Copyright Clearance Center, PAREXEL, Eaton, And More: News From January 2019

January 30, 2019 | January featured exciting new, products, and partnerships from around the bio-IT community from innovating companies, organizations, and universities, including Copyright Clearance Center, PAREXEL, Eaton, and more.

Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) and its wholly-owned subsidiary, RightsDirect, announced the RightFind suite for emerging life science companies. This content workflow solution provides fast, easy access to a full range of published content – anytime, anywhere – providing a more efficient research process and competitive advantage. “The ability to seek, discover, access, and share STM articles is vital to the success of any emerging life science organization, especially with rising costs and increasing complexities involved in bringing products to market,” Jill Shuman, Director, Product Engagement, CCC, said in a press release. “Without a centralized information solution, there are significant barriers to retrieving and sharing content, presenting challenges that could hinder innovation.” RightFind offers emerging life sciences companies a secure gateway to discover STM content from journals, books, and databases, with immediate access to subscriptions and an easy way to purchase unsubscribed content. Employees are able to collaborate with team members and view company rights for sharing content, simplifying copyright compliance. Press release

PAREXEL introduced a new, dedicated division to support emerging biotech companies in reaching their drug development and commercialization goals quickly and cost-effectively. PAREXEL Biotech builds on the company’s heritage of clinical, regulatory, commercial, and technology expertise with enhanced strategic consulting and asset development capabilities, offering a new Biotech-focused team and organizational structure for customers. Led by James Anthony, Global Head of Biotech, and Graciela Racaro, Global Head of Biotech Operations, the division will help emerging companies minimize complexity, reduce costs, and accelerate timelines. PAREXEL Biotech takes a consultative approach to develop tailored strategies that help companies achieve their objectives throughout the journey from discovery, proof of concept, development, registration and ultimately commercialization, with services that include: global regulatory consulting, with more than 50 former regulators from around the world and more than 1,000 regulatory experts on staff; strategy consulting led by Health Advances, a boutique consultancy with more than 26 years of experience in the biotech sector; China Advisory Services to help companies participate in the country’s growing, yet complex market opportunity; Quantitative Clinical Development and Genomic Medicine Services to optimize clinical success and maximize product value; patient recruitment services proven historically to provide 22% faster enrollment from first subject randomized to last subject randomized; Trial execution services, with completion rates historically 4% faster than industry averages from final protocol available to Clinical Study Report approved; and Real World Evidence programs informed by and connected to biotech stakeholder perspectives and requirements. Press release

Eaton announced the North American launch of its High Density rack power distribution unit (PDU) platform. Building on the best-in-class power distribution capabilities of Eaton’s ePDU G3 technology, the High Density rack PDU offers advanced configurability and serves as an ideal solution for environments in which high power density is essential. “From multi-tenant and colocation data centers to large enterprise facilities, the shift toward hyperconverged infrastructure and multi-cloud environments has forced companies to rethink their power distribution requirements to keep up with the pace of change,” said Jeff Kennedy, manager, rack PDU product and operations, Eaton, in a press release. “Our High Density rack PDU platform was designed with data center customers in mind, equipping them with a flexible and configurable solution that allows them to optimize operations and reduce risk as power demands grow.” Eaton’s High Density rack PDU offers improved outlet counts and the addition of 11 color options for easy identification of A/B power feeds. Providing 11 different outlet module options, the High Density rack PDU allows configuration for up to 54 outlets per PDU and unlocks over 20,000 configurable options for users. Alternative phase outlets simplify load balancing and improve airflow by putting outlets where they are needed, reducing the potential for tripped breakers. Press release

Tamr announced it has joined Accenture’s open partner ecosystem, designed to help independent software vendors (ISVs) and life science companies team more effectively to accelerate drug discovery efforts and improve patient outcomes. The ecosystem is an integral part of Accenture’s cloud-based informatics research platform, which has been designed to help life sciences organizations improve productivity, efficiency, and innovation in drug discovery. Accenture is currently working with Tamr and a select number of other ISVs and organizations to integrate their technology and content into Accenture’s research platform. The inclusion of Tamr’s technology will make it easier for life sciences companies to address challenging data unification issues that too often become bottlenecks in digital transformation initiatives. By applying Unify–Tamr’s patented machine learning-based software platform–to automate the unification of myriad data sources, users of Accenture’s research informatics platform will be freed from tedious data integration work and empowered to focus on finding new insights. “The open partner ecosystem is one of the ways we’re bringing innovation to our clients through the Accenture research platform,” Joe Donahue, a managing director in Accenture’s Life Sciences practice, said in a press release. “Tamr’s participation in this ecosystem and integration with the research platform will give users a new, efficient way to overcome the challenge of data variety. As a result, researchers will be able to focus more time on analytics and discovery, rather than data preparation, which will ultimately lead to better patient outcomes.” Press release

