Jones Lang LaSalle
Biotech Blooms in NJ
By Ilene Dorf Manahan, Contributing Writer
A Celgene research scientist working on the biotech company's next innovation.
Unquestionably, one of the most exciting business developments in New Jersey over the past two decades has been the emergence of the biotechnology industry - research and products derived from living sources, not from chemicals.
The success of the state's biotech companies to date has made New Jersey an internationally recognized center for biotechnical research, generating high-paying jobs and enhancing the state's economy. Today, New Jersey is ranked as the nation's fourth largest biotech cluster.
According to the Biotechnology Council of New Jersey (BCNJ), Trenton, the state's biotech industry has grown from some 80 companies and 4,000 employees in 1998 to more than 200 companies and over 8,000 employees today. And the industry is growing - partly because New Jersey is ideally located and partly because the state's government, healthcare and educational leaders are committed to supporting biotech's growth.
In January, FierceBiotech, the biotechnology industry's bible, named New Jersey one of the nation's top five regions targeting and attracting biotech companies. And in April, the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) - which represents more than 1,100 biotech-related organizations worldwide, including BCNJ - reported that New Jersey is the only state with specialization in all four bioscience sub-sectors it measured: drugs and pharmaceuticals; research testing and medical laboratories; medical devices and equipment; and agricultural feedstock and chemicals. BIO agreed with FierceBiotech that the state's financial incentives and support programs for biotech companies have been key in driving New Jersey's gains in the industry.
Five of New Jersey's biotech firms also made Deloitte's 2005 list of 500 U.S. and Canadian Technology Fast companies. Deloitte's criteria are that the selected companies must "rally behind innovation" and must outperform other companies.
Debbie Hart, BCNJ president and one of the state's most enthusiastic champions for the industry, notes that not only are biotech companies - often spinoffs from large pharmaceutical firms or university research projects - expanding in the state, but they are relocating here from other states and countries. "New Jersey has all the features needed to make a cluster - universities, 15 of the world's 20 leading pharmaceutical companies, with their experienced employees and the opportunities for collaborations, government support, clinical research organizations, financial firms and venture capitalists." Plus, New Jersey's location makes it possible for biotech executives to do business with California and Europe, in person at any one of the pharmaceutical firms in the state, and with financiers in New York City or Philadelphia all in the same day and "be home in their own bed that night."
The medical goals, research underway and successes of New Jersey's biotech companies are both admirable and incredible.
Based in Princeton, and a New Jersey company for all of its 26 years, Cytogen was one of the first biotech companies in the country and is the oldest in the state. Growing from 40 employees in the late 1990s to 80 today, Cytogen has invested more than $400 million to develop products that target the sites and stages of cancer.
Quadramet, Cytogen's flagship product, treats pain caused by bone disease in various cancers. Quadramet combines a bone-seeking molecule with a radioactive element to deliver radioactivity directly to skeletal areas that have been invaded by tumors. The radioactivity shrinks the tumors and helps to alleviate the pain they cause. As a result of this "anti-tumor action," Cytogen is exploring Quadramet's use to actually treat the disease and has some 15 clinical trials underway.
Cytogen's ProstaScint is an imaging agent used to determine the extent and location of prostate cancer. Knowing whether or not the disease has spread beyond the prostate gland enables physicians to prescribe appropriate treatment.
Expanding its therapeutic pipeline, Cytogen recently licensed U.S. marketing rights to Soltamox, the first oral liquid hormonal therapy approved by the FDA to treat or reduce the risk of breast cancer. A liquid formulation of tamoxifen (the widely used breast cancer therapy), Soltamox is easier to take for women with dysphagia (difficulty swallowing), which affects more than 18 million U.S. adults.
Celgene Corporation began in the early 1980s as a start-up biotech group of Celanese, in Summit.
Today, with some 1,000 employees worldwide - most in New Jersey - Celgene is profitable, the largest biotech company in New Jersey and the sixth largest in the world.
It has multiple products, including a new cancer drug, Revlimid. Revlimid resulted from work done on thalidomide, the generic name for a medication known as Thalomid. With studies demonstrating that thalidomide had unique immunological and anti-inflammatory properties, Celgene concluded it might be used to affect a range of diseases. Celgene's goal was to develop a class of drugs based on the optimization of thalidomide's positive attributes while diminishing its negative features. Revlimid was the first promising compound using thalidomide and received FDA approval in 2005 for patients with a leukemia-like condition who require frequent blood transfusions. Because Revlimid is taken orally, patients no longer need regular, time-consuming infusions.
