3 NC Presenters, 4 Companies at Mid-Atlantic Bio

North Carolinians will be front, center and everywhere during the two-day Mid-Atlantic Bio conference Sept. 27 and 28 at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center in suburban Washington, D.C.

Only problem is, you won’t be one of them until you register to attend.

The conference is not only a “Who’s Who” of the Mid-Atlantic regional life sciences, but also demonstrates the significance of the region to the biotech world. More than 800 executives, policymakers, academics, financiers, media and service providers will come together from some 30 states and 10 countries.

Three of this year’s conference presenters are from North Carolina, and four Tar Heel companies are among the 22 chosen to make pitches to investors and potential partners attending the event.

The North Carolina Biotechnology Center has been involved in planning this year’s program, as a strategic partner with the conference’s three investor-association sponsors -- The Mid-Atlantic Venture Association, the Virginia Biotechnology Association and the Tech Council Of Maryland.

The Capital-area location is a natural for this year’s programming, which includes a half-day workshop with program managers from the Small Business Innovation Research program and other opportunities to schmooze with representatives of the National Institutes of Health.

Service providers looking for clients or technology developers looking for partners can use the BioMatch online system, set up this year for the first time, to let registered attendees arrange valuable one-on-one contact opportunities. Attendees will also show off cutting-edge science in the Innovation Corridor, a lineup of scientific poster presentations.

Presenters from North Carolina include:

  • Peter Ginsberg, NCBiotech’s vice president for Business and Technology Development, moderating a panel called Novel Funding Sources for Bioscience Companies;
  • Art Pappas, Managing Partner, Pappas Ventures, is on a panel titled New Developments in Traditional and Corporate Venture Capital;
  • Christy Shaffer, Ph.D., venture partner and managing director of Hatteras Venture Partners, is a presenter in the SBIR/STTR Workshop: Strategies, Program Changes, and Current Opportunities.

North Carolina firms making presentations are:

  • Arbovax, of Raleigh, which is developing a vaccine platform for Dengue fever and other insect-borne viruses. The company received a $250,000 a Strategic Growth Loan from NCBiotech earlier this year to help it expand testing of its dengue vaccine.
  • Cary-based Trana Discovery is a drug discovery company focusing on treatments of bacterial, viral, and fungal diseases. Earlier this year, NCBiotech awarded the company a $35,000 Small Business Research Loan for research into therapies to fight the HIV virus and bacterial infection from Staph aureus.
  • MxBiodevices, a Greenville-based wound-care company developing an advanced treatment for diabetic foot ulcers, which was awarded a $30,000 Company Inception Loan by NCBiotech earlier this year.
  • Raleigh kidney disease therapeutics company Katharos is developing technology to remove excess phosphate from blood during dialysis, improving care for patients with kidney failure.
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