This was a great year for Seattle biotech if you measure success through sheer number of acquisitions. But if you prefer to measure the health of an innovation community by the number of exciting new startups it hatches, then this was most certainly a down year.

That’s the mixed bag of returns that I saw when looking back at the news of 2011 from the Seattle life sciences scene. This was the year of the acquisition for Calistoga Pharmaceuticals, Pathway Medical Technologies, Calypso Medical Technologies, SonoSite (NASDAQ: SONO), Amnis, Geospiza, and Pacific Biosciences Labs (the maker of the Clarisonic skin brush.)

While those companies got harvested, not a whole lot of new seeds got planted. The list of notable Seattle biotech startups this year includes Cardeas Pharma, Oncofactor, Blaze Bioscience, Aquedect Neuroscience and Cardiac Insight.

Who else made headlines in Seattle biotech in 2011? Seattle Genetics emerged. Dendreon crashed. Marina Biotech, Omeros, and AVI Biopharma all had years they’d like to forget. Cell Therapeutics somehow managed to stay in business. New leaders emerged at the global health nonprofits, as Alan Aderem moved in to run the Seattle Biomedical Research Institute, Stewart Parker took over at the Infectious Disease Research Institute, and Chris Elias created a vacancy at the top of PATH by leaving for a new gig at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The foundation’s head of global health, Tachi Yamada, left for a new venture capital gig, and was replaced by a former Novartis executive, Trevor Mundel.

Here’s a company-by-company rundown of the major events at Seattle biopharmaceutical and global health organizations we keep tabs on here at Xconomy. Tomorrow, I’ll follow up with the rundown of rundown of medical device, diagnostic, and others in fields like Bio-IT or Health IT.

Seattle Genetics (NASDAQ: SGEN). This was a transformative year for Seattle Genetics. The company broke through in August by winning FDA approval of its first product, a souped-up antibody for rare lymphomas. The drug validated a new target on the surface of cancer cells, CD30, and provided hard proof that Seattle Genetics’ proprietary chemistry can successfully link toxins to antibodies—a feat that has eluded scientists for 30 years. Big Pharma companies have beaten a path to Bothell to get licenses to the antibody-drug linking technology, and Seattle Genetics has exceeded Wall Street expectations in the early days of its drug rollout.

Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN). Dendreon was the star of local biotech in 2010, and this year it fell flat on its face. The company failed to live up to its first full year sales forecast with its immune-boosting drug for prostate cancer, and burned its shareholder base in the process. The company lost more than $3.5 billion in market valuation, and had to cut 500 jobs, largely because it sparked controversy and confusion by pricing its cancer drug too high—at $93,000 per patient. It remains to be seen this year whether Dendreon can pick up the pieces, as the disastrous screw-up of 2011 has created a gaping opportunity for emerging competitors like Johnson & Johnson’s abiraterone (Zytiga) and Medivation’s MDV-3100.

Amgen (NASDAQ: AMGN). The Thousand Oaks, CA-based biotech company, which has significant R&D in Seattle, said at the end of the year that longtime CEO Kevin Sharer … Next Page »

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Bob Kirkman, the CEO of Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY), took an unexplained medical leave from the company back in September. The company said at the time he’d return in the fourth quarter of 2011, but now it’s official that he’s back on the job as CEO, Xconomy has learned.

“Bob is back,” says Christopher Henney, the Oncothyreon chairman who stepped in as interim CEO this fall. Henney told me about the move at last night’s Xconomy event, “The Immunex Impact.” Kirkman made a presentation to the company’s board on Thursday, Henney says.

Kirkman, listed as 62 in the company’s most recent proxy report, declined to comment this morning, saying he still has to put out the usual regulatory disclosure about his return. But he is coming back just in time for the biggest event in Oncothyreon’s history—the results of a pivotal lung cancer trial of its immunotherapy known as Stimuvax.

Researchers and investors are eagerly awaiting the clinical results of this drug, being tested in partnership with Germany-based Merck KGaA. Data should be available sometime in the first quarter of 2012, Oncothyreon has said.

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Christopher Henney, the immunologist who co-founded three of Seattle’s most successful biotech companies from the past 30 years, has made it into the industry’s Hall of Fame.

Henney, 70, was given the Hall of Fame award for outstanding individual contributions to biotech at the annual Biotech CEO Meeting in Laguna Beach, CA. He’s currently the chairman and interim CEO of Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY), the chairman of Hayward, CA-based Anthera Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: ANTH) and the vice chairman of Berkeley Heights, NJ-based Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: CYCC).

