Janssen Research & Development will use UK biopharma Hemogenyx Pharmaceuticals subsidiary Immugenyx's advanced hematopoietic chimeras to develop a model of systemic lupus erythematosus. Financial details of the deal were undisclosed.
The Uganda Biotechnology Information Centre urged the country's education system to include biosciences. As part of its goal, UBIC conducted workshops and seminars for teachers that involved discussion on modern agricultural biotechnology.
Green Biofuels, Scania and Lucketts Travel are working together to turn hydrotreated vegetable oil into sustainable biofuel. A three-month trial was recently conducted in 14 coaches.
Varian has announced completion of its acquisition of
Noona Healthcare, which develops a cloud-based mobile service for capture of cancer patient-reported outcomes. Varian, which did not disclose financial terms, plans to integrate its 360 Oncology SaaS platform with the patient user interface of Noona.
The value of merger and acquisition activity in the medtech industry has reached almost $5 billion so far this year, attributed to deals reached by Medtronic, Stryker and Boston Scientific, while medtech stocks have increased to record highs. AdvaMed President and CEO Scott Whitaker said the industry is benefiting from the device tax delay and streamlined regulatory process and is seeing medical devices and technology align in a "golden era" that led to innovations, although government coverage and reimbursement continue to be the biggest obstacle.
MEDX Xelerator, an Israel-based medical device incubator, has reached partnerships with Philadelphia-based accelerator Parvizi Surgical Innovation and health care-innovation acceleration program Health Hub Vienna in an effort to advance medtech through expanded global collaboration in the US and EU. The incubator has also teamed up with the University of Navarra in Spain.
ConvaTec has announced the immediate retirement of its CEO, Paul Moraviec. Non-executive director Rick Anderson, former chairman at Johnson & Johnson, will serve as interim CEO.
Three-year data from a 281-patient, 21-site study presented at the American Urogynecologic Society's annual scientific symposium showed use of Boston Scientific's Solyx single incision sling system to treat stress urinary incontinence was non-inferior to the gold-standard transobturator mid-urethral sling procedure. The system demonstrated a higher treatment success rate, as well as non-inferior rates of procedure or device-related serious adverse events, compared with the procedure.
The FDA has given Israel-based Transseptal Solutions 510(k) clearance for its transseptal puncture system that is intended for accessing the left atrium of the heart, as well as for transseptal catheterization procedures. The device, called TSP Crosser Transseptal Access System, combines a sheath, a puncturing needle and a dilator.
European regulators have granted Hologic CE mark approval for the Panther Fusion Bordetella assay, a real-time PCR test that provides detection and differentiation of Bordetella pertussis and Bordetella parapertussis from nasopharynx samples.