1CellBio and Partek have partnered to deliver a data analysis pipeline for the inDrop System for use within Partek Flow bioinformatics software. The pipeline allows users to pre-process raw inDrop single cell RNA-Seq data and utilize advanced Partek statistical and visualization tools for characterizing individual cells. In addition, users developing their own custom inDrop applications can take advantage of the wide variety of single cell bioinformatics tools available in the software and configure them using an intuitive interface. Single cell analysis is growing in popularity within the life science community and provides exciting, novel insights into biological processes and diseases. It can be used in a wide variety of applications including tumor profiling, validation of drug targets, identification of cell-to-cell variation, and developmental lineage tracing. However, bioinformatics analysis remains a roadblock for many researchers. Traditional solutions require advanced computational skills or in-house informatics capabilities. Partek Flow solves this problem by enabling scientists to easily analyze their scRNA-Seq data with an intuitive point-and-click interface. Press release

Twist Bioscience announced that its quality management systems for manufacturing its next-generation sequencing (NGS) Target Enrichment Panels received International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 9001:2015 and 13485:2016 certification, the latter for medical device applications. Twist Bioscience offers NGS Solutions including Twist Custom Panels and Twist Human Core Exome Kits. “Based on its ability to provide robust and clinically-actionable data, we believe NGS is already changing the landscape of identification and diagnosis of disease,” Emily M. Leproust, CEO and co-founder of Twist, said in a press release. “As part of the overall NGS workflow, our NGS target enrichment panels lower the bias and inefficiencies in downstream sequencing analysis, saving our customers time and money. In addition, our customization capability supports our customers in the development of their assays, scaling rapidly from development to full commercial scale with competitive turnaround time. We are extremely pleased to receive ISO 13485:2016 and 9001:2015 certification as it validates that all aspects of our NGS quality management systems, including our production processes, were inspected thoroughly, meeting the highest quality standards for their intended use. In addition to continuing to provide exceptional customer service to our current customer base, we now have the ability to support customers in more regulated markets that require ISO certification from their key reagent suppliers.” Press release

Molecular Health announced that it has granted an exclusive license for Molecular Health Predict (MH Predict) to DATEN for its use in the financial industry. MH Predict was developed by Molecular Health to calculate the likelihood of success of drug clinical trials, and DATEN is a private limited liability partnership founded to commercialize data-science, AI-driven approaches to investing. Molecular Health will receive an annual license fee as well as success-based payments from DATEN. Friedrich von Bohlen, Co-founder & CEO of Molecular Health, said in a press release: "We are very excited to announce this exclusive license for the financial industry with DATEN CAPITAL. Understanding and effectively predicting the likelihood of success of clinical trials is critical to achieving better efficiencies and savings in drug R&D - which today still represents billions of dollars of annual losses due to trial attrition for both pharmaceutical companies and investors. We believe that MH Predict will drive a true paradigm shift in drug development, resource and investment allocations and ultimately patient outcomes. We look forward to launching this product also to the pharmaceutical industry in early 2019." Press release

Cambridge Semantics announced that its AnzoGraph Graph Database product was rated highest in analytic processing capabilities in the latest Graph Database Market Update 2019 by Bloor Research. The Bloor Graph Database Market Update 2019 compares property graph with RDF databases, native versus non-native implementations, single versus multi-model databases and operational versus analytic solutions. It discusses the latest trends in this market, along with an assessment of the leading vendors in the market and captures any market shift in the last two years. Relative to shifts in the graph database market, Bloor noted that Cambridge Semantics unbundled AnzoGraph from its Anzo Data Lake offering, and that Amazon and SAP also entered the graph database market. Within the report, Cambridge Semantics was ranked number one in several categories including: Integration- Analytic environments, Language- Analytic environments, and Features- Analytic environments. AnzoGraph is a massively parallel distributed native graph analytics database built to interactively analyze trillions of relationships at record speed. The database provides BI-style analytics, graph algorithms and inferencing with open W3C standards based graph technology and labelled property graphs. The underlying technology is a third-generation data analytics engine built by the engineers who built Netezza and the technology behind Amazon Redshift. AnzoGraph has been in production at large enterprise customers as a part of Anzo and is now available behind the firewall or in the cloud on AWS, Google Cloud Platform, Microsoft Azure and all cloud environments supporting Docker. Press release

Obsidian announced a strategic collaboration with Celgene for the discovery and development of novel, regulated cell therapies that utilize Obsidian’s Destabilizing Domain (DD) technology. Specifically, the collaboration is based on Obsidian’s DD technology for the controlled expression of two immunomodulatory factors, IL12 and CD40L, that have the potential to augment the power of adoptive cell therapies but require precise control to optimize their therapeutic benefit. This multi-year collaboration provides Celgene with the exclusive option to in-license worldwide rights for cell therapy candidates that incorporate DD-regulated IL12 or CD40L for the treatment of cancer. The collaboration includes an upfront payment and equity investment by Celgene, and potential future milestone and royalty payments. "Obsidian’s technology has the potential to unlock the activity of cell therapy in a number of new settings, particularly against solid tumor malignancies, and this is a prime example of the new technologies that we see enabling broader applications for CAR-T and cell therapies for the treatment of cancer," said Robert Hershberg, Executive Vice President, Business Development & Global Alliances for Celgene Corporation, in a press release. "We value the innovation that the Obsidian team can bring and we look forward to working together to bring powerful new immunotherapies to patients.” This strategic agreement is Obsidian’s first collaboration with a major pharmaceutical company to deploy its DD technology. Obsidian’s technology enables integration and precise pharmacologic control of potent new activities in cell therapies and offers additional capabilities to Celgene’s portfolio of cellular immunotherapies for cancer. Press release

XIFIN unveiled VisualStrata, a precision medicine informatics platform that curates and visualizes diagnostic, clinical, and financial data to document the patient journey through diagnosis, treatment, and outcomes. By uniquely collating structured and unstructured data from disparate systems into a single source, healthcare professionals gain deeper insights into optimal disease treatments and drive personalized care decisions. VisualStrata also supports strategic organizational objectives such as clinical improvement initiatives, efficiency programs, physician engagement, and population health efforts. Built for the healthcare industry by bioinformaticists and leveraging XIFIN’s 20 years’ expertise in working with healthcare big data, VisualStrata seamlessly integrates with most electronic medical record systems (EMRs) and electronic health record systems (EHRs). It also integrates with XIFIN’s RPM 10 and LIS 5 solutions, as well as other products that collect patient clinical, diagnostic and financial data. VisualStrata assists healthcare teams and researchers with Real-World Data Analytics, Healthcare Quality Reporting, Temporal Record and Case Management, and Care Team Collaboration. Press release

EpiVario announced it has secured an exclusive worldwide license, in all fields, for novel technologies and drug candidates for a wide range of memory-related psychiatric disorders, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), Alzheimer’s disease, and alcohol and drug addiction. The license agreement, executed by EpiVario and the Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania (Penn), covers patents related to the acetyl-CoA synthetase (ACSS2) gene and its role in memory-related psychiatric conditions. EpiVario and Penn also executed a sponsored research agreement, which funds the lab of Dr. Shelley Berger, the Daniel S. Och, University Professor at the University of Pennsylvania and one of EpiVario’s co-founders. Through this agreement, EpiVario will have access to additional understanding of ACSS2 and potentially other modulators of its activity. “Securing this exclusive license was a key element in our strategy to be the first to bring this treatment to market with strong patent protection,” said Thomas Kim, CEO of EpiVario, in a press release. “We look forward to working with Dr. Berger and her research team to continue to hit milestones on our way towards Phase I clinical trials in 2020.” Press release

Cryoport announced it has partnered with Dacos to deliver end-to-end temperature-controlled logistics solutions to Dacos' global client base of biopharmaceutical companies. Dacos is a leading manufacturer of laboratory products for the storage of biological commodities, including human and animal cells, specializing in the production of high-quality cryogenic vials, storage boxes, centrifuge tubes, shipment containers for blood samples and PET bottles for serum and media. Partnering with Cryoport will enable Dacos to offer Cryoport's full range of temperature-controlled logistics solutions, including the Cryoport Express shippers, the industry-leading Cryoportal Logistics Management Platform, Smartpak II Condition Monitoring System and 24/7/365 logistics support, to its existing client base of biopharmaceutical companies. Press release

Auron and Elucidata announced a scientific collaboration using Elucidata’s AI-based target discovery platform to identify and validate targets for differentiation9-based therapy for Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) and eight other oncology indications. As part of this collaboration, Elucidata will use its data analytics platform Polly, to analyze transcriptomic, metabolomic and epigenetic data from biological samples, as well as disease and treatment response data from patients. This four-year collaboration is among the broadest efforts to date to apply the differentiation-based approach for oncology therapies and has the potential to improve outcomes for patients living with these diseases. Elucidata’s AI-based platform combines different forms of omics data using advanced computational analysis techniques to characterize healthy and diseased states at the molecular level. Auron will provide phenotypic data along with transcriptomic, metabolomic and epigenetic data from hundreds of patient samples which will be analyzed on Polly to identify and validate targets to develop new therapies with improved treatment efficacy and minimal side effects for a subgroup of patients. The insights generated from this collaboration will further enable stratification of subtypes of different cancers. Press release

