First day of Dealings and Admission to AIM

The Board of Directors of Retroscreen, the viral challenge and “Virometrics” specialist, is pleased to announce the Company’s admission to the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange and the commencement of dealings in its Ordinary Shares on AIM at 8.00am today. The Company’s ticker symbol is “RVG” and the ISIN number of the Ordinary Shares is GB00B6ZM0X53.

The Company has raised gross proceeds of GBP15.0 million in a placing of 18,750,000 Ordinary Shares at 80 pence per share. On the basis of 40,976,920 Ordinary Shares being admitted to trading on AIM, and the Placing Price, the market capitalisation of the Company at Admission will be approximately GBP32.8 million.

Highlights

- Retroscreen is a virology healthcare business that provides clinical services, focused on the Viral Challenge Model (“VCM”), and pre-clinical analytical services primarily to large, global pharmaceutical companies and biotechnology organisations.

- The Group has grown and developed the VCM for evidencing the efficacy of antiviral and viral therapeutics in RSV, flu and cold. As the business develops, it intends to expand into adjacent clinical areas, such as asthma. It also intends to leverage “Virometrics”, harvesting the potential of its research for the discovery and creation of proprietary intellectual property.

- Admission to AIM with a market capitalisation of approximately GBP32.8 million.

- The Company has raised gross proceeds of GBP15.0 million, including GBP2.4 million from existing shareholders, Directors and employees, via the placing of 18,750,000 Ordinary Shares at 80 pence per share; net proceeds raised of GBP14.0m.

- A further GBP2.4 million, before expenses, has been raised for selling shareholders via a placing of existing shares at the Placing Price.

- Proceeds are to be used to invest in infrastructure, facilities and personnel, to allow the Group to pursue its development strategy and as general working capital to fund the Group’s 2012 and 2013 pipeline.

Commenting today, Kym Denny, CEO of Retroscreen, said: “I am delighted that Retroscreen has today joined AIM and I would like to welcome all our new shareholders to the Company. It is a very exciting day for Retroscreen, and one which we believe will be transformational for the development of the business. We are all looking forward to developing the unique Retroscreen model and growing the business as a public company alongside our existing and new shareholders.”

Conformetrix CEO Sam Williams said NMR is not typically used to determine 3D structures of small molecules because, according to dogma, molecules in solution aren’t in the same conformation as when they are bound to a target. Williams said the most common first option is to use computational chemistry. “Computational chemistry gives you an estimate of a compound’s bioactive conformation, but it is just an estimate,” he said.

The gold standard for determining the bioactive conformation of a compound is X-ray co-crystallography of the compound bound to its target. But co-crystallography can take 6-18 months to generate a structure, and it does not always work with targets like GPCRs and ion channels, according to Williams.

Conformetrix’s co-founders, CTO Andrew Almond and CSO Charles Blundell, took a different approach to thinking about data generated by traditional NMR. “It is very esoteric, about bond angles and how bonds relate to each other,” Williams said. “And then they completely rewrote all the software for analyzing NMR data.” The result is that Conformetrix can run standard NMR data through its analysis system and generate a compound’s 3D structure as accurately as X-ray co-crystallography.

Williams said the company has generated the conformations of “many compounds,” and all match structures previously determined by co-crystallography. “There are tiny differences with cocrystallography, but we are within the error margins of the crystal structures themselves, and that hasn’t been seen before with any other technology,” he said. Williams said the company has publications in process. One case study on the company’s website compares 3D structures of lisinopril, a generic angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitor. The compound’s bioactive
conformation as determined by Conformetrix’s technology was statistically identical to the shape determined by co-crystallography.

By contrast, published conformations determined by conventional NMR and X-ray crystallography of the unbound compound, as well as conformations determined by Conformetrix using a “standard industry computational chemistry software program,” contained significant deviations from the co-crystallography gold standard. “No one is going to replace X-ray co-crystallography as a gold standard for looking at the structures of co-bound targets and ligands, but if it’s just the ligand structure you need, we can generate precise conformations of ligands in their bound state very quickly,” Williams said.

