11/06/09

SpectraScience Raises $4.3M

SpectraScience, the San Diego medical device maker, has raised more than $4.3 million through a private placement that combines preferred shares and warrants, according to a regulatory filing today. As I reported previously, SpectraScience (OTCBB:SCIE) acquired its optical biopsy technology when CEO Jim Hitchin acquired certain assets from the bankruptcy of Minnesota’s GV Medical. In its filing, SpectraScience says the company sold 433,000 units at $10 a share. Hitchin tells me the offering closes a $5 million round the company began earlier this year.

11/05/09

GreatCall Paid With Stock for MobiWatch

A regulatory filing made last month by GreatCall, the San Diego-based parent of Jitterbug, offers some insight into the value of Jitterbug’s acquisition of Waltham, MA-based MobiWatch. Jitterbug announced the deal yesterday but declined to comment beyond its press release. The filing shows that GreatCall provided 630,000 shares of common stock to MobiWatch and its shareholders. A note in the filing says the common stock was issued “in connection with the acquisition of certain assets of MobiWatch, pursuant to a purchase agreement dated 9/30/2009.” GreatCall currently values its common stock at 17 cents a share, which puts the official value of the MobiWatch deal at just $107,100—but with a big potential upside.

11/03/09

Arkeia Acquires Kadena Systems

San Diego’s Arkeia Software, which specializes in affordable network backup software, says today it has acquired Kadena Systems, a Santa Clara, CA-based developer of data de-duplication technologies. Financial terms were not disclosed. Arkeia, which shipped the industry’s first network backup solution for Linux in 1999, says it plans to integrate Kadena’s technology in its system. Arkeia says Kedena’s chief technology officer, Tamir Ram, also will join Arkeia as chief architect.

11/02/09

Nascenzi Steps Into ExtraBux

San Diego software industry executive Bob Nascenzi has joined ExtraBux a just-launched San Diego retailing website that combines cash back and rebate offers with comparison shopping capabilities. Nascenzi tells me he’s joining ExtraBux as both a board member and CEO. He previously was the interim CEO and a board member at San Diego-based ProQuo, former chief operating officer of TARGUSInfo, and CEO of Claritas, the marketing information resources company now operated by the New York-based Nielsen Co.

10/29/09

Novocell Gets $20 Million Award

San Diego’s Novocell has received a disease team award totaling $20 million from the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) to fund work on its cell therapy for type 2 diabetes. The team includes scientists at the University of California, San Francisco, which will receive $2.8 million. Novocell’s research involves transforming embryonic stem cells into insulin-secreting beta cells that can be implanted into patients as an alternative to insulin injections. Novocell, a venture-backed company, told CIRM it would be ready to begin clinical trials in three years, but CIRM scientific reviewers said a more realistic estimate was four years.

iRobot Lanches Healthcare Unit

IRobot (NASDAQ:IRBT), the Bedford, MA-based maker of robots such as the Roomba for vacuuming and the PackBot for the military, revealed today that it has created a healthcare unit to focus on developing robots that help seniors live independently in their homes. Technology veteran Tod Loofbourrow is heading the new healthcare unit as its president and will report directly to iRobot CEO Colin Angle, according to the company. Angle is expected to discuss the company’s healthcare strategy today at the TEDMED conference in San Diego.

10/28/09

Santaris Nabs Isis, Amgen Vets

Santaris Pharma, the Danish company that has pushed the first microRNA therapy into clinical trials, has recruited a pair of big name executives from Isis Pharmaceuticals and Amgen Ventures to help lead its new U.S. subsidiary in San Diego. Mark Wedel, the former chief medical officer at Carlsbad, CA-based Isis, will fill that same position at Santaris, while Stuart Mackey, the former managing director of Amgen Ventures, has joined Santaris as chief business officer. The two executives are part of Santaris’ U.S. growth strategy, which I described in a feature story last month.

10/27/09

Sequenom Settles Ibis Dispute

Sequenom, the San Diego-based maker of laboratory tools and diagnostics, said today in a regulatory filing it has agreed to accept a $1 million payment from Ibis Biosciences, a unit of Abbott Laboratories, to settle a patent infringement lawsuit. As part of the deal, Sequenom (NASDAQ: SQNM) has granted Ibis a non-exclusive license to three mass spectrometry-based patents. Abbott acquired Ibis, a spinoff from Carlsbad, CA-based Isis Pharmaceuticals, for $215 million in December.

Ligand Buys Metabasis For $3.2M

San Diego-based Ligand Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: LGND) said today it has agreed to pay $3.2 million to acquire Metabasis (NASDAQ: MBRX), the developer of treatments for diabetes and high cholesterol. Ligand has also committed $8 million to finance Metabasis’ drug development programs within the next 42 months. The sale comes after a rough year for Metabasis, in which it ran low on cash, warned investors it might have to shut down, and CEO Mark Erion resigned for a new job at Merck.

10/26/09

Axeda Adds $9M from JMI, MMV

Axeda, the Waltham, MA-based startup that makes a cloud-based system for wireless tracking of company assets, announced today that it has completed a $5 million Series B funding round led by JMI Equity of San Diego and Baltimore. At the same time, the company raised $4 million in venture debt from MMV Financial of Toronto.

