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NetScientific buoyed by Vortex’s tech endorsement

Published: 09:25 31 Mar 2017 EDT

Netscientific has its thumbs in a few clinical pies
Netscientific has its thumbs in various clinical pies

Healthcare and biomedical investor NetScientific plc  (LON:NSCI) is making considerable strides in 2017.

The firm commercialises intellectual property (IP) through developing early and mid-stage healthcare firms focused on diagnostics and digital health.

The big  players in its portfolio are Wanda, Vortex Biosciences, Glycotest and ProAxsis.

Vortex in focus..

In focus and growing over the  last year have been Vortex - a California based cancer circulating cells specialist and Wanda - an analytics software group, whose aim is to reduce US hospital admissions.

Recent big news has centred around the  former, Vortex, in which Netscientific has pumped in over £13mln and owns 95%.

Last month begun the milestone commercial launch of its VTX1 Liquid Biopsy System - the first time Netscientific has been able to market a cancer diagnostic instrument.

The tech offers a breakthrough in early cancer detection in that it is able to collect circulating tumour cells (CTC) from the bloodstream that provide the tell-tale sign of the killer disease.

François Martelet, NetScientific's chief executive and  chairman of Vortex said: "We believe that CTC technology will increasingly feature in ground-breaking work to enhance our understanding of cancer."

This belief has been backed up by recent  research papers. One lauds its use to capture CTCs in a preliminary step to performing a single-CTC Western blot test by researchers at three US universities.

Such a test is often used as a follow-up to confirm the presence of an antibody to help diagnosis.

Meanwhile, data to be presented at the American Association for Cancer Research  will demonstrate its use to collect  populations of CTCs for colorectal cancer, non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), breast cancer and drug testing research.

Vortex has registered a Class I medical device with the US FDA (Food and Drug Administration) and established a CE Mark for the proprietary technology.

At ProAxis

At ProAxsis last November, its medical diagnostics company, the firm successfully registered a CE Mark for its novel ProteaseTag Active Neutrophil Elastase Immunoassay, allowing it to proceed to the commercialisation stage of its biochemical test in the European Union.

At Glycotest

Glycotest is a US-based liver diagnostics company seeking to commercialise new and unique blood tests for life threatening liver cancers and fibrosis-cirrhosis with exclusive worldwide rights to more than 50 patent-protected serum protein biomarkers.

A clinical study of its lead product, HCC Panel, has shown the product’s ability to detect early-stage liver cancer significantly better than the alpha-fetoprotein blood test, which is the current standard in healthcare.

At Wanda

Wanda is a San Francisco-based digital health company, which has developed a way to digitally monitor people with congestive heart failure and other chronic conditions, so that specialists can monitor risk and lower readmissions.

The latter is significant because in the US the system means hospitals have to pay when patents are discharged then re-admitted.

Last year it signed a contract with a leading US high-tech home nursing and therapy services agency, Health Resource Solutions (HRS), for the use of its chronic condition management product.

It also signed a collaborative agreement with the fifth largest health provider organisation in the US, Dignity Health, to launch its new oncology platform, Oncoverse.

The platform allows clinicians to work together to establish the most effective treatment plan and helps to reduce administration costs.

The firm has also launched myWanda, the only mobile application specifically aimed at empowering women to improve the health of their hearts.

At PDS Biotechnology

At the tail end of 2016, Netscientific upped its stake in another of its firms -  PDS Biotechnology -  to 14.6%.

This is  a developer of cancer immunotherapies ( an area of medicine attracting much excitement) and vaccines for infectious diseases by exercising warrants for 1.39mln shares. It has now put US$3.5ln into PDS.

Its cancer treatment pipeline includes compounds for prostate, ovarian, breast and colorectal cancers, in addition to its lead PDS0101 programme for several HPV-related cancers – HPV, or human papillomavirus, being a virus that infects the skin and the cells lining body cavities.

PDS has positive phase I/IIa trial data under its belt and, significantly, has agreed partnership funding from the National Institute of Health and MD Anderson for three phase II clinical trials.

NetScientific portfolio company PDS Biotechnology to advance lead candidate...

Frank Bedu-Addo, president and CEO of PDS Biotechnology Corporation (NASDAQ:PDSB), a NetScientific PLC (AIM:NSCI) portfolio company, tells Proactive's Stephen Gunnion that a recent US$35mln debt financing agreement provides the financial resources necessary to advance the company's clinical...

on 09/20/2022