Williams said Conformetrix’s technology has two main uses in drug development. The first is when a medicinal chemist has developed a series of compounds, has a hypothesis about their conformations and wants to modify them to improve binding. The second is to design compounds against targets that are difficult or impossible to analyze with X-ray crystallography, such as GPCRs and ion channels. “If you have an endogenous ligand, thenwe can solve the structure of that ligand very quickly. Then we have an in silico screening platform to pull out other compounds that are similar to the ligand in terms of space occupancy. Or the endogenous ligand structure can be used as the direct template for designing new drugs,” he said. AstraZeneca and Conformetrix will use the technology for both purposes on the pharm.’s preclinical therapeutic pipeline.

Mike Snowden, VP and head of discovery sciences for AstraZeneca, said the pharma conducted pilot studies last year. “As we’ve done due diligence, we’ve been looking to see if there is anything else out there that competes with Conformetrix’s technology, and we feel it is truly unique,” Snowden said. “Given time and quite a bit of money,
we probably could do what they do.But why replicate what someone else has
already managed to perfect?”

Snowden said Conformetrix’s technology will not replace AstraZeneca’s crystallography, NMR or computational chemistry technologies, but instead adds to the pharma’s “armory of capabilities” in internal discovery. “Their technology is very good for lead optimization” by determining which chemical modification will give a compound the desired conformation, Snowden said. “It is also very good for finding structures that are based on natural ligands.” Snowden noted Conformetrix is AstraZeneca’s second recent deal to help improve the probability of success of its discovery programs. “The key here is the toolbox approach, using multiple techniques to find the right molecule,” he said.

Last May, AstraZeneca entered a four-year collaboration to use the StaR technology from Heptares Therapeutics Ltd. To discover and develop therapeutics against GPCR targets in CNS/pain, cardiovascular/metabolic and inflammatory disorders.
Heptares received $6.3 million up front, plus undisclosed research funding, and
is eligible for up to $181.8 million in milestones, plus royalties.

Williams said Conformetrix has done several fee-for-service pilot studies with pharma companies, but the AstraZeneca deal is the first collaboration across an entire pipeline where the biotech can share financially in a project’s success. Under the two-year deal, Conformetrix received an upfront payment, will receive research funding and is eligible for milestones.

http://http://www.biocentury.com/biotech-pharma-news/tech/2012-04-30/astrazeneca-accesses-conformetrixs-nmr-technolgy-to-find-compound-structures-a12

Conformetrix’s technology determines accurate three-dimensional structures – or conformations – of drug molecules in their bioactive states. This is achieved without the need for traditional structural information regarding the protein target of each drug and provides researchers with valuable information on how development-stage
compounds are likely to interact with their targets. This new information
should improve the efficiency and quality of the lead identification, lead
optimisation and candidate selection stages of drug discovery programmes. Under
the terms of the two-year collaboration, the technology will also be used to
determine the bioactive conformations of naturally occurring ligands as
templates for drug library enhancement and hit identification.

Commenting on today’s news, Conformetrix’s CEO, Dr Sam Williams, said, ‘Conformetrix is delighted that its first collaborative deal is with AstraZeneca, a company with a strongreputation in innovative science-led R&D. We believe that this deal provides important validation of our technology, which improves the quality and
efficiency of drug discovery, reducing the number of molecules needed to find a drug and enhancing the likelihood of clinical success. The Conformetrix team is looking
forward to working with our new partner on this exciting programme.’

Mike Snowden, Vice President and Head of Discovery Sciences, AstraZeneca, said: “We are excited to be working with Conformetrix. We believe their technology will provide a powerful addition to our hit identification and lead optimisation approaches, supporting our strategic objectives to improve the quality and choice of candidate compounds for our early pipeline.”

