Trio in deal to commercialise nanotechnology
US companies Dendritic NanoTechnologies (DNT) and The Dow Chemical Company have reached an agreement with Starpharma Holdings, of Melbourne, Australia, that provides DNT and Starpharma with ownership or access to the world's broadest patent portfolio in the field of dendrimers, and establishes the companies as leading providers of market-validated nanotechnology.
US companies Dendritic NanoTechnologies (DNT) and The Dow Chemical Company have reached an agreement with Starpharma Holdings, of Melbourne, Australia, that provides DNT and Starpharma with ownership or access to the world's broadest patent portfolio in the field of dendrimers, and establishes the companies as leading providers of market-validated nanotechnology.
Under terms of the deal, Dow will assign its entire intellectual property portfolio and associated royalties in the field of dendrimers (196 patents comprising 41 patent families) to DNT in exchange for a significant equity stake in DNT. Starpharma, which already held a 42% interest in DNT, will make an additional cash equity investment of US$1m in DNT in exchange for exclusive rights to DNT and former Dow intellectual property for polyvalent, dendrimer-based pharmaceutical applications.
Following the transactionStarpharma will remain the largest shareholder in DNT with a holding of 33%.
'This move consolidates a great amount of the important intellectual property in the dendrimer field into one company,' said Mike Pirc, manager of intellectual property, The Dow Chemical Company. 'It will be very positive for developing the applications and further demonstrating the value of this technology.'
Dendrimers are a new class of nanostructures with physical properties that make them ideal vehicles for targeting diseases and delivering drugs to fight them. Dendrimer technology was first developed at Dow when DNT founder Donald Tomalia was a Dow employee. Today, DNT has more than 30 patents in dendrimer science, and sells and licenses more than 200 variations of dendrimers to pharmaceutical, biotechnology and diagnostics companies.
DNT's current product development areas include protein, antibody, and anti-inflammatory drug delivery technologies for the pharmaceutical industry; small-interfering RNA (si-RNA) drug targeting and delivery solutions for the biotech industry; and new diagnostic solutions for enhancing the findings of MRIs. With the assignment of the Dow patent portfolio, DNT will now own the world's broadest intellectual property position in dendrimer science.
In January 2004, Starpharma became the first company in the world to initiate human clinical testing of a dendrimer-based pharmaceutical (VivaGel, for prevention of HIV) under a US FDA Investigational New Drug application.