Deal Flow

On the verge of success

Move by ProThera Biologics to Eddy Street presages potential new market partners

Photo by Richard Asinof

Dr. Yow-Pin Lim talks with Rep. Jim Langevin on April 24, 2013, at ProThera Biologics' commercial lab facility at the former Fuji Film building. ProThera has recently located to 349 Eddy St., taking a three-year lease in a building owned by Brown University.

By Richard Asinof
Posted 3/16/15
The move by ProThera Biologics to lease space for three years at 349 Eddy Street appears to presage the next successful growth phase by the early stage company. It also reinforces the growing strength of the emerging biomedical industry ecosystem in Rhode Island. It also underscores the potential of the former Route 195 land to become a hub of biomedical and life sciences companies.
With the announcement by Gov. Gina Raimondo in her budget for some new money for investment in the Commerce Department, beyond the additional $500,000 added to the matching grant fund to support Rhode Island firms that have received SBIR awards, how much will be targeted toward the biomedical industry sector? Beyond looking at the development of more incubator space, what specific investments are being considered to support the infrastructure to support the biomedical industry sector? With the proposed funding of a state-run small business loan fund, what kinds of job creation metrics will be used?
Mnemosyne Pharmaceuticals, an early stage Rhode Island drug development firm, much like ProThera Biologics, appears to have some promising potential developments in the near future. With both companies, their success is based upon the strength of their excellence in scientific research. The value of research as an economic engine of the state’s innovation economy, and its ability to attract world-class talent to Rhode Island, needs to be better understood as a force of future economic prosperity. And, that it is a long-term investment.

PROVIDENCE – Amidst all the manufactured news last week, it was easy to have missed the story – and the significance – of the move by ProThera Biologics, an early stage Rhode Island company, to lease the 4,000 square-foot building at 349 Eddy St., owned by Brown University, for three years.

ProThera has developed a new biologic, known as Inter-alpha Inhibitor Proteins, which is a naturally occurring, broad-spectrum protease inhibitor. The biologic has shown strong potential in treating a range of life-threatening inflammatory diseases, such as dengue fever, anthrax and bacterial sepsis.

In addition, as part of its core technology platform, ProThera is developing a series of biomarkers in systemic inflammation from bacterial and viral causes, as well as a diagnostic marker for neonatal sepsis.

Co-founder and CEO Dr. Yow-Pin Lim has compiled an impressive track record in securing about $7 million in federal preclinical research grants since the company was founded in 2002, backed by an initial $100,000 investment by the Slater Technology Fund. The company has received an additional $500,000 in equity investments by Slater since then.

Among the relationships forged with clinical and academic research scientists include: Dr. James Padbury, from Women & Infants Hospital and Brown, working on neonatal sepsis; Dr. Stephen Opal, from Memorial Hospital and Brown Medical School, working on sepsis and biodefense; Dr. Alan Rothman from the University of Rhode Island, working on dengue; Dr. Barbara Stonestreet from Women & Infants and Brown, working on brain injury; and Dr. Louise McCullough from the University of Connecticut, working on stroke.

Last spring, Prothera Biologics had moved into a commercial research lab facility at the former Fuji Film building at 200 Massasoit Ave. in East Providence. Congressman Jim Langevin toured the facility on April 24, 2013, and had been briefed by Lim about the company’s potential to introduce a biologic solution to combat multiple diseases that cause systemic inflammation. [See link below to ConvergenceRI story.]

The move to the East Providence facility had been part of ProThera Biologics’ efforts to leap across the chasm and evolve into a successful biomedical firm, capturing the equity financing needed to compete in the market.

At that time, ProThera had been in the midst of discussions to form a strategic partnership with a leading player in the blood product industry to ensure the flow of high-quality product supply needed to support clinical development and trials. The Inter-alpha Inhibitor is created through a blood fractionation process.

The move to Eddy Street
Now, the move to 349 Eddy St. in the former Jewelry District, into a building that once housed successful startups Nabsys and NuLabel Technologies during their early growth stages, appears to presage ProThera’s move onto a larger-scale platform with new partners.

With the move comes an apparent new confidence about its future: Prothera becomes the lead tenant, sub-leasing space to two startups: Ryon Technologies, a Brown University academic lab spinout, has developed new technology to perform what it calls “unambiguous chemical analysis”; and 3prime Dx, a company being launched by Dr. Samuel Dudley, chief of cardiology at Rhode Island Hospital and Brown University.

“It’s ProThera that is leasing the facility and assuming the responsibility of lead tenant,” Richard Horan, senior managing director at Slater, told ConvergenceRI. The company’s new confidence is based in large part on the good progress made in its R&D over the last two years, according to Horan.

The actual move from its former space in East Providence to its new home on Eddy Street involved a brief temporary sojourn at Slater’s headquarters, before moving into the new facility on Feb. 15.

The location on Eddy Street, Horan, continued, will enable closer collaboration with the medical community. “The former Jewelry District is the place to be for a biopharma company,” Horan said. “I think it’s a good illustration and argument in support of using the [former] 195 land as a locus for the biomedical industry sector.”

Brown University spokesman David Orenstein said that ProThera’s leasing of space at 349 Eddy St. furthers the school’s vision for the building as a welcoming home for startups, according to an article in The Providence Journal.

The building is located across from the South Street Landing project, where a shared nursing school center and administrative offices for Brown are being constructed.

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