In addition to an undisclosed upfront payment, Conformetrix will receive research funding and be eligible for
milestones as certain targets are met. The discovery programme will be managed
by a joint AstraZeneca-Conformetrix research team.

Manchester, UK, March 7 2012 – The Board of Conformetrix Ltd, a leader in optimising drug discovery and design, has appointed Dr Sam Williams as Chief Executive Officer, it is announced today. Dr Williams, who has extensive transactional and business development expertise, was previously a Non-Executive Director of the company. He takes over from one of Conformetrix’s founder scientists, Dr Andrew Almond, who becomes Chief Technology Officer.

Conformetrix uses its NMR-based technology to determine the accurate bioactive structures of molecules, an approach which has significant potential in the optimisation of drug discovery and design, as well as the generation of novel drugs. By solving dynamic 3D structures independently of techniques such as X-ray crystallography, the Conformetrix approach derives valuable data more quickly and cheaply than standard approaches. It has been validated by studies both in-house and with partners, and further data and partnering deals are expected this year.

Prior to moving into company management, Dr Williams spent over a decade in the City as a top-rated healthcare analyst, with Robertson Stephens and Lehman Brothers. As well as advising on life sciences investments, he was involved in several IPOs and M&A transactions. Sam has a biology degree from the University of Oxford and a PhD from the University of Cambridge. He will combine his duties at Conformetrix with his role as CEO of Modern Biosciences, a virtual drug development company.

Dr Clive Dix, Chairman of Conformetrix, said, ‘We welcome Sam as CEO of Conformetrix, where his expertise will be invaluable as the company enters this important next phase of its development. The Board’s thanks are also due to Andrew and to Chief Scientific Officer and fellow founder Dr Charles Blundell for their significant contribution to the company’s growth so far.’

Dr Sam Williams, CEO of Conformetrix, added, ‘Conformetrix’s technology has huge potential in the optimisation of how the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry generates new products, and I’m really pleased to be taking on this more active role within the company. The team has expanded significantly during the last year, and I look forward to working with it as Conformetrix matures and moves towards collaborative deals.’

Influenza, an acute viral infection, affects hundreds of thousands of people a year and puts an enormous strain on healthcare providers globally. The last pandemic flu outbreak in the UK – swine flu – was in 2009 when it claimed 457 lives. While previous pandemics have been even more severe, there is a heightened risk of more severe pandemics in the future.

The scientific collaboration used a research method known as “Human Viral Challenge Studies”, where healthy volunteers are infected with influenza virus, and their immune responses closely monitored in an isolation unit.

These were important to the research, published online in Nature Medicine, as they allowed the healthy volunteers to be held in “sterile” isolation conditions and ensured they had no existing infections. The volunteers were then “challenged” with influenza
virus, with blood samples being taken at regular intervals to observe how their immune systems responded to the viral infection.

Researchers discovered that the immune systems produced various types of T-cells (part of the immune system that kills both viral particles, and cells infected with viral particles). Notably, the T-cells responded to peptides associated with the
internal structures of the influenza viruses.

Unlike the external structures of influenza virus, that mutates very rapidly and creates a new strain of virus most years, the internal structures change very slowly over a long period of time. These internal structures are found in all strains of influenza virus – thus, a vaccine that targets such peptides may provide immunity against all strains of influenza, including seasonal (yearly), avian
(bird), and swine flu, for many years.

A vaccine against these peptides would activate the T-cell immune response – which is able to respond much more rapidly than vaccines that activate an antibody response.

Dr Tom Wilkinson, Senior Lecturer in Respiratory Medicine at the University of Southampton, who led the study, says: “Influenza is a virus that we know has a global impact, and the threat of further pandemics is a real one. Most influenza vaccines only protect us against known influenza strains by creating antibodies in the blood but the influenza virus has the ability to rapidly change itself
and new strains can emerge which rapidly spread across the globe by escaping this immunity.

