Newsroom
Biotech Bosses Show and Tell
CEOs try to wow investors at a forum to drum up interest in the industry
Thomas Gaudio
NJBIZ Staff
6/19/2006
JERSEY CITY - Everything you wanted to know about biotechnology but were too timid to ask was on view for investors last week at the BIO VentureForum East 2006 in Jersey City.
The three-day event, held at the Hyatt Regency on the Hudson, attracted some 380 biotech-industry people from 11 states and Canada. Almost 200 CEOs were there to give 15-minute pitches about their emerging technologies and share their fund-raising goals with investors in hopes of attracting money or partnerships. The rest of the days were filled with workshops, speeches and impromptu hallway meetings. These networking opportunities brought together biotech executives, venture capitalists and universities looking to commercialize their lab work.
The Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), a trade association based in Washington D.C., hosted the forum. A local trade group, the Biotechnology Council of New Jersey in Trenton, helped coordinate the event.
Twelve of the presenting companies represented New Jersey, including AustarPharma, an Edison-based firm developing multiple therapies that include treatments for strokes and erectile dysfunction, and Urovalve, a company working out of the New Jersey Institute of Technology’s business incubator in Newark.
Ron Liu, president of AustarPharma, says the company’s drugs for stroke and erectile dysfunction are being tested in China where a subsidiary of the 20-person outfit is based. He says human data from the overseas clinical studies will be helpful in gaining faster approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
“Now we are looking for partnerships either from a major pharmaceutical company or from venture capitalists to bring the drugs to the U.S.,” says Liu. “After we have enough funding, I expect the drugs to reach the U.S. market in two to three years. ”
He would not disclose how much money the company has secured to date but says it is seeking $20 million to continue funding research, intellectual-property protection and clinical studies of its four products.
Liu believes the forum was an effective way to connect with the financial world. “I had investors come to me after the talk. We’ve had many one-on-one meetings [at the forum],” he says. “You meet investment bankers in the hallway. You meet venture capitalists in the hallway.”
Debbie Hart, president of the New Jersey Biotechnology Council, says Liu’s experience was typical. “Watching people exchanging business cards and walking by these conversations, you can feel the networking going on,” she says. “It’s really surpassed my expectations.”
Also giving her reason to smile were the results of a study her group released last week. It shows the number of biotech companies in the state almost tripling to 226 in 2006 from 80 in 1998. “The New Jersey biotech industry is growing dynamically,” says Hart.
This is going on despite a shortage of money for nascent biotech startups, she says. “We have skilled labor. We have venture capitalists in Princeton. We have Wall Street across the river. We have space. We have infrastructure. We have the pharmaceutical industry to partner with. We have a very supportive state government,” she says. “The one piece that we’re looking at more ways to develop is very early-stage investment. There’s very little angel funding for biotech companies.”
The council has been focusing on the issue. In April, it held the “Biotechnology Venture Idol” gathering at Princeton University as a run-up to last week’s forum. Playing off the popular television show “American Idol,” 12 biotech companies sharpened their pitches in front of a panel of investors who provided insight and feedback.
Several were at last week’s event. Urovalve, which is looking to fund its technology that helps males with spinal cord injuries control urine flow, arrived at the forum with a first-place trophy from the Biotech Idol. Vicus Therapeutics, a Morristown-based developer of supportive-care technologies for cancer patients, had taken second.
Harvey Homan, CEO of Urovalve, says the company’s participation in the Biotech Idol got the attention of the right people. “We have a couple of discussions going with venture capitalists and some private investors, and a company that we’re potentially strategically partnering with, that were stimulated by some of the publicity we got out of [the Biotech Idol],” he says. “But we haven’t closed on funding.”
Urovalve, which has four employees, is working with about $850,000 in capital. Homan is still on the hunt for some $5.5 million to continue developing and commercializing the company’s urine-regulating device.
“There’s a kind of process of potential investors following a company, becoming more familiar with the progress of the company and the management of the company,” says Homan. “So this is a continuation of people getting to know better what Urovalve does and how we’re progressing.