News and Resources from the WTWH Media Life Science Network - Page 3 of 968

Novartis begins $256M Singapore expansion

(Left to right) : Ms Cindy Koh, Executive Vice President, Economic Development Board (EDB); Ms Ana Locatelli, Site Head, Novartis Singapore; ⁠Mr Heng Swee Keat, Deputy Prime Minister and Coordinating Minister for Economic Policies; Mr Steffen Lang, President of Operations at Novartis; Mr Christoph Buerki, Chief Financial Officer Operations, Novartis. [Image courtesy of Novartis]

Novartis announced last week that it broke ground on a biopharmaceutical manufacturing plant in Singapore.

The company put forward a $256 million investment to begin the project, which will lead to the deployment of digital and automation solutions to enhance manufacturing productivity, improve operational efficiency, and upskill the workforce. Novartis said this site will focus on manufacturing therapeutic antibody drugs to deliver breakthrough treatments to patients globally.

“In the next phase of growth for the biopharma sector…

Health Canada licenses Medtronic Symplicity Spyral renal denervation system

The Medtronic Symplicty Spyral RDN system expands inside the renal arteries. It then ablates nerves in the vessel wall to treat hypertension. [Illustration courtesy of Medtronic]Medtronic (NYSE: MDT) + announced today that it received a license from Health Canada for its Symplicity Spyral renal denervation (RDN) system.

The licensing covers the management of essential hypertension in patients for whomblood pressure remains uncontrolled despite lifestyle modifications and guideline-driven medical therapy with antihypertensive medications, or when guideline-driven therapy is poorly tolerated.

Approval in Canada comes about four months after the company’s landmark FDA approval for Symplicity Spyral in November 2023.

Symplicity Spyral delivers radiofrequency energy to nerves near kidneys in a minimally invasive procedure. These nerves can become overactive and contribute to high blood pressure.

After sedat…

W.R. Grace expands manufacturing plant in Michigan

W.R. Grace announced that it opened an expanded fine chemical contract development and manufacturing plant in Michigan.

The Columbia, Maryland-based specialty chemicals company opened the facility in South Haven, Michigan. Following a 21-month project, more than 200 employees joined executives and community leaders for a ribbon-cutting ceremony this week.

Grace’s facility has 25% more capacity, with more room for a 4,000-gallon Hastelloy centrifuge and three 4,000-gallon, multi-use chemical reactors. This strengthens Grace’s ability to serve growing demand for active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs).

The company’s South Haven facility produces APIs, regulatory starting materials (RSMs) and drug intermediates in quantities from kilos to tons. It lands in compliance with the FDA’s current Good Manufacturing Practice (cGMP) regulations. The site integrates with Grace’s Tyrone, Pennsylvania facility, the company said. It offers custo…

Medtronic is raising the bar on outcomes with MiniMed 780G automated insulin delivery system

The MiniMed 780G with the Guardian 4 sensor. [Image courtesy of Medtronic]Not long ago, automated insulin delivery technology from Medtronic (NYSE: MDT) + ranked third in the market in terms of patient satisfaction.

That’s according to the Diabetes Patient Voice survey (DQ&A) — a third-party survey that evaluates U.S. diabetes patient satisfaction on a quarterly basis. However, the patient responses were for the previous-generation MiniMed 670G — before the company brought its next-generation MiniMed 780G system to the market.

The current iteration of MiniMed 780G uses the latest Guardian 4 technology and requires no fingersticks while in “SmartGuard” mode. It provides meal detection technology providing automatic adjustments and corrections to sugar levels every five minutes. This occurs for both basal (background) and bolus (mealtime) insulin needs.

MiniMed 780G with Guardian 4 offers insulin to account…

After Intuitive, Shockwave and Avail, Daniel Hawkins is now CEO at AI-powered MRI software startup Vista.ai

Former Avail Medsystems CEO Daniel Hawkins is now president and CEO of Vista.ai. [Photo courtesy of Avail Medsystems]Avail Medsystems founder and former CEO Daniel Hawkins has a new job as president and CEO of MRI software startup Vista.ai.

Palo Alto, California-based Vista.ai (founded and incorporated as HeartVista) makes AI-guided software for automating magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) exams.

Vista.ai was founded by Chief Medical Officer Bob Hu, Chief Architect and Head of Research Juan Santos and Chief Technology Officer William Overall. Its advisory board includes Stanford University doctors and professors and the radiology chair at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

The company won FDA 510(k) clearances for its HeartVista Workstation with RTHawk application software for the acquisition of real-time and accelerated images from GE Healthcare whole-body MRI systems in 2014, 2017 and 2017. In 2019, the FDA cleared the company’s AI-assisted One Cli…

Biden signs executive order for women’s health research and innovation

President Joe Biden [Image courtesy of the White House]President Joe Biden this week signed an executive order that will direct funds and actions toward expanding and improving research on women’s health.

The initiative builds on First Lady Jill Biden’s announcement last month in which the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) earmarked $100 million in funds to “fundamentally change” how the U.S. approaches and funds women’s health research.

This week’s executive order follows President Biden’s March 7 State of the Union address, in which he called on Congress to invest $12 billion in new funding for women’s health research.

Biden’s executive order will create directives that will ensure women’s health is integrated and prioritized across the federal research portfolio and budget, according to the White House. It will also motivate new research on a wide range of topics in womenR…

How Solventum plans to create value after spinning out of 3M

Bryan Hanson, soon-to-be CEO of 3M’s Solventum healthcare spinoff, is no stranger to major changes in medtech.

He had direct involvement in medtech’s largest spinoff, when Covidien separated from Tyco. Hanson then led the integration of Covidien into Medtronic in medtech’s largest-ever acquisition. While at Medtronic, he also led the divestiture of its Patient Recovery business to Cardinal Health.

After several years in the corner office at orthopedic giant Zimmer Biomet, he’s now tasked with leading the planned Health Care spinoff at 3M.

“I have a lot of knowledge and experience in transformation,” Hanson said during Solventum’s inaugural Investor Day event. “[They were] all different transformations, but what you’ll find is some commonality in every transformation. There are always differences, but there’s always commonality as well. So I will bring experience to make sure that this transforma…

GE HealthCare, Nvidia team up to bring AI to ultrasound

GE HealthCare (Nasdaq: GEHC) + announced that it utilized Nvidia technology to develop an AI-powered research model called SonoSAMTrack.

SonoSAMTrack combines a promptable foundation model for segmenting objects on ultrasound images called SonoSAM. It segments anatomies, lesions and other essential areas in ultrasound images. GE HealthCare also offers a streamlined version called SonoSAMLite.

The latest development builds on a long-term AI collaboration between GE HealthCare and Nvidia. Nvidia, a leader in AI computing, has worked with a number of medtech companies to incorporate AI into their technologies. Johnson & Johnson MedTech announced this week that it plans to accelerate and scale AI for surgery in partnership with Nvidia.

Asensus Surgical linked up with Nvidia last year to deliver novel clinical intelligence to surgeons in surgical robotics. Medtronic also partnered with Nvidia to enable an AI Acce…

Avail Medsystems tech sold to robotics startup founded by former Auris leaders

The Avail Medsystems telepresence console beams video, audio and information to laptops and tablets. [Photo courtesy of Avail Medsystems]Medical robotics startup Mendaera has purchased the technology of Avail Medsystems and hired some of its employees, Mendaera co-founder and CEO Josh DeFonzo said in an exclusive interview.

The deal includes “substantially all” of Avail’s assets, said DeFonzo, who offered new details on his company’s objectives as it exits stealth mode.

He declