Month: December 2021

Biogen and TheraPanacea Announce New Collaboration

Posted on by Blaise Deltombe

Read the press release here.

 

Biogen and TheraPanacea Announce New Collaboration with the Potential to Advance Digital Health for Personalized Medicine in Neuroscience

 

  • Collaboration aims to develop innovative machine learning and artificial intelligence solutions for personalized and earlier treatment in neurology
  • Biogen to gain exclusive rights to TheraPanacea technology in neuroscience

 

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. and PARIS, Dec. 14, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Biogen Inc. (Nasdaq: BIIB) and TheraPanacea today announced that they have entered into a collaboration focused on multiple therapeutic areas in neuroscience, to further build on the companies’ existing relationship. The aim is to leverage machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) analysis to develop digital health solutions that may improve patient care, accelerate drug development, and further the understanding of the underlying pathologies of neurological diseases.

 

“We believe that neuroscience is at an inflection point for innovation and breakthrough. Advancements in technology may increase our ability to understand disease, target treatments, and manage risk,” said Martin Dubuc, Head of Biogen Digital Health. “Based on the outcome of our prior work with TheraPanacea and their success with AI in oncology, we are excited to further this collaboration. We believe digital health solutions will enable us to pioneer a new era of personalized medicine built upon a foundation of accessibility and precision.”

 

By harnessing ML and AI to draw meaning from medical imaging and other clinically relevant data sources, there is potential to improve disease understanding and enable more personalized clinical trial design. This could result in shortening drug development cycles, lowering associated costs, and increasing probability of success. At the same time, these digital health solutions have the potential to support more informed clinical decisions and could lead to improved health outcomes for patients.

 

“We are excited to collaborate with Biogen and combine our ML and AI solutions with their world-class clinical expertise and unique datasets in neuroscience,” said Professor Nikos Paragios, Chief Executive Officer of TheraPanacea and distinguished professor of mathematics at CentraleSupélec, University of Paris-Saclay. “Through this collaboration, we aim to scale our artificial intelligence multi-omics biomarker discovery platform and deploy clinical solutions that have the potential to deliver better treatment decisions for patients living with neurological diseases.”

 

Under the terms of the agreement, Biogen will invest up to $15 million in exchange for TheraPanacea convertible debt. The agreement also provides for up to approximately $41 million (based on current exchange rates) in milestone payments contingent upon the achievement of certain research and development milestones. In addition, Biogen gains exclusive rights to TheraPanacea’s technology in neuroscience. To meet the goals of this collaboration, TheraPanacea will invest in expanding its existing operations and workforce in Europe.

 

About Biogen

 

As pioneers in neuroscience, Biogen discovers, develops, and delivers worldwide innovative therapies for people living with serious neurological diseases as well as related therapeutic adjacencies. One of the world’s first global biotechnology companies, Biogen was founded in 1978 by Charles Weissmann, Heinz Schaller, Sir Kenneth Murray, and Nobel Prize winners Walter Gilbert and Phillip Sharp. Today, Biogen has the leading portfolio of medicines to treat multiple sclerosis, has introduced the first approved treatment for spinal muscular atrophy, and is providing the first and only approved treatment to address a defining pathology of Alzheimer’s disease. Biogen is also commercializing biosimilars and focusing on advancing the industry’s most diversified pipeline in neuroscience that will transform the standard of care for patients in several areas of high unmet need.

 

In 2020, Biogen launched a bold 20-year, $250 million initiative to address the deeply interrelated issues of climate, health, and equity. Healthy Climate, Healthy Lives™ aims to eliminate fossil fuels across the company’s operations, build collaborations with renowned institutions to advance the science to improve human health outcomes, and support underserved communities.

 

We routinely post information that may be important to investors on our website at www.biogen.com. Follow us on social media – Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube.

 

Biogen Safe Harbor

 

This news release contains forward-looking statements, including statements made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, about the potential impact of machine learning/artificial intelligence with respect to clinical and health outcomes; the potential benefits from early identification of disease; the potential benefits and results that may be achieved through our collaboration with TheraPanacea; the potential of our commercial business and pipeline programs; and our strategy and plans. These statements may be identified by words such as “aim,” “anticipate,” “believe,” “could,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “goal,” “intend,” “may,” “plan,” “possible,” “potential,” “will,” “would” and other words and terms of similar meaning. You should not place undue reliance on these statements, or the scientific data presented.

 

These statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those reflected in such statements, including without limitation, the risks of unexpected costs or delays; the risk of other unexpected hurdles; failure to protect and enforce our data, intellectual property and other proprietary rights and uncertainties relating to intellectual property claims and challenges; regulatory authorities may require additional information or further studies; third party collaboration risks; and the direct and indirect impacts of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic on our business, results of operations and financial condition. The foregoing sets forth many, but not all, of the factors that could cause actual results to differ from our expectations in any forward-looking statement. Investors should consider this cautionary statement as well as the risk factors identified in our most recent annual or quarterly report and in other reports we have filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. These statements are based on our current beliefs and expectations and speak only as of the date of this news release. We do not undertake any obligation to publicly update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future developments or otherwise.

 

 

About TheraPanacea

 

TheraPanacea is a highly innovative information technology company devoted to unlocking the unlimited power of AI-based solutions to drive innovation in healthcare.

 

Spinoff of University of Paris-Saclay, TheraPanacea works in close cooperation with the most prominent healthcare facilities to combine the power of its proprietary platforms with clinical domain-knowledge. Our technology is a unique combination of decisional, domain-constrained, and data-driven artificial intelligence software equipping clinicians and healthcare professionals with the most innovative tools to improve treatment selection, planning, delivery, and outcomes, including biomarker discovery and patient stratification.

 

Using TheraPanacea’s AI-powered clinical solutions (ART-Plan™), healthcare providers experience significant gain in productivity, higher standardization of care, improvement of clinical workflow and better treatment outcomes for cancer patients. TheraPanacea’s AI-powered biomarker discovery platform (ART-Omics™) offers upstream/downstream innovation to pharmaceutical companies through shorter development cycles, decreased costs and higher efficacy.

 

TheraPanacea’s development benefited from the ecosystems of University of Paris Saclay and Paris Biotech Santé while being backed by Therinvest, (Innothera’s independent growth digital health fund) and competitive fundings from the SATT Paris-Saclay, the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research, French Public investment Banque (BPI), the European Research Council (ERC) and the EIC Accelerator from the European Innovation Council.

UAVIA DEPLOYS ITS TECHNOLOGY WORLDWIDE

Posted on by Blaise Deltombe

Article CF NEWS BY RODOLPHE LANGLOIS Published on 15 Dec 2021 at 14:49

 

Since 2018, and its first round of financing, the challenge for Uavia has been to demonstrate the usefulness of its technology to industry (see below). According to the publisher, which provides a collaborative platform for piloting autonomous and connected drones, it has achieved its goal, since the Total group, as part of a collaborative programme, has validated its interest in facilitating and securing the deployment of drones in order to capture data on their industrial sites. Its new ambition is now to “supply the major system integrators, to continue to find new use cases and to hand over our technologies to them, who can scale up to deployments for major clients”, confides Pierre Vilpoux, President of Uavia for the past two years. In this context, Uavia is raising €5m and inviting Innovacom and Cattleya Finance, the investment holding company of Benjamin & Ariane de Rothschild, to join its capital. The existing shareholders, UI Investissement and Bpifrance, who participated in the fundraising process, are taking advantage of the opportunity to reinject cash.

 

Validated economic model

 

One of the first recognised uses of the software platform is its ability to carry out remote missions. Uavia, which works with six to seven drone manufacturers, thus facilitates the piloting of surveillance, maintenance, verification or crisis management missions. “We have validated our business model. As a technology provider, we are going to hire system integrators worldwide who will represent the technology on the markets,” explains the manager. Our technologies allow us to take measurements directly inside the drone using our on-board intelligence, and to have real-time visualisations, such as for the search for pollutants on industrial sites. Uavia wants to offer end-users, particularly large groups in the energy, logistics or oil and chemical industry sectors, a unified and secure interface, with all configuration and usage settings being made via the software interface. The company, which will increase its workforce from 23 to 40 next year, is facing a market player such as the Swiss company Autérion.