As studies found Revlimid also attacked abnormal tumor cells in many patients' bone marrow, it is being evaluated in clinical trials around the world to treat a range of hematological malignancies.
Thalomid, meanwhile, has become the most widely prescribed therapy for multiple myeloma, a cancer in bone marrow cells, and the second most common blood cancer. It is being evaluated in clinical studies worldwide for combating hematological and solid tumor cancers.
Celgene's Cellular Therapeutics subsidiary is devoted to stem cell research. Last December, New Jersey was the first state to invest public funds in research using human embryonic stem cells, awarding a total of $5 million to 17 university, industry and nonprofit lab research teams. Celgene was one of the first recipients of this funding and plans on continuing its research collaborations with Rutgers and The University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ).
VioQuest Pharmaceuticals, with labs and offices in Princeton and Basking Ridge, was founded in 2000 and went public in 2003. With some 50 employees, the company develops targeted therapies directed at oncology, viral and autoimmune disorders.
"We have a targeted approach to treating cancer," explains VioQuest President and CEO Dan Greenleaf. "Historic approaches treated all cancers the same - as with chemotherapy. Our technology detects when a specific protein that seems to enhance tumor growth in certain cancers appears at a higher amount; those are the patients we treat with our protein-inhibiting drugs."
VioQuest has two therapeutics in clinical development: VQD-001, to treat solid tumors, lymphoma and myeloma, and VQD-002, to treat breast, ovarian, colorectal, pancreatic and liquid cancers.
VioQuest's Chiral Quest subsidiary commercializes and sells its proprietary products to fine chemical companies and to 12 of the top 18 pharmaceutical companies worldwide to improve their production efficiencies and, often, to increase the overall safety and efficacy of the underlying drug by activating its most positive components.
Medarex, with corporate offices in Princeton and development and manufacturing facilities in Bloomsbury and Annandale, develops fully human monoclonal antibody-based therapeutics to treat life-threatening and debilitating diseases, including cancer, inflammation, autoimmune and infectious diseases.
"Antibodies are the eyes and ears of the immune system," explains Don Drakeman, Medarex president and CEO since the company's founding in 1987. (He is also chairman of the New Jersey Commission on Science & Technology.) For example, the flu vaccine tricks the body to make antibodies against the flu, so the immune system knows what to kill. Historically, antibodies were made in lab mice to use in people - "but those antibodies were mouse antibodies, which can cause undesirable immune responses when used in people." Medarex developed a way to create fully human antibodies and is using that technology to develop its products. New Jersey partners using the Medarex technology to make new medicines include Johnson & Johnson, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Novartis.
At the end of March, Medarex began a second registrational trial of ipilimumab (MDX-010) for previously-treated, late stage metastatic melanoma and other diseases. The development and anticipated commercialization of ipilimumab is a partnership between Medarex and Bristol-Myers Squibb.
To date, Medarex's technology has led to the advancement of 31 different product candidates into human clinical testing. Four of the most advanced product candidates are currently in Phase III clinical trials. The next step is applying for FDA approval to commercialize the product.
With approximately 100 employees, PTC Therapeutics, in South Plainfield, was founded in 1998 from "post-transcriptional control" (PTC) research being conducted at UMDNJ by PTC's founding president and CEO, Stuart Peltz. Post-transcriptional control mechanisms are the sequence of events in the cell that ultimately regulate how much, and when, each particular protein is produced. Overproduction or underproduction of critical proteins can result in a variety of diseases. PTC discovers and develops small-molecule drugs that inhibit or enhance protein production through the modulation of the PTC mechanisms.
PTC's most advanced product, PTC124, is in Phase II clinical trials for patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) and Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) due to a "nonsense mutation," an alteration that causes a genetic disorder by inducing a defect in the production of a critical protein and the basis for an estimated 5 to 15 percent of most inherited diseases. PTC124 is an orally administered drug that allows the cellular machinery to direct proteins to bypass nonsense mutations and continue the translation process to make a full-length and functional protein.
In March, PTC and Schering-Plough Corporation announced they will jointly develop PTC's preclinical compounds for the oral treatment of hepatitis C virus, one of the most serious and common blood borne infections in the world, and other viral diseases.
The state's commitment to the industry is multi-faceted. Many of the biotech companies have benefited from the state's numerous programs to support their operations.
"New Jersey is making the right investments," asserts state Commerce Secretary Virginia Bauer, "and the state's commitment to the biotechnology industry is stronger than ever. If there are things the state can do better or do to help companies, all they have to do is contact us."