Henney, one of the speakers at “The Immunex Impact” event Xconomy is organizing on Dec. 1, co-founded Immunex in 1981 before moving on to help start Icos in 1989 and Dendreon in 1995. He stepped down as CEO of Dendreon at the beginning of 2003. Those companies are best-known for developing drugs for autoimmune diseases (Immunex’s Enbrel); erectile dysfunction (Icos and Eli Lilly’s Cialis); and prostate cancer (Dendreon’s Provenge). While Henney played a key role in building all three companies, the FDA approvals of all those products came years after he left.

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Immunoids, and friends of Immunoids, listen up. Come December, it will be 10 years since Immunex agreed to be acquired by Amgen. I figure it’s the perfect time to reunite the people who lived through the exhilarating, and sometimes terrifying, experience of building Seattle’s first major biotech company.

So I’m super-psyched to say that we are bringing together a dream team of Immunex alumni for Xconomy’s next big event in Seattle, called “The Immunex Impact” on December 1.

Here are the confirmed speakers who will be there to tell a few war stories from their Immunex days, and to connect with lots of friends old and new:

—Steve Gillis, Immunex co-founder, now managing director, Arch Venture Partners

—Christopher Henney, Immunex co-founder, now chairman and interim CEO, Oncothyreon

—Doug Williams, Immunex chief technology officer, now executive vice president of R&D, Biogen Idec

—Stewart Parker, Immunex’s first employee, now CEO, Infectious Disease Research Institute

—Steve Graham, Immunex’s longtime corporate attorney, now co-chair of life sciences, Fenwick & West

—Janis Wignall, Immunex scientist and science education leader, now a consultant

—Dave Urdal, Immunex president of manufacturing, now chief scientific officer, Dendreon

I plan to make sure the speeches are short and sweet, leaving plenty of time for what this event is really about. It’s a chance to connect and re-connect with the Immunex network that continues to make a big impact on Seattle biotech every day.

Steve Gillis

This event will be from 6 pm to 8:30 pm on December 1 at the Institute for Systems Biology’s new headquarters in South Lake Union. ISB president Lee Hood (not a co-founder of Immunex, but a biotech industry godfather nonetheless) is planning to provide some opening remarks. I’m going to encourage him to reminisce a bit about what he was doing in 1981 when this whole biotech business started really taking off.

As if you couldn’t already tell, I’m chomping at the bit to get this event started. To get your tickets, check out the new “Immunex Impact” registration page here. See you there at the ISB on December 1.

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The writing was on the wall at Dendreon for weeks, but that didn’t make the bad news of layoffs any easier to stomach.

—Seattle-based Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN) said this past week that it is cutting 500 jobs, including about 100 locally, as it seeks to conserve cash in the wake of its sales and marketing stumble. Nothing much more to say other than this hurts those people, especially in a tough job market.

—The new head of global health over at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation was named this week, and it’s Trevor Mundel. He’s a former Novartis executive, so his pedigree is similar to that of his predecessor Tachi Yamada, who now works in venture capital with Frazier Healthcare Ventures.

—A couple of sizable financings crossed my desk this week. Seattle-based Theraclone Sciences, the company working to discover new antibody drugs, raised another $10.6 million. And across the lake, Bellevue, WA-based RF Surgical pulled in $12 million for its technology that’s supposed to help surgeons avoid leaving behind sponges inside patients.

—Remember Bothell, WA-based Liposonix, the developer of the ultrasound body sculpting machine? It has been pretty quiet in the three years since it was acquired by Scottsdale, AZ-based Medicis Pharmaceutical for $150 million. But now Liposonix has a new corporate parent in Hayward, CA-based Solta Medical, which paid $35 million in upfront cash and near-term milestones to see what it can do with this technology.

—Seattle-based VentiRx Pharmaceuticals is now just that, Seattle-based. The company said it is closing down its San Diego operations and consolidating its work here around an immune-boosting compound for cancer. Co-founder Rob Hershberg has moved up to the role of president, and remains the chief medical officer.

—This week in BioBeat I tried to show what biotech pros are missing by avoiding the daily conversation on Twitter. So far, at least one local CEO, PhaseRx’s Bob Overell, agreed to give it a shot, and you can follow his comments at @Robert_Overell on Twitter. If there’s more interest among our readers, I might be willing to help with a free Twitter tutorial at one of the local coffee shops. Ping me the old-fashioned way—ltimmerman@xconomy.com—if you’re interested.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) said this week that CEO Bob Kirkman is taking a temporary medical leave of absence, and will be replaced on an interim basis by chairman Christopher Henney. Kirkman is expected to return to work in the fourth quarter, a company spokeswoman says.