 

The stakeholders of the UAVIA operation

 

Target company: UAVIA

Buyer or Investor : INNOVACOM , UI INVESTISSEMENT (EX UI GESTION) , BPIFRANCE INVESTISSEMENT , PERSON(S) PHYSICAL , Benjamin de Rothschild , Ariane de Rothschild

Purchaser Corporate Lawyer : JOFFE & ASSOCIES

Company Corporate Lawyer : FIDAL , Anne Fréchette-Kerbrat

 

Sea Vorian acquires Seafin, leader in high-tech products for the blue economy.

Posted on by Blaise Deltombe

Article NEOTEK, published on 14 December 2021

 

Sea Vorian, a company created by a pool of investors led by Jean-Luc Biache and François-Xavier de Cointet, is acquiring 100% of Seafin, the leading distributor and manufacturer of high-tech products for the blue economy, from its founder Claude Pacheco, the Atalaya and Financière de Brienne 2 funds managed by Ace Capital Partners and the SFLD fund.

 

Founded in September 2004 by Claude Pacheco, Neotek specialises in the distribution and integration of data acquisition, oceanographic and hydrographic instrumentation, positioning, UAV and mine clearance equipment.

 

RTSys, acquired in 2012 when Ace Capital Partners funds entered the market, has established itself in the design and manufacture of underwater acoustics and robotics products. Its high level of expertise is now recognised in 4 main areas of innovation: passive acoustic monitoring (PAM), underwater exploration via autonomous underwater drones (AUV), mine countermeasures (MCM) and anti-submarine warfare (ASW).

 

Numerous R&D programmes have been carried out in partnership with the Directorate General for Armaments, the Pôles Mer de Compétitivité, or the European Defence Fund, to design miniaturised products without compromising either performance or cost. Renewable marine energies, deep sea exploration and anti-submarine warfare are all sectors in which the Seafin group now claims a leading position.

 

With the transfer of the group to Sea Vorian, a new stage is opening up for the Seafin group to become an undisputed European player in the naval, civil and defence submarine markets.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

GitGuardian secures two funds

Posted on by Blaise Deltombe

Article CF NEWS BY RODOLPHE LANGLOIS Published on 7 Dec 2021 at 14:00

 

GitGuardian’s international dimension is set to grow further in the coming months. Born in 2017, this publisher of an automated detection solution for secrets hosted in the cloud has generated 75% of its revenues in the United States since its first round of funding in 2019, which has remained confidential (see below). The company, co-founded by Jérémy Thomas and already sponsored by Balderton Capital, Bpifrance and Germany’s Fly Ventures, is opening up directly to Eurazeo and Californian VC Sapphire Ventures in its series B round, which amounts to just over €39m ($44m). Alongside these two investors, who were also involved in Andjaro’s third round last year (see below), several of the company’s historical shareholders have taken the opportunity to strengthen their positions. Together, they value the Paris-based software publisher at just over €156m ($177m), three times more than two years ago. The whole process was quick,” says Jérémy Thomas, “since it took us a month to obtain our first term sheet. After that, we had to turn down proposals from five investment funds.

 

A first branch in the US

 

Within the source code security market, which is expected to reach between $50 and $100 billion by 2025, GitGuardian operates in a niche vertical, DevSecOps, estimated at $10 billion, i.e. the automated detection and identification of leaks of sensitive authentication data processed daily by developers. Its international clients include Talend, Mirantis, Instacart, Genesys, Now:Pensions and Maven Wave, “which spent an average of $140K this year,” adds the executive. We are the number one source code security application on GitHub in terms of number and installation, with 130,000 downloads.” The company, which employs 60 people, wants to take advantage of its funding to add other types of vulnerability, and thus move into adjacent verticals by 2022, which form a “very fragmented” market, in which the Israeli start-up Checkmarx, in particular, is operating. GitGuardian should also open its first foreign office next year, with the creation of an office in Texas, headed by Jérémy Thomas. The publisher could also launch a recruitment campaign for a hundred people by 2022.