10/23/09

SDG&E Installing Pyron Solar System

San Diego Gas & Electric, a public utility operated by San Diego-based Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE), says it is planning an 18-month field demonstration of a solar power system that floats in a shallow pool of water. When operational later this year, the 20-kilowatt system developed by San Diego’s Pyron Solar is expected to generate electricity at higher efficiencies and lower costs than conventional flat-panel photovoltaic systems. Pyron’s technology uses a dual-tracking system and acrylic lenses and to concentrate the sun’s energy on a proprietary glass optic. Pyron says its system could produce nearly twice the electricity of conventional flat-panel photovoltaic systems.

10/21/09

Burnham Hires Paul Laikind

The La Jolla, CA-based Burnham Institute for Medical Research said it has hired Paul Laikind, the co-founder of Gensia Pharmaceuticals, Viagene, and Metabasis, to be the institute’s senior vice president of business development and chief business officer. The hiring is a sign of the Burnham’s increasing emphasis on spinning out technologies, and forming deals with partners who can further develop and commercialize its ideas, said Greg Lucier, the chairman of the Burnham board of trustees, in a statement.

10/20/09

Reaction Design Gets $817K Grant

The Department of Energy is awarding an $817,384 grant to San Diego-based Reaction Design, which uses advanced computer-based modeling technology to simulate the fiery combustion reactions in turbines and other engines. The grant from the DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory is one of seven awards totaling $7 million that are intended to advance highly efficient electric power generation technologies with near-zero emissions. Reaction Design, which I profiled in June, says it is developing new simulation technology to improve the performance of next-generation coal-powered systems.

10/19/09

Verdezyne Gets $1.7M Grant

[Corrrected 10/22/09, 11:30 a.m. to show Coda Genomics instead of Coda Genetics] Carlsbad CA-based Verdezyne, a synthetic biology company previously known as CODA Genomics, says it has received a $1.7 million Small Business Technology Transfer grant to develop mutant gene libraries for its computational and bioinformatics programs. The venture-backed startup says identifying such genes will enhance the metabolic engineering tools needed in its biofuels and chemical production programs. The grant came through the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Verdezyne says its libraries also will be useful to life sciences researchers.

10/15/09

La Jolla Pharmaceutical Sets Vote to Shut Down

La Jolla Pharmaceutical (NASDAQ: LJPC) has scheduled a special shareholder meeting for Oct. 30 to vote on a plan of liquidation and dissolution. If approved, the biotech expects to satisfy remaining debts and distribute remaining cash to shareholders. With estimated cash of $4.4 million at the end of August, the company estimates the distribution to the company’s 66 million shareholders would fall between 2.8 cents and 4.5 cents a share.

10/14/09

Illumina Countersues Life Technologies

San Diego-based Illumina (NASDAQ: ILMN) and its Solexa subsidiary are countersuing Carlbad, CA-based Life Technologies (NASDAQ: LIFE) and Applied Biosystems in a patent dispute over gene sequencing technologies. In a statement today, Illumina and Solexa denied allegations that Life and Applied Biosystems raise in their Sept. 21 lawsuit, assert that Applied Biosystems’ patents are invalid, and allege that Life is infringing on four Solexa patents. A Life spokesman says, “We believe these claims are without merit and we will vigorously defend our intellectual property.”

Semtek Raises $6.7M in Series B Round

San Diego’s Semtek Innovative Solutions has raised more than $6.7 million in a planned Series B round of $8 million, according to a recent regulatory filing. Semtek, which is commercializing technologies for preventing the theft of credit card data and identifying counterfeit credit cards, said earlier this month that VeriFone Holdings now owns a 19.9 percent stake in the company. Semtek’s founding investors and venture capital investors Venrock and RRE Ventures, which added to their investment in the round, will own the remaining 80.1 percent stake in Semtek.

10/13/09

Illumina licenses Orchid Cellmark DNA technology

San Diego’s Illumina (NASDAQ: [[ticker: ILMN]]) has licensed worldwide rights to commercially develop Orchid Cellmark’s proprietary single base nucleotide extension technology for forensics and diagnostics. Princeton, N.J.-based Orchid (NASDAQ: ORCH) is one of the largest providers of forensic DNA testing services used by the criminal justice system. Orchid says Illumina agreed to pay $850,000 upfront and up to $150,000 in milestone payments. Although Orchid retains the right to use its patents, Illumina received exclusive rights to sublicense the technology. Orchid will receive royalties on any such deals.

10/06/09

Gen-Probe Pays $60M for Prodesse

San Diego’s Gen-Probe (NASDAQ: GPRO), which uses nucleic acid testing of blood samples to diagnose human diseases, says it has agreed to pay $60 million in cash to acquire Prodesse, a privately held medical diagnostics company in Waukesha, WI. Gen-Probe says it could eventually pay as much as $85 million if Prodesse meets certain financial and regulatory milestones through 2011. Prodesse specializes in a type of molecular testing known as PCR (polymerase chain reaction) to develop reagents that rapidly identify certain types of respiratory viruses, intestinal bacteria, and other infectious microbes.

10/01/09

Neurocrine Cuts Office Costs

One-time biotech darling Neurocrine Biosciences (NASDAQ: NBIX) says it is vacating one of two buildings at its headquarters campus to save $27 million a year. The company paid an immediate $4 million release fee to the landlord, and agreed to make certain rent payments and rent differential payments. Neurocrine has been struggling to regain its footing since 2006, when Pfizer pulled out a deal to develop a sleeping pill.