—Lastly, Bob Nelsen of Arch Venture Partners unloaded on the elected officials in Washington D.C. who voted in favor of a patent reform bill that he says will hurt the little guy inventors out there. There’s a really good thread of comments at the bottom of this post, which I’d encourage you to check if you haven’t already.

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[Updated: 10:28 am PT] Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) is getting some new executive leadership, at least for a while, anyway.

CEO Bob Kirkman is taking what the company calls a “temporary medical leave of absence,” starting Monday, Sept. 12, according to a regulatory filing. While Kirkman is away, chairman Chris Henney will step in to take Kirkman’s place, according to the regulatory filing. The company didn’t say what kind of medical issue Kirkman is dealing with, or how long the leave of absence might last.

[Updated comment from company]. Kirkman is expected to return to Oncothyreon sometime in the fourth quarter of 2011, says Julie Rathbun, a spokeswoman for the company. The company isn’t disclosing Kirkman’s diagnosis out of respect for his privacy, she says.

Henney, who turns 70 this year, is well known as the co-founder of three of Seattle’s biggest biotech successes—Immunex, Icos, and Dendreon. The idea at Oncothyreon (on-koh-THEAR-ee-on) is similar in concept to what is being pursued at Dendreon. Oncothyreon is seeking to stimulate a patient’s immune system against cancer through a product known as Stimuvax. That drug is being developed in partnership with Germany-based Merck KGaA, and is expected to generate interim results from a pivotal lung cancer trial in the first quarter of 2012. Oncothyreon also has another cancer drug in its pipeline at an earlier stage of development.

Kirkman, who was listed at age 62 in the company’s most recent proxy filing, has been Oncothyreon’s CEO since September 2006. He previously worked at Seattle-based Xcyte Therapies, where Henney was also a member of the board.

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We had a grab bag of life sciences-related coverage this week, with a big device company acquisition, some wild ideas for global health, and a whole lot of focus on biofuels.

—Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers never has done much investing in the Northwest from what I can tell, but this week I came across a quiet company in South Lake Union that the fabled VC firm built to help convert organic waste into clean-burning natural gas. The big idea at this company, called Harvest Power, is to develop what you could call a giant concrete stomach.

—While biofuel entrepreneurs are brimming with enthusiasm about weaning the world off fossil fuels, I thought it would be helpful to get a bit of a reality check from a top local scientist who’s been thinking hard about this problem—Nitin Baliga of the Institute for Systems Biology. Baliga will also provide some brief welcoming remarks at the next Xconomy Seattle event on May 19, titled “Separating Hype from Reality in Alternative Fuels.”

—This week, I spent a fair bit of time recruiting new speakers to flesh out the agenda for the event mentioned above. The new additions, who will each provide 4-minute “burst” talks about their approach to alternative fuels, are Kelly Ogilvie of Blue Marble Energy, Hoby Douglass of General Biodiesel, and Jeff Surma of S4 Energy Solutions.

—Seattle-based Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN) came out with its first-quarter earnings report, and there were no big surprises. The company hit its forecast for sales in the first three months, has started scaling up sales in April now that it has more available manufacturing capacity, and reiterated that it plans to sell $350 million to $400 million worth of sipuleucel-T (Provenge) for prostate cancer patients in 2011.

—One of the big dreams in biofuels is that someday we’ll have open ponds in the desert, full of fast-dividing algae that are genetically modified to spit out the maximal amount of oil. Ned David of Arch Venture Partners has pushed that idea forward as a co-founder of Sapphire Energy, but a couple years into that endeavor, he realized he needed to capture a whole heck of a lot of carbon dioxide from the air in order to feed the algae at companies like Sapphire. The result is his latest startup, Kilimanjaro Energy, which I profiled this week.

—Seattle Genetics (NASDAQ: SGEN) got a big date to circle on the calendar—August 30. That’s when the FDA has agreed to complete its review of the company’s application to start marketing brentuximab vedotin (SGN-35) in the U.S. The agency agreed to a faster-than-usual six-month review schedule for this drug because of its groundbreaking potential against a couple deadly forms of cancer.

—The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has taken some flack for its approach to funding big science ideas in the past, which some contended was too heavily weighted toward big-money, long-term projects. The foundation has sought ways to make a bigger impact by tilting more of its research portfolio to really early-stage, out-of-the-box proposals that get $100,000 to sink or swim, which discovery director Chris Wilson explained in our interview.

—Considering a career in biotech? I’m not so sure it’s a good idea to encourage young people to dive in, as you can see in this week’s BioBeat. The action is clearly in computer science, and unless something pretty dramatic happens in government research funding, or pharma/biotech business models, it looks like it will stay that way for quite some time.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) pulled in more than $40 million in a new stock financing. This will provide a lot more fuel for the company to pursue development of the cancer drugs in its pipeline other than Stimuvax, the immune-booster that is being developed in partnership with Merck KGaA.

