Novel Financing For Gene Therapy Company

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By Cathy Yarbrough, Contributing Editor

Gene therapy pioneer Katherine High, M.D., was looking forward to her first meeting in 2011 with Jeffrey Marrazzo, then a consultant to the CEO of Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). A veteran of three life sciences companies, Marrazzo was meeting with Dr. High and other CHOP leaders to identify potential new revenue streams for the hospital.

Dr. High, an international leader in gene therapy research and clinical application, had considered postponing the meeting because she was so busy with her work as director of the hospitals Center for Cellular and Molecular Therapeutics (CCMT). However, she did not reschedule because she wanted to ask Marrazzo for a favor: Could he speak with the VCs who were calling her and inquiring about investing in CCMTs work on RPE65?

I hadnt spoken to them yet, because at the time I was busier than usual with my patient care, research, and teaching responsibilities. In addition, VCs are not a constituency that I normally deal with, said Dr. High, professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania as well as a Howard Hughes medical investigator.

Scheduled to last just 60 minutes, Dr. Highs first meeting with Marrazzo stretched to seven hours and was followed by many more meetings to determine the best approach for advancing CCMTs gene therapy discoveries. The result was a commitment of $50 million from CHOP to fund a new biotech company, Spark Therapeutics, to design, evaluate, and commercialize gene therapies for disorders that can lead to blindness, hemophilia, and neurodegenerative diseases. The company, like the hospital, is headquartered in Philadelphia.

CHOPs serving as the sole equity investor in Spark is definitely a novel financing model for early corporate activities to develop novel therapeutics, said Marrazzo, now president, CEO, and cofounder of Spark. Every situation is unique, and the situation should dictate the model.

Sparks situation was unusual because long before the companys official launch in late 2013, many assets were already in place, said Marrazzo, who uncovered them during his seven-hour conversation with Dr. High. It was like peeling back the layers of an onion, with each layer representing another asset, he said.

The assets included two clinical trials, a Phase 3 trial to treat a rare form of hereditary blindness, and a Phase 1/2 trial targeting hemophilia B, as well as staff members with gene therapy expertise in regulatory affairs, clinical research, and the manufacture of clinical grade vectors to transport genetic material into targeted cells.

Assembled at the center were world experts in gene therapy, said Marrazzo. CHOP had been incubating a biotech company within its four walls.

GENE THERAPY ASSETS UNDERVALUED Before investing $50 million to launch and operate Spark Therapeutics, CHOP officials considered but ruled out a licensing deal with an existing biopharm company or a start-up with VC funding. While we did have licensing deals on the table, that route would not have recognized the value of the asset in part because of the broad retrenchment that had occurred in the industry after the tragic 1999 death of Jesse Gelsinger in a gene therapy clinical trial, said Dr. High. Gelsinger died while participating in a clinical trial conducted by a University of Pennsylvania lab not connected to CCMT or CHOP.

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Novel Financing For Gene Therapy Company

The future of education and degrees. Excerpt from my talk at Future Day 2014. Futurist Speaker – Video

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The future of education and degrees. Excerpt from my talk at Future Day 2014. Futurist Speaker
It #39;s getting to be more important to ask the right questions not just have the right answers:) This is a brief except from my talk at Future Day 2014 in Ista...

By: Gerd Leonhard

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The future of education and degrees. Excerpt from my talk at Future Day 2014. Futurist Speaker - Video

Jobs 2050 – Morris Miselowski Business Futurist on Sky News’ Technology Behind Business – Video

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Jobs 2050 - Morris Miselowski Business Futurist on Sky News #39; Technology Behind Business
If we #39;re not going to be doing and working the way we are today, then how will we be working and what jobs will we doing in 2050? Nigel Freitas of Sky Business #39; Technology Behind Business...

By: Morris Miselowski

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Jobs 2050 - Morris Miselowski Business Futurist on Sky News' Technology Behind Business - Video

Global Futurist and Trend Expert Jack Uldrich to Keynote Nine Events in May

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San Francisco, CA (PRWEB) April 30, 2014

Described as "an extremely knowledgeable and engaging facilitator" and "the hit of the show" futurist Jack Uldrich is crossing the country speaking on topics such as The Internet of Things, How to Future-Proof Your Business, and Unlearning.

Throughout the month of May, Uldrich has nine engagements scheduled across the US, six of which are with Verizon Wireless addressing the topic of "How the Internet of Things will Transform Business." Uldrich's keynotes for Verizon's "Connected Technology Tour" will mainly focus on the opportunity, excitement and potential for new machine-to-machine (M2M) technology that will be available in the next few years. Uldrich will also speak on why future trends demand unlearning to the Utility Supply Management Association and the Produce Marketing Association.