“We have found that there is an important role for T-cells that recognise the flu virus, which if harnessed could protect against
most or even all strains of seasonal and pandemic flu. Through this discovery we hope to improve vaccines for future strains of influenza; and potentially protect against the next pandemic. However there is more to do to translate these findings into new approaches to treatment.”

“Current flu vaccines are very good at producing antibodies against flu, but not so good at generating a lasting immunity involving T-cells,’ says Professor Sir Andrew McMichael, Director of the Medical Research Council (MRC) Weatherall Institute of Molecular
Medicine at Oxford University. “The big question is: if we had a pandemic involving a much more severe virus than the swine flu we saw, what would we do in the six months it takes to develop an effective vaccine? This study suggests that vaccines stimulating a T-cell response might be an option, but there remains a lot to do to be certain of this approach.”

Dr Rob Lambkin Williams, Chief Scientific Officer of Retroscreen, adds, “It is great to see the quality of data produced using the challenge study technique. Knowing that the volunteers were only infected with the viral strains that the research team had introduced, takes the guess work out of such research. The immune response observed in these volunteers was as a direct result of the virus to which they
had been exposed. This quality of data will have the potential to rapidly speed up the rate that we are able to create a universal vaccine for
influenza.”

Retroscreen’s Chief Executive Officer, Kym Denny said: “Retroscreen is delighted that our scientists and doctors have been able to work so closely with two leading universities. This work significantly expands our understanding of the immune response to influenza infection; this could be key in the fight against a future pandemic.”

Finally, Professor John Oxford, President, Scientific Director and founder of Retroscreen and Professor of Virology at St Bartholomew’s and the Royal London Hospital, Queen Mary’s School of Medicine and Dentistry said: “Dedicated volunteers in our isolation unit have helped us to open a window into why some people get flu and others do not and even better to formulate a new vaccine.”

The study was funded by the University of Southampton, the MRC and Retroscreen Virology Limited.

http://www.retroscreen.com/index.php/news-releases/121-universal-vaccine-for-influenza

There is currently vast investment opportunity within Biotechnology. It is a sector that is confusing to many; therefore there is currently a lack of investment within the area. Gradually overtime people will understand the sector more and then the possibility of the greatest return will diminish.

Samuel Isaly, investment manager of the Worldwide Healthcare Trust (WWH) states that “the largest subset of catalyst-driven investment opportunities that we are finding continues to be in the biotechnology sector, in which we see a combination of high growth rates, attractive valuations, clinical catalysts, product pipelines, new product launches and M&A activity”.

Tom Bulford, a fund manager in the City of London and in Hong Kong for the past twenty years also believes that biotechnology is the next red hot sector. He suggest that the race is on, because as more and more research money is being directed to biotechnology, more products are hitting the market and therefore investment opportunities are being missed by private investors.

Tom Bulford currently writes a twice weekly newsletter called The Penny Sleuth. This provides private investors with his free analysis of the penny share market.

Manchester-based Nanoco said the criteria for achieving the milestone included a performance life of at least 50,000 hours.

Nanoco’s quantum dots have the potential to be used in next-generation TV screens, lighting and solar cells.

The firm said it would now begin production of a 1kg batch of the dots, which will result in a milestone payment of two million US dollars (£1.27m).

It has already shipped 1kg of red quantum dots for the same customer. Nanoco’s client intends to combine the red and green dots with blue light-emitting diodes to produce a source of white light with multiple potential applications.

Chief executive Michael Edelman said: “We are delighted to have demonstrated that the performance of these green quantum dots meets our customer’s specification as it marks an important step towards the customer’s launch of a marketed product.

http://http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/business/s/1472486_nanoco-performance-triggers-1m-dollar-payment?s_cid=business%20bulletin-20120131%20(1045)

“The current financial year is proceeding well,” Rowley is set to tell shareholders later today. “We continue to make good progress with our commercial relationships, our technology, our manufacturing capability and our company infrastructure.”

The business reported a pre-tax loss of £3.2m in the year to 31 July 2011, compared with a loss of £1.4m last year. Revenues for the same reporting periods also fell from £2.94m to £2.64m.