—GE Healthcare made a pretty sizable acquisition last week when it took over Issaquah, WA-based Applied Precision. The local operation, which has 130 employees, makes super high resolution microscopes with software and data visualization tools for biomedical researchers.

—Lastly, Vancouver, BC-based Indel Therapeutics reported that it raised $1.4 million in a Series B financing to support its development of new antibiotics. Things have been pretty quiet lately on the financing front—makes me wonder if there are some big ones in the works.

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Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) said today it has raised $40 million by selling 10 million new shares at $4 apiece. The underwriters of the deal, Cowen & Co and Wedbush PacGrow Life Sciences, have a 30-day option to purchase more shares, which could bring in another $6 million to the company. Oncothyreon said the cash will be used to support Oncothyreon’s experimental cancer drug PX-866, and ONT-10, an immune-boosting compound for fighting cancer. Stimuvax, its best-known program in the final stage of clinical trials against cancer, is supported through a partnership with Merck KGaA.

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Lots of little blurbs crossed the desk this week, along with one major blowup for a drug in the third and final stage of clinical trials.

—Seattle-based Omeros (NASDAQ: OMER) said it failed in a series of pivotal clinical trials with its anti-inflammatory drug to help patients undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery. The trials, which enrolled more than 1,000 patients from 2004 through 2010, were a big reason investors bought into the Omeros IPO of October 2009. The stock is down 39 percent since the news broke.

—An individual shareholder in Kansas kicked up a debate online after calling for a boardroom shakeup at Seattle-based Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN). Brad Loncar accused the company of failing to properly look out for the interests of small shareholders, and encouraged fellow readers of a popular stock message board, InvestorVillage.com, to urge the company to add one or two new board members to represent those interests. Loncar says he has received some support in his effort, along with plenty of vocal criticism.

—Bothell, WA-based Halosource, the maker of technology for purifying drinking water in the developing world, introduced three new products that consumers use at home. These are powered-water pitchers, or a gravity-based water container that use Halosource’s technology for killing viruses and bacteria. The company made its initial inroads into developing world markets by selling a replaceable cartridge with its technology that works with devices made by other companies.

—Vancouver, BC-based Tekmira Pharmaceuticals made headlines a few weeks ago when it accused its partner, Cambridge, MA-based Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: ALNY) of misappropriating trade secrets related to the delivery of RNA interference drugs into cells. Now Alnylam has formally responded to the allegation in court, saying it plans to fully defend itself.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) said this week it has started a mid-stage clinical trial of drug for brain cancer, PX-866, which is designed to work against one of the high-profile molecular targets in cancer biology—the PI3 kinase. The study is enrolling 30 patients at seven sites in Canada.

—This week’s BioBeat column was about antibiotics, and why more biotech entrepreneurs should take this field seriously. I listed a few promising companies I’ve covered in this business all over the country, but couldn’t think of a single example of an antibiotics company from Seattle. If any readers out there have an idea why that is—or can alert me to some promising company I overlooked—please enlighten me at ltimmerman@xconomy.com.

—The University of Washington’s Center for Commercialization said last week it has added five new people to its roster of entrepreneurs-in-residence, who scout for university technologies with business potential. Ron Berenson, the former CEO of HemaQuest Pharmaceuticals, and Stephanie Amoss, formerly of Pathway Medical Technologies, are a couple of the new additions with expertise in biotech and medical devices, respectively.

—Bothell, WA-based AVI Biopharma (NASDAQ: AVII) said it has raised $30 million through a stock offering. The company followed up a few days later to say its underwriters exercised their options to buy extra shares, meaning that AVI netted about $32 million after paying expenses. AVI said previously that it entered this year with about $34 million of cash in the bank, and a plan to spend about $23 million to $28 million of its cash on operations.

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Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY), the Seattle-based cancer drug developer, said today it has begun a mid-stage clinical trial for patients with relapsed forms of brain cancer—glioblastoma multiforme. The company is testing whether its treatment, PX-866, is able to help shrink tumors in about 30 patients at seven clinical sites in Canada. The drug is designed to block the activity of the PI3 kinase, one of the hot targets in cancer biology.

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My favorite team, the Green Bay Packers, won the Super Bowl on Sunday. So it’s kind of amazing I was able to concentrate on work at all this week. I’m beginning to think there’s a Green & Gold glow coming out of my skin, as a matter of fact.

—Seattle-based Dendreon (NASDAQ: DNDN) tacked on another $80 million to its convertible debt financing announced just after the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference last month. The company expects to net about $607 million under the deal, now that underwriters have exercised their options to buy extra shares to cover over-allotments.