Uldrich's current list of May 2014 keynotes include:

May 6: Verizon's Connected Technology Tour, Kansas City, MO

May 8: Marana, AZ: Fireman's Fund Insurance Companies (Property and Casualty Insurance)

May 14: Verizon's Connected Technology Tour, Houston, TX

May 15: Verizon's Connected Technology Tour, Boise, ID

May 19: Nashville, TN: Utility Supply Management Association

May 20: Verizon's Connected Technology Tour, Memphis, TN

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Global Futurist and Trend Expert Jack Uldrich to Keynote Nine Events in May

This is Where It All Begins: Futurist Jack Uldrich to Address the Internet of Things and M2M Technology at Verizon …

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Kansas City, MO (PRWEB) April 30, 2014

On May 6, Global Futurist Jack Uldrich will continue his series of keynotes being delivered to Verizon's Connected Technology Tour in Kansas City, MO. Uldrich has been selected to scheduled to deliver a series of 12 keynote presentations across the United States for Verizon Wireless on How the Internet of Things Will Transform Business.

The Connected Technology Tour is "designed specifically for public sector organizations, the Tour will explore how machine-to-machine (M2M) technologies and solutions can enable the transformation of government operations and delivery of services by leveraging the power of cloud, mobility and the Internet."

While the majority of things Verizon is promoting on the tour is M2M technology for use by businesses, the applications of such technology are for every day living as well. And be assured, M2M is where it all begins. As one of their highlighted keynotes, Futurist Jack Uldrich points out: "The Internet of the Future will be all around us and we will need to shift our thinking of the Internet from a place you go to a new and much different paradigm of 'living in the Internet.'"

For more of Uldrich ideas take a look at this recent article on the Internet of Things.

Uldrich, a former naval intelligence officer and Defense Department official, also served as the Director of the Minnesota Office of Strategic and Long Range Planning under Governor Jesse Ventura. Uldrich is a renowned business trend expert and the author of eleven books, including: The Next Big Thing is Really Small: How Nanotechnology will Change the Future of Your Business; and Jump the Curve: 50 Strategies to Help Your Company Stay Ahead of Technology, and Foresight 20/20: A Futurist Explores the Trends transforming Tomorrow. He is also the founder and "chief unlearning officer" of The School of Unlearning - an international leadership, change management and technology consultancy dedicated to helping business, governments, and non-profit organizations prepare for and profit from periods of profound transformation.

Celebrated as a national and international speaker and scholar, Uldrichs recent keynotes have been delivered to the Fiatech, the 2014 ATEA Conference, the American Medical Association, TEXPERS, the Idaho Technology Council, Wells Fargo, the Allan P. Kirby Lecture Series at Wilkes University and The Million Dollar Round Table in Kuala Lumpur.

Other clients of Uldrich include General Electric, IBM, Cisco, United Healthcare, PepsiCo, Verizon Wireless, General Mills, the Young Presidents Organization (YPO), Pfizer, Healthcare Association of New York, Southern Company, St. Jude Medical, Dressbarn, AG Schering, Imation, Lockheed Martin, Fairview Hospitals, Touchstone Energy, The Insurance Service Organization.

Parties interested in learning more about Jack Uldrich, his books, his daily blog or his speaking availability are encouraged to visit his School of Unlearning website. Media wishing to know more about either the event or interviewing Jack can contact Amy Tomczyk at (651) 343.0660.

Uldrich is a renowned global futurist, best-selling author, editor of the monthly newsletter, The Exponential Executive, and host of the award-winning website, http://www.jumpthecurve.net.

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This is Where It All Begins: Futurist Jack Uldrich to Address the Internet of Things and M2M Technology at Verizon ...

Freedom Schools, Freedom Dreams

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Freedom Schools offered a creative alternative to Southern underfunded, segregated schools during the Civil Rights Movement. Freedom Schools embraced a radical pedagogy and philosophy that emphasized self-knowledge, applied knowledge and critical thinking: the classroom became a site for teaching and learning freedom. Today, poor and communities of color are deeply immersed in struggles for access to quality education.

Join the UIC Social Justice Initiative to explore the legacy of Freedom Schools and for an honest conversation with teachers, students, parents, and activists about the state of neighborhood schools in Chicago, the push to privatize, and the ongoing struggles in public education.

Featured speakers:

Malcolm London, Teaching Artist, Young Chigago Authors Jackson Potter, Staff Coordinator, Chicago Teachers Union David Stovall, Associate Professor of Educational Policy Studies and African American Studies, UIC Reyna Wences, member, Immigrant Youth Justice League and Organized Communities Against Deportation Prudence Browne, Managing Editor, SOULS, moderator and more....

In commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of Freedom Summer, the UIC Social Justice Initiative is hosting a series of events to examine how we collectively remember this historic summer and to use it as a stimulant for discussion of what Dr. King called the fierce urgency of now. This series will culminate in a national conference Freedom Dreams, Freedom Now! on May 28-30 at University of Illinois at Chicago.

Co-sponsored by UIC Social Justice Initiative and WBEZ.

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Freedom Schools, Freedom Dreams

Pattern of Press Freedom Abuses in Cameroon

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YAOUNDE Saturday is World Press Freedom Day. Commemorative activities are already going on in Cameroon, with journalists complaining that the press is manipulated by the more than three decade rule of President Paul Biya.

Cameroon has more than 500 newspapers and 100 radio and television stations. Journalists said most of the media outfits were created by the government to give an impression there is press freedom in the country led by President Paul Biya, the world's sixth longest serving leader.