Recursion announced progress in its collaboration with Takeda to evaluate and identify novel preclinical candidates for rare diseases. In less than 18 months, this collaboration has resulted in the evaluation of Takeda preclinical and clinical molecules in over 60 unique indications, with new therapeutic candidates identified for over half a dozen diseases. Takeda has exercised its option for drug candidates in two rare diseases from these early results. Takeda and Recursion have also extended the partnership to enable additional discoveries to be made and evaluated by both teams. Financial details were not disclosed. Signed in October 2017, the collaboration centers around the use of Recursion’s unique AI-fueled drug discovery platform to identify novel candidates for genetic diseases. The platform combines massive biological data generation at scale with state-of-the-art machine learning that can draw meaning from millions of microscopy images generated in Recursion’s laboratory with Takeda’s compounds. Press release

Solentim and bioengineering company ATUM announced a technology partnering and collaboration agreement. This agreement creates the most efficient cell line development solution for biotherapeutic drug developers yet, by integrating Solentim’s VIPS (verified in-situ plate seeding) hardware for isolating single cells with ATUM’s efficient Leap-In transposase expression technology. “This collaboration allows Solentim and ATUM to offer a unique integrated solution to our customers and significantly accelerate stable cell line development workflows,” Ian Taylor, Commercial Director of Solentim, stated in a press release. “This approach means that scientists no longer need to pre-screen for high producing clones, e.g. using fluorescence detection to measure secretion from single cells or colonies. Instead, using the Leap-In transposase technology, almost every transfected cell is a high producing clone. Combining this with high seeding efficiencies from VIPS has huge practical benefits to the workflow in time, cost and efficiency.” “The protein pharmaceutical market is approaching a quarter of a trillion USD per year. Establishing and isolating the most suitable cell lines producing these drugs is a major manufacturing bottleneck. We are extremely excited to combine our advanced bioengineering tools with the leading instrumentation technology of Solentim to accelerate the discovery and development process” says Jeremy Minshull, CEO of ATUM, in an official statement. Press release

Quanterix announced the full launch of its Simoa SP-X Imaging and Detection System, 10-Plex Simoa CorPlex Cytokine Panel, and broad menu of additional multiplex panels. The new instrument platform and highly validated CorPlex assays promise to revolutionize oncology research and drug development. The progress made since the early access program was initiated in early November 2018 with select industry leaders has validated the performance and promise of the technology, resulting in an accelerated timeline for full launch. The company is now taking orders for shipping by April 1. For the first time, researchers are able to access over one thousand assay configurations of critical immunomodulatory biomarkers for oncology research with multiplexing up to 10-plex without sacrificing sensitivity. The broad assay menu covers more than 50 analytes and enables researchers to easily develop custom homebrew assays, further extending the range of applications to include PK/PD and immunogenicity assays as well. Simoa CorPlex assays undergo extensive validation, providing one of the most highly validated assay menus in the industry, ensuring customers can utilize the assays in the most demanding clinical and translational research applications. The next generation Simoa planar array technology utilized in CorPlex assays promotes non-invasive biomarker measurements, supporting easier and more approachable methods for determining drug efficacy and toxicity. This addresses the previously unmet needs of oncology researchers, particularly in the rapidly expanding fields of immuno-oncology and immunotherapy, including checkpoint inhibitors and CAR-T cell therapies. Press release

SIRION announced that it signed a license and collaboration agreement with Denali to develop adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors to enable therapeutics to cross the blood-brain barrier for clinical applications in neurodegenerative diseases including Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s disease, ALS and certain other diseases of the CNS. Once again SIRION’s strategic alliance partner Dirk Grimm from the University Hospital Heidelberg (UKHD) is a key contributor to this highly innovative development. Main terms of the agreement include development expenses, upfront and contingent milestone payments to SIRION Biotech, and additional low-to-mid single digit royalties on net sales resulting from certain future products or therapies. AAV vectors are considered the most promising gene delivery system for therapeutic applications. Denali Therapeutics, together with SIRION Biotech and Dirk Grimm will combine their proprietary technology platforms to create a next generation of AAV vectors. The goal is to develop new and modified AAV capsids exhibiting a safe product profile with improved specificity and high efficiency for therapeutic drug delivery to the brain at therapeutic levels to effectively treat patients. Press release

TARA and Insilico Medicine announced the launch of a collaboration to discover and develop novel therapies for cardiac disease and diseases associated with cardiac muscle aging. The discovery and development of new drugs for cardiac disease requires significant time and capital. The unique collaboration will address this significant global health problem by combining Insilico Medicine’s rapid discovery capabilities with the power of TARA’s human-relevant tissue models, shaving off years and associated expense, and incorporating clinically relevant physiology early and consistently throughout preclinical development. Press release