—Amgen (NASDAQ: AMGN) gets lots of attention for its new drug for bone loss, denosumab, but it has another lesser-known drug called AMG785 working through the pipeline that could give the company a one-two punch against bone loss. This story traces its roots to work in Seattle by antibody drug expert John Latham, who did some critical early work for Celltech R&D in Bothell, WA, which is now part of Belgium-based UCB. Latham is now the chief scientific officer of Bothell, WA-based Alder Biopharmaceuticals.

—Redmond, WA-based Mobisante had big news this week as it won FDA clearance to start marketing the first platform that puts ultrasound technology on a smartphone. CEO Sailesh Chutani plans to market this low-cost system to community and rural health clinics in the U.S. that can’t afford today’s handheld ultrasound machines, and eventually plans to lower the cost even more to take this diagnostic tool into developing countries.

—NanoString Technologies, the Seattle-based maker of a digital machine for genetic analysis, said it has hired a new chief medical officer away from Redwood City, CA-based Genomic Health, one of the few success stories in molecular diagnostics. This time, Wayne Cowens says at NanoString he wants to incorporate health economic data into the clinical plan from the get-go, to make sure NanoString’s diagnostic applications can win over both skeptical doctors and payers.

—The Seattle-based Institute for Systems Biology said it has formed a three-year research collaboration with consumer products giant Procter & Gamble to study systems biology of the skin. P&G is interested in skin care, and ISB is interested in skin diseases.

—We had a great conversation Monday at a sold-out Xconomy event titled “Computing in the Age of the $1,000 Genome.” Lee Hood, Bob Nelsen, Cliff Reid, and Eric Schadt joined an all-star cast of speakers talking about the technical, and cultural, challenges ahead as genome sequencing gets ever faster and cheaper. You can check out a few photos here, and links to the members of the audience who kept a running commentary going on the event via their Twitter accounts.

—Geospiza, the Seattle-based maker of genetic analysis software, said it has pulled in a $1.2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study differences in DNA between cancerous and healthy tissues. The company is sharing the grant with collaborators at Weill Cornell Medical College, and the Mayo Clinic.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) said it has secured a $12.5 million loan from GE Capital to help pay for its mid-stage clinical trials. The company drew an initial $5 million this week, and can take the rest later in the year.

—Redmond, WA-based Physio-Control struck an alliance with San Diego-based BeneChill to market a technology in Europe which cools down the brain in emergency cardiac arrest situations. The hope is that this system will be able to save a few minutes to help doctors ward off brain damage.

—The Life Sciences Discovery Fund announced a new round of grant recipients, who pulled in a collective $600,000. University of Washington researcher Patrick Stayton, and Christopher Bernards of Benaroya Research Institute were among the recipients.

—Seattle Genetics (NASDAQ: SGEN) said it raised the last installment of a financing that will bring in $178 million into the company’s coffers. Counting on that new infusion, the company now expects to close out this year with about $280 million in the bank, down slightly from the $295 million it started this year with.

—Rowan Chapman of Mohr Davidow Ventures, a former Rosetta Inpharmatics employee, talked about how she sees business models improving for new diagnostic companies in the era of faster/cheaper gene sequencing. This ran as a bit of a preview to Rowan’s appearance at the $1,000 Genome event on Monday.

—Susannah Malarkey of the Technology Alliance offered up this guest post about how “it’s fashionable to be early” if you’re a high-tech startup seeking angel financing. She drew that conclusion after the Tech Alliance’s Innovation Showcase event, which highlighted a number of small early stage life sciences companies from the Northwest.

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Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) said today it has secured a $12.5 million loan from GE Capital Healthcare Financial Services. The company drew $5 million from the loan this week, and can receive the rest anytime before Nov. 1, as long as it hits certain milestones. Oncothyreon said it plans to use the money to run mid-stage clinical trials, particularly of PX-866, a drug that blocks the PI3 kinase pathway involved in tumor growth and proliferation.

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This was the week that one of the mainstays of Seattle biotech, after a dozen years, confirmed that it has developed its first drug with real commercial legs.

—Seattle Genetics (NASDAQ: SGEN), the company mentioned above, released some truly remarkable data from the pivotal trial of its “empowered antibody” for Hodgkin’s disease. This drug, brentuximab vedotin, only needed to help shrink tumors in about 30 percent of patients who were the sickest of sick, in order to be good enough for the company to seek FDA approval. The drug completely or partially shrank tumors in 75 percent of the patients, with mild side effects like those seen in early clinical trials. The trial design was cleared in advance by the FDA, so Seattle Genetics is now on an all-out push to seek FDA clearance to start marketing this drug sometime in the first half of 2011.