VOA asked the President of the Cameroon Union of Journalists, Charlie Ndi Chia, if the proliferation of media outlets means there is freedom of the press in Cameroon.

"The answer is definitely no, we are just deceiving the world into thinking that there is press freedom in Cameroon. Its a mere boogie [deception]," he said. "The government created its own Frankenstein monster and which is allowing everyone else to be a journalist, to have a media. Look at what is happening around, just any body, just any body. I am a journalist, I am a journalist.''

Journalist John Mbah Akuru said some of the media organs are at times told by the government what to report.

"There are a lot of media houses where sometimes articles are dictated by news sources. They just call you, they dictate an article and you know these articles are carried and published and you call yourself a journalist," he said. "When you a journalist, a publisher, and you find yourself being dictated a story, you should be ashamed of calling yourself a journalist."

Kini Nsom, another journalist who reports for the Post newspaper, said those journalists who struggle to be independent are never given access to information.

"You cannot move to [approach] the presidency and verify information. There are certain institutions that are like no go areas for journalists. We cannot be talking about press freedom in a country where the president of the republic has never at any one moment granted a press conference to the national press, the prime minister the same. We cannot be pretending," said Kini Nsom.

Another issue raised by the media is that a majority of the journalists working in Cameroon never had formal training. There is poor pay, intimidation and regular arrests and detention of journalists.

President Paul Biya created Cameroon's National Communications Council to regulate the practice of journalism.

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Pattern of Press Freedom Abuses in Cameroon

Eugenics in disguise: PUP senator slams parental leave scheme

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Palmer United Party senator-elect Jacqui Lambie. Photo: Peter Mathew

Tasmanian senator-elect Jacqui Lambie has compared the Coalition's paid parental leave scheme to eugenics - the discredited social policy associated with Adolf Hitler's Nazi-era attempts to breed a race of ubermenschen, or super humans.

As Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced he would scale back his ambitious paid parental leave scheme from an upper limit of $150,000 to $100,000, blaming the budget emergency created by the former Labor government, Ms Lambie accused the government's generous scheme of attempting to discourage poor people from having children.

Eugenics emerged in the 19th century as a "scientific" theory designed to control which people became parents and thereby limit which genes were passed on. It was adopted by the Nazis and used to justify the forced sterilisation of an estimated 400,000 people, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial museum, and the deaths of tens of thousands of people.

"Its clear that the Liberals paid parental leave scheme is a not-so-subtle attempt at discouraging Australians with the undesirable trait of being poor (when compared with those who are rich) from reproducing. Why else would Mr Abbott and his supporters champion a government scheme which ensures rich Australians receive more than double, sometimes triple the amount of parental leave that poor working Australians receive?" she said in a statement.

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"The only fair way to administer any government-sanctioned paid parental leave scheme is as per the Palmer United policy - and ensure that all Australian parents and babies are treated equally. Otherwise those championing a government scheme which clearly tries to influence or control who becomes parents must be associated with eugenics- and all the historic, moral and political baggage attached to this reviled social theory."

"If the Liberals really want to improve Australian society then they should allow our children to access free university degrees and visits to their GPs, not introduce a sly social policy which divides us into rich and poor - and attempts to influence which group reproduces the most."

Ms Lambie, a former soldier, has courted controversy since being elected to the Senate last September.

She has been engaged in a public stoush with her Palmer United Party colleague, Queensland MP Alex Douglas, who suggested she came from "Boganland". Ms Lambie hit back at that criticism, telling her local paper she was from the "underdog world".

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Eugenics in disguise: PUP senator slams parental leave scheme

Tatas plan ecosystem to incubate new ideas

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The author has posted comments on this articleTNN | May 1, 2014, 07.04AM IST KOLKATA: Tata Group is toying with the idea of introducing a central eco-system for incubating new ideas. It is yet to decide on the structure through which the incubation would be done. This could be through floating a new company or a new division or it could be done through Tata Industries as well. Tata Sons had set up Tata Industries in 1945.

Tata Industries' mandate was recast, in the early 1980s, to promote Tatas' entry into new and high-tech businesses. Sunil Sinha, the CEO of Tata Quality Management Services, a division of Tata Sons, said creating an infrastructure for incubation is in the back of the mind of the group.

Tata Group has an innovation forum called Tata Group Innovation Forum (TGIF) for fostering a culture of innovation in Tata companies. TGIF has been conducting a programme to encourage innovation in the group since 2006. "Innovation agenda will remain and be more focused now. Incubating innovative ideas is in our agenda. But in what form, we have not yet decided," he said. Sinha was in Kolkata on Tuesday to disclose the name of the winners in Tata Innovista 2014.

Commenting on Tata Innovista 2014, Mukund Govind Rajan, brand custodian and member of group executive council of Tata Sons, said 43 innovations were shortlisted in the 'promising' category, which recognizes innovations that have been successfully implemented during the year and have accrued benefit. "The combined economic benefit assessed from these innovations was $1 billion."

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Tatas plan ecosystem to incubate new ideas