S. Ryan N., Samira Aghlara-Fotovat, David Aubuchon, Lori Kelley

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Encouraging one-year data from Foldax validating the performance and safety of its polymer mitral valve. A strong milestone as the company moves toward broader adoption.

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Love this Andrei Georgescu, Ph.D. “Success, to me, looks like Vivodyne becoming the modern infrastructure for drug programs that seek to eradicate the extremely burdensome diseases of today, like fibrosis, cancers, inflammatory disease, autoimmunity... I see Vivodyne as the fundamental infrastructure needed to drive successful new therapies for such complex diseases that human trial-and-error cannot solve quickly enough.”

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Generate Biomedicines is set to raise up to $425 million through its upcoming Nasdaq IPO, with proceeds aimed at advancing its lead asthma drug, GB-0895, through Phase 3 trials. The AI-powered anti-TSLP antibody has been engineered for an extended half-life, promising a long-acting therapy that could be administered only twice a year. The funds will primarily support these pivotal trials, expected to enroll 1,600 patients. Additionally, the IPO will help drive development for other programs, including treatments for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and cancer. With backing from Big Pharma partners like Amgen and Novartis, Generate is poised to push forward in the competitive biotech landscape. #Biotech #Asthma #AIinHealthcare #RespiratoryHealth #Biopharma https://lnkd.in/gdRGsGJT

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We are launching our Biotech Startup Academy in Dallas this fall for anyone interested in learning more about the inner workings of biotech startups. How to build, how to fund, and how to grow a biotech company. It's hybrid in-person in Dallas over three sessions with two weeks of zoom-based interaction and coursework in between. Our goal is to bring together an incredible cohort of entrepreneurially-minded folks who are aligned with our mission of collaboratively curing all disease and making medicine accessible and affordable to all. All are welcome! This is not just for PhDs!

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Today's planned acquisition by Pfizer of GLP-1 tx developer Metsera reinforces a few key attributes of the global #biotech industry and VC investment within this vertical: 1. If you can prove you can make revenue then you have a non-zero valuation. Although competitive, GLP-1s have proven you can make lots of revenue in a big and growing market (no pun intended). So if you have an (importantly) *clinical* stage asset (even early clinical) that's sufficiently differentiated in a big market then you have a chance of being taken out. In a similar vein a few years ago, suddenly ADCs were interesting when someone *proved you could make money* in the modality. Record-high long-bond rates mean that if you're preclinical these days, your future revenues are effectively discounted to zero. 2. Pharma have big big revenue holes to fill in the next few years. VCs need to do their homework on who needs what and when - and they need to do it early. Who is going to be the buyer of a business if it successfully demonstrates safety in man and at least some sign of clinical efficacy? Demand pull (that is, the demand a pharma company has for generating profitable revenues, and happily by proxy patient demand for an unmet healthcare need) is more important than tech push. 3. The right place at the right time? When someone proves they can make profitable revenues in a new modality or an untapped market then it of course attracts followers in the space - fine for validation, but once pharma has slaked its thirst in that vertical (i.e. specific modality x specific indication) a lot of earlier stage businesses might be too late to attract a buyer. Innovation is critical... as ever. https://lnkd.in/eyMHQ2Yd (and a shout out to Jacqueline Fok on this one!)

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