—The same morning as the big news from Seattle Genetics, Acucela had an interesting new deal to talk about with its Japan-based partner, Otsuka Pharmaceutical. Under this deal, Seattle-based Acucela has obtained the option to co-develop and co-promote a new drug from Otsuka for glaucoma, a leading cause of blindness. Acucela will pay nothing upfront, and Otsuka will essentially hire Acucela to run the early clinical development, which means that Acucela will continue to be that rarest of birds—a profitable biotech company with no marketed products.

—Here’s some good news for melanoma patients, but which might carry a bittersweet aftertaste for the shareholders and employees of Seattle-based ZymoGenetics. One of Zymo’s experimental drugs, IL-21 for metastatic melanoma, helped some very sick patients live an impressive median time of 12.4 months in a clinical trial of 40 patients. This is one of the lesser-known assets that Bristol-Myers Squibb will be scooping up if it can complete its acquisition of ZymoGenetics (NASDAQ: ZGEN) for $9.75 a share, or about $885 million.

—Calistoga Pharmaceuticals had what looked like a run-of-the-mill personnel announcement this week, but which actually could be a sign of interesting things to come. Calistoga hired a seasoned public company chief financial officer, Andrew Guggenhime, to be its new finance chief. CEO Carol Gallagher has said in the past that she’s laying the groundwork for a potential IPO, and if Calistoga follows through with this, it will need someone with a Wall Street Rolodex like Guggenhime’s to gin up some demand for its shares.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) fortified its balance sheet last Friday when it announced it had raised $14.9 million to support its cancer drug development programs.

—Lastly, we found an interesting Seattle biotech connection to one of the companies we cover in Michigan. Kalamazoo, MI-based Pronai Therapeutics, a developer of DNA interference drugs, is leaning on technology from Bothell, WA-based Marina Biotech (NASDAQ: MRNA) to deliver its DNA-silencing drugs where they need to go inside cells.

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Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY), the Seattle-based developer of cancer drugs, said today it has raised $14.9 million through a private placement transaction. The company sold 4.24 million securities units (a combination of common stock and warrants) at $3.50 apiece. That represents a 7.2 percent discount to the 30-day trailing average stock price, Oncothyreon said. JMP Securities led the deal, and Roth Capital Partners served as the co-agent.

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Some say the days when venture capitalists could bet big on risky, world-changing companies like Google and Genentech are in the past. The prolonged sluggish period in the U.S. economy has taken a toll, and an estimated one-third to one-half of all venture funds are thought to be slowly going out of business. Many VC firms that remain are relegated to propping up dogs in their existing portfolios, or gravitating toward supposedly safer late-stage investments. Others are making smaller, “micro VC” bets on earlier-stage startups (mostly in tech).

So if VCs are turning gun shy, and this is truly a permanent change in the investment landscape, who will step up to support the most groundbreaking ideas in information technology, life sciences, and clean energy for the 21st century? How will the changing reality of venture capital alter the always-delicate power balance between financiers and entrepreneurs?

We at Xconomy make it our business to dig deep into questions like this in our local communities, and to convene some of the region’s brightest and most respected business leaders to seek real answers. That’s why I’m thrilled to announce a blockbuster event we are organizing here at Xconomy Seattle on the evening of October 28.

This special forum, which we are calling “VC Crossfire,” will gather four of the Northwest’s most successful and candid leaders across the spectrum of IT, life sciences, and clean energy. The conversation will feature Bob Nelsen of Arch Venture Partners, Tom Alberg of Madrona Venture Group, Martin Tobias of Tippr, and Christopher Henney, the chairman of Oncothyreon and the co-founder of Immunex, Icos, and Dendreon. Xconomy’s national technology and life sciences editors (Greg Huang and yours truly) will ask the hard questions of these speakers and invite you to join the conversation. This event will be held in the heart of Seattle’s fast-growing innovation hub in South Lake Union, at Amazon’s new headquarters.

Space is limited, and we anticipate that tickets will get snapped up fast. So if you want to attend, it’s a good idea to get tickets sooner rather than later. I’m personally really excited about this event, and to hear what the speakers and the audience have to say about this important subject. See all the details on how to register. We look forward to seeing many of you there on October 28.

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For the second month in a row we’re compiling all recent Seattle-area tech and biotech deals—”under the radar” and otherwise—into one comprehensive overview of all financings for the month. As always, the information is based on data provided by our partner, New York-based private company intelligence platform CB Insights, and our own prior coverage. And just as in June, the July data shows a clear trend: the majority of the local venture and angel-backed investments are going to the healthcare sector, which includes biotech.