Biotech Blooms in NJ
By Ilene Dorf Manahan, Contributing Writer
A Celgene research scientist working on the biotech company's next innovation.
Unquestionably, one of the most exciting business developments in New Jersey over the past two decades has been the emergence of the biotechnology industry - research and products derived from living sources, not from chemicals.
The success of the state's biotech companies to date has made New Jersey an internationally recognized center for biotechnical research, generating high-paying jobs and enhancing the state's economy. Today, New Jersey is ranked as the nation's fourth largest biotech cluster.
According to the Biotechnology Council of New Jersey (BCNJ), Trenton, the state's biotech industry has grown from some 80 companies and 4,000 employees in 1998 to more than 200 companies and over 8,000 employees today. And the industry is growing - partly because New Jersey is ideally located and partly because the state's government, healthcare and educational leaders are committed to supporting biotech's growth.
In January, FierceBiotech, the biotechnology industry's bible, named New Jersey one of the nation's top five regions targeting and attracting biotech companies. And in April, the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) - which represents more than 1,100 biotech-related organizations worldwide, including BCNJ - reported that New Jersey is the only state with specialization in all four bioscience sub-sectors it measured: drugs and pharmaceuticals; research testing and medical laboratories; medical devices and equipment; and agricultural feedstock and chemicals. BIO agreed with FierceBiotech that the state's financial incentives and support programs for biotech companies have been key in driving New Jersey's gains in the industry.
Five of New Jersey's biotech firms also made Deloitte's 2005 list of 500 U.S. and Canadian Technology Fast companies. Deloitte's criteria are that the selected companies must "rally behind innovation" and must outperform other companies.
Debbie Hart, BCNJ president and one of the state's most enthusiastic champions for the industry, notes that not only are biotech companies - often spinoffs from large pharmaceutical firms or university research projects - expanding in the state, but they are relocating here from other states and countries. "New Jersey has all the features needed to make a cluster - universities, 15 of the world's 20 leading pharmaceutical companies, with their experienced employees and the opportunities for collaborations, government support, clinical research organizations, financial firms and venture capitalists." Plus, New Jersey's location makes it possible for biotech executives to do business with California and Europe, in person at any one of the pharmaceutical firms in the state, and with financiers in New York City or Philadelphia all in the same day and "be home in their own bed that night."
The medical goals, research underway and successes of New Jersey's biotech companies are both admirable and incredible.
Based in Princeton, and a New Jersey company for all of its 26 years, Cytogen was one of the first biotech companies in the country and is the oldest in the state. Growing from 40 employees in the late 1990s to 80 today, Cytogen has invested more than $400 million to develop products that target the sites and stages of cancer.
Quadramet, Cytogen's flagship product, treats pain caused by bone disease in various cancers. Quadramet combines a bone-seeking molecule with a radioactive element to deliver radioactivity directly to skeletal areas that have been invaded by tumors. The radioactivity shrinks the tumors and helps to alleviate the pain they cause. As a result of this "anti-tumor action," Cytogen is exploring Quadramet's use to actually treat the disease and has some 15 clinical trials underway.
Cytogen's ProstaScint is an imaging agent used to determine the extent and location of prostate cancer. Knowing whether or not the disease has spread beyond the prostate gland enables physicians to prescribe appropriate treatment.
Expanding its therapeutic pipeline, Cytogen recently licensed U.S. marketing rights to Soltamox, the first oral liquid hormonal therapy approved by the FDA to treat or reduce the risk of breast cancer. A liquid formulation of tamoxifen (the widely used breast cancer therapy), Soltamox is easier to take for women with dysphagia (difficulty swallowing), which affects more than 18 million U.S. adults.
Celgene Corporation began in the early 1980s as a start-up biotech group of Celanese, in Summit.
Today, with some 1,000 employees worldwide - most in New Jersey - Celgene is profitable, the largest biotech company in New Jersey and the sixth largest in the world.
It has multiple products, including a new cancer drug, Revlimid. Revlimid resulted from work done on thalidomide, the generic name for a medication known as Thalomid. With studies demonstrating that thalidomide had unique immunological and anti-inflammatory properties, Celgene concluded it might be used to affect a range of diseases. Celgene's goal was to develop a class of drugs based on the optimization of thalidomide's positive attributes while diminishing its negative features. Revlimid was the first promising compound using thalidomide and received FDA approval in 2005 for patients with a leukemia-like condition who require frequent blood transfusions. Because Revlimid is taken orally, patients no longer need regular, time-consuming infusions.