But Rowley added: “In our commercial relationships we are making good progress across our LED and solar projects, including the final stages of development of green quantum dots for a major Japanese corporation. In addition, we are in discussions with further potential commercial partners.

“To accommodate our increasing level of activity we recently signed a lease to a further 12,500 sq ft of laboratory space at our Manchester head office. We have also recently received planning permission for the Kilo Lab production facility in Runcorn.”

http://www.insidermedia.com/insider/north-west/63550-nanoco-chairman-hails-progress

The Manchester University spin-out business, a world leader in the manufacturing of cadmium-free quantum dots, which have the potential to be used in next generation TV screens, today told shareholders it is continuing to make good progress in commercialising its technologies.

Chairman Peter Rowley said: “The current financial year is proceeding well. We continue to make good progress with our commercial relationships, our technology, our manufacturing capability and our company infrastructure.

“In our commercial relationships we are making good progress across our LED and solar projects, including the final stages of development of green quantum dots for a major Japanese corporation. In addition, we are in discussions with further potential commercial partners.

“To accommodate our increasing level of activity we recently signed a lease to a further 12,500 sq ft of laboratory space at our Manchester head office. We have also recently received planning permission for the Kilo Lab production facility in Runcorn.

“We look forward to the future with confidence.”

AIM-listed Nanoco claims to be the only company in the world capable of making dots in industrial quantities and has a product development agreement worth more than £500,000 with a major Japanese LCD television maker.

It also recently completed the first phase of a solar cell development program with Tokyo Electron, with an agreement in place to start phase two.

In the year to July 31, it reported a pre-tax loss of £3.2m, compared with a loss of £1.4m last year, while turnover in the same period dropped from £2.9m to £2.6m.

http://http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/business/technology/s/1468278_nanoco-grows-laboratory-space?s_cid=business%20bulletin-20111216%20(973)

Highlights

· The Placing proceeds will potentially enable the Company to progress its key programmes through a range of key value inflection points;

- fund the development of further applications of the vascular patch through a mixture of preclinical and clinical studies;
- develop the porcine heart valve product and seek regulatory approval for a decellularised version of an existing bioprosthetic heart valve;
- progress existing meniscus project towards CE approval and initiate ligament development programme targeted at anterior cruciate ligament repair;
- progress the advanced woundcare area with the development of dermis products; and
- fund expanded teams in product development, quality assurance, regulatory affairs and manufacturing as well as overheads and costs of a planned move into larger premises.

· The Placing Price represents a discount of approximately 2.7 per cent. to the closing mid-market share price of the Company on 7 December 2011;

· The Placing has attracted both existing and new investors and includes a significant investment in the Company by Invesco Asset Management Limited;

· The 181,818,182 Placing Shares will represent approximately 38.6 per cent. of the existing issued share capital of the Company prior to the issue of the Placing Shares;

· The Placing is conditional, inter alia, on Resolutions being passed at a general meeting of the Company to grant the directors of the Company authority to allot the Placing Shares and disapply pre-emption rights in connection with the allotment of the Placing Shares; and

· The Placing has been fully underwritten by Peel Hunt LLP who are acting as sole nominated adviser and broker.

John Samuel, Executive Chairman of Tissue Regenix, said:

“We are delighted to announce this material funding round which will transform our balance sheet and gives us the firepower to leverage our innovative technology platform. As well as allowing the Company to develop a range of products simultaneously following the established medical device regulatory route, this commitment from both existing and new investors is a significant endorsement of the commercial potential of our broad product pipeline. We are also pleased to note that the planned expansion of key teams will potentially lead to the creation of up to 30 high quality medical technology jobs in Yorkshire. The Directors continue to believe that our tissue products’ ability to retain biomechanical and regenerative capabilities on implantation provides us with an attractive platform from which we aim to become a significant global player in regenerative medicine.”

http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-detail.html?announcementId=11057093