Of the 17 deals Washington companies saw over the month of June, seven of them were in the healthcare sector, amounting to $62.5 million of the $81.7 million invested overall.  Compare this to the $104.3 million raked in locally in June, of which biotech companies nabbed $41.1 million, and it’s easy to see that the healthcare sector is leading in terms of regional financings. But whereas the energy and utilities and computer hardware and services sectors trailed close behind healthcare in June, no other sector was even close to bringing in the same amount of funding in July. The electronics sector trailed far behind with $5.8 million in financing, and the business products and services sector was close to follow with deals totaling $5.4 million.

The Internet sector came in fourth with $4 million in financing. (The Northwest Open Access Network did nab $54.5 million in federal stimulus money to expand high-speed broadband service across Washington state, but as this is grant money and not investment financing, it is not included on the list). Software took fifth place, with $2 million, and the mobile and telecommunications sector took a distant sixth place with $1.3 million in funding.

Perhaps the most shocking result has to do with the energy and utilities sector, which only brought in $0.69 million in July—the only sector to drop below the million-dollar mark—compared to the $35.8 million they raked in back in June. The computer hardware and services, risk and security, industrial, automotive and transportation, and gaming sectors brought in no funding at all in July.

We reported on a number of the larger deals that came through in July, including the $32 million Seattle-based Immune Design raised in Series B funding for the development of a new generation of vaccines. This deal, the second-largest venture deal in Washington state this year so far (behind the $40 million nabbed by Seattle-based Calistoga Pharmaceuticals in June) is just another indication of the healthcare sector’s leading role in Washington state investments. Further evidence: Uptake Medical’s $17.5 million investment for the sale of its emphysema treatment device, and Integrated Diagnostics $10 million deal, the second of its three-part, $30 million Series A.

On the tech side, contact-organizing software developer Gist raised an additional $4 million from Vulcan Capital and the Foundry Group. There were also a few interesting deals you may not have heard of, including a $690,000 round of equity that Seattle-based General Biodiesel, one of the first cleantech companies to set up shop at the McKinstry Innovation Center, brought in.

Here’s the full list of July’s equity-based deals, both under the radar and on it:

July also saw a few startups raising cash through deals based on debt, options, and/or warrants, rather than equity, including mobile software company Dashwire, which brought in over $515,000 in July from an undisclosed investor. (CEO Ford Davidson says the mobile app space is a “market that’s on fire.”) Those seven transactions, worth a combined $14.5 million, are listed below.

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This being a short holiday week, the Seattle biotech roundup is short and sweet.

—Seattle-based online retail giant Amazon has been pushing hard for a few years to become the leader in cloud computing, which has enabled a generation of tech startups to run their businesses with less startup capital. But it’s only recently been picking up steam with biology labs that are generating massive amounts of data from next-generation gene sequencing machines. Amazon’s Deepak Singh talked about the strategy and, and how Amazon has sought to customize the service to biotech customers, in this national exclusive.

—Seattle-based Uptake Medical, the developer of a catheter-based device to treat emphysema, nailed down a Series B venture round worth a cool $17.5 million. The company’s system uses hot water vapor to seal off damaged parts of the lung where air can get trapped, making it difficult to breathe. The cash will go toward winning approval in Europe, marketing in countries outside the U.S., and to help Uptake do what it takes to win FDA approval.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY), the developer of cancer drugs, said it has lined up a financing arrangement in which it could raise as much as $20 million over time from Small Cap Biotech Value.

—Bothell, WA-based CMC Icos Biologics made news in the summer of 2008 when it rolled out a bold expansion plan, which it had to shelve when the financial crisis struck. But CMC Icos, the contract manufacturer of biotech drugs, has apparently weathered the storm. It has grown from about 130 employees in January 2009 to about 175 today.

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Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) said today it has secured a line of equity financing in which it may sell as much as $20 million worth of new common stock to Small Cap Biotech Value. Oncothyreon said it will determine the timing and dollar amounts of the stock sales, and it is not obligated to use the new financing vehicle. Oncothyreon was stung earlier this year by an unexpected adverse event that stalled development of Stimuvax, an immune booster for cancer being developed by its partner Merck KGaA, although it received some relief last month when two of the three major Stimuvax trials were given the green light to resume.

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Summertime may be officially here, but we are a long way from the dog days. This week, the Seattle biotech desk had reports on cancer drugs, drug discovery tools, and antibiotics, as well as a few sharp guest editorials.