As studies found Revlimid also attacked abnormal tumor cells in many patients' bone marrow, it is being evaluated in clinical trials around the world to treat a range of hematological malignancies.
Thalomid, meanwhile, has become the most widely prescribed therapy for multiple myeloma, a cancer in bone marrow cells, and the second most common blood cancer. It is being evaluated in clinical studies worldwide for combating hematological and solid tumor cancers.
Celgene's Cellular Therapeutics subsidiary is devoted to stem cell research. Last December, New Jersey was the first state to invest public funds in research using human embryonic stem cells, awarding a total of $5 million to 17 university, industry and nonprofit lab research teams. Celgene was one of the first recipients of this funding and plans on continuing its research collaborations with Rutgers and The University of Medicine & Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ).
VioQuest Pharmaceuticals, with labs and offices in Princeton and Basking Ridge, was founded in 2000 and went public in 2003. With some 50 employees, the company develops targeted therapies directed at oncology, viral and autoimmune disorders.
"We have a targeted approach to treating cancer," explains VioQuest President and CEO Dan Greenleaf. "Historic approaches treated all cancers the same - as with chemotherapy. Our technology detects when a specific protein that seems to enhance tumor growth in certain cancers appears at a higher amount; those are the patients we treat with our protein-inhibiting drugs."
VioQuest has two therapeutics in clinical development: VQD-001, to treat solid tumors, lymphoma and myeloma, and VQD-002, to treat breast, ovarian, colorectal, pancreatic and liquid cancers.
VioQuest's Chiral Quest subsidiary commercializes and sells its proprietary products to fine chemical companies and to 12 of the top 18 pharmaceutical companies worldwide to improve their production efficiencies and, often, to increase the overall safety and efficacy of the underlying drug by activating its most positive components.
Medarex, with corporate offices in Princeton and development and manufacturing facilities in Bloomsbury and Annandale, develops fully human monoclonal antibody-based therapeutics to treat life-threatening and debilitating diseases, including cancer, inflammation, autoimmune and infectious diseases.
"Antibodies are the eyes and ears of the immune system," explains Don Drakeman, Medarex president and CEO since the company's founding in 1987. (He is also chairman of the New Jersey Commission on Science & Technology.) For example, the flu vaccine tricks the body to make antibodies against the flu, so the immune system knows what to kill. Historically, antibodies were made in lab mice to use in people - "but those antibodies were mouse antibodies, which can cause undesirable immune responses when used in people." Medarex developed a way to create fully human antibodies and is using that technology to develop its products. New Jersey partners using the Medarex technology to make new medicines include Johnson & Johnson, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Novartis.
At the end of March, Medarex began a second registrational trial of ipilimumab (MDX-010) for previously-treated, late stage metastatic melanoma and other diseases. The development and anticipated commercialization of ipilimumab is a partnership between Medarex and Bristol-Myers Squibb.
To date, Medarex's technology has led to the advancement of 31 different product candidates into human clinical testing. Four of the most advanced product candidates are currently in Phase III clinical trials. The next step is applying for FDA approval to commercialize the product.
With approximately 100 employees, PTC Therapeutics, in South Plainfield, was founded in 1998 from "post-transcriptional control" (PTC) research being conducted at UMDNJ by PTC's founding president and CEO, Stuart Peltz. Post-transcriptional control mechanisms are the sequence of events in the cell that ultimately regulate how much, and when, each particular protein is produced. Overproduction or underproduction of critical proteins can result in a variety of diseases. PTC discovers and develops small-molecule drugs that inhibit or enhance protein production through the modulation of the PTC mechanisms.
PTC's most advanced product, PTC124, is in Phase II clinical trials for patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) and Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) due to a "nonsense mutation," an alteration that causes a genetic disorder by inducing a defect in the production of a critical protein and the basis for an estimated 5 to 15 percent of most inherited diseases. PTC124 is an orally administered drug that allows the cellular machinery to direct proteins to bypass nonsense mutations and continue the translation process to make a full-length and functional protein.
In March, PTC and Schering-Plough Corporation announced they will jointly develop PTC's preclinical compounds for the oral treatment of hepatitis C virus, one of the most serious and common blood borne infections in the world, and other viral diseases.
The state's commitment to the industry is multi-faceted. Many of the biotech companies have benefited from the state's numerous programs to support their operations.
"New Jersey is making the right investments," asserts state Commerce Secretary Virginia Bauer, "and the state's commitment to the biotechnology industry is stronger than ever. If there are things the state can do better or do to help companies, all they have to do is contact us."
posted by Jones Lang LaSalle NJ News Blog at 8:58 AM
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