—Seattle Genetics (NASDAQ: SGEN) has generated a lot of buzz about its drug candidate, an “empowered antibody” for Hodgkin’s disease. But a lesser-known drug candidate, a more traditional “naked” antibody that hits tumor cells without packing an extra toxic payload, is also nearing a key turning point in which the company will learn whether it can help leukemia patients live longer.

—Quite a bit has happened in the last few months at Presage Biosciences, a Seattle-based spinoff from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. The company topped off a $4 million angel investment round, hired a new CEO, and has found a couple paying customers from Big Pharma that are using its technology to help sift out the winners from the losers in cancer drug development.

—Gilead Sciences (NASDAQ: GILD), the Foster City, CA-based company with significant operations in Seattle, said that its inhalable antibiotic for cystic fibrosis beat a competing drug from Novartis in a head-to-head study. This trial compared patients who mostly had three prior cycles of the Novartis drug and who were getting a fourth round, or a new round of the Gilead drug. The Gilead drug, originally developed by Corus Pharma in Seattle, won FDA approval in February.

—Seattle-based Oncothyreon (NASDAQ: ONTY) was able to breathe a sigh of relief late last week. The company said its partner, Germany-based Merck KGaA, was cleared to re-start two of three pivotal trials of an immune-boosting treatment for cancer called Stimuvax that was first developed at Oncothyreon.

—A familiar face to many local biotechies, Tom Ranken, is taking on a new challenge as the first full-time CEO of the Washington Clean Technology Alliance. This may seem like déjà vu for Ranken, who in the mid-90s, took the helm of a loosely affiliated trade association at the time, the Washington Biotechnology & Biomedical Association, and made it into a much bigger organization with more impact for the local life sciences industry.

—The Vancouver, BC, biotech cluster had a big financing to report last week. Aquinox Pharmaceuticals pocketed $25 million in a Series B venture round to advance its drug candidates against cancer and inflammatory diseases.

—We had a flurry of guest editorials built around life sciences themes. The first was from Thong Le of WRF Capital, who contends that Silicon Valley needs to invest in truly innovative people and companies if it wants to be a more stable hub. Next was a piece from Dan Vorhaus, well known as @genomicslawyer on Twitter, with a piece on how consumer genetics needs more transparency instead of heavy-handed regulation. And, we had a post from WBBA chief Chris Rivera on how biotech must have more capital, more talent, and predictable regulations to thrive. Thanks to all for your contributions, and anyone else who wants to chime in, shoot me a note at ltimmerman@xconomy.com.

—Last, but not least, we had some good news around the Xconomy Seattle office this week. I’m happy to introduce our newest team member, Thea Chard, who is covering all kinds of technology here in the Northwest. She is replacing the co-founder of this bureau, Greg Huang, who is moving to run Xconomy’s editorial shop in Boston. Greg will continue to cover national themes in IT, so his byline will still appear from time to time on these pages.

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Oncothyreon can breathe a sigh of relief. The Seattle-based developer of cancer treatments (NASDAQ: ONTY) said today its partner, Germany-based Merck KGaA, has been cleared to re-start clinical trials of an immune-boosting therapy after trials were halted earlier this year when a patient developed an unexpected inflammation of the brain.

The German-based Merck got clearance from the FDA and local ethics review boards to resume two of three large pivotal trials, after the case of encephalitis appeared in March in a separate exploratory study, forcing all three pivotal trials to go on hold until researchers could figure out whether it was really safe to continue. The FDA hold applied to two lung cancer trials known as Start and Inspire as well as a breast cancer study called Stride; the breast cancer trial remains on hold, while the lung cancer trials are resuming, Oncothyreon said. The three trials, all of which involve the BLP25 liposomal vaccine (Stimuvax), include a combined 2,600 patients.

“The resumption of the BLP25 liposome vaccine clinical program is very good news for the oncology community and non-small cell lung cancer patients. If the Start and Inspire Phase III trials are successful, BLP25 liposome vaccine could play an important role in the treatment of these currently underserved patients,” said Dr. Frances Shepherd, director of the Medical Oncology Princess Margaret Hospital in Toronto, Canada, and an investigator of the Start trial, in an Oncothyreon statement.

Oncothyreon has no marketed products, but it has other cancer drugs in its pipeline besides the BLP25-based immune booster. Even though its partner is primarily responsible for the development of this program, and Oncothyreon just stands to collect royalties on product sales if the treatment is successful, it still accounts for a large portion of the value investors assign to the company. That’s partly because of renewed interest in immune-based therapies for cancer, as investors seek the next home-run opportunity following the success of Seattle-based Dendreon.

So, Oncothyreon (on-KOH-thear-ee-on) saw its stock go up today. Shares climbed by about 15 percent to $4.15 at 10 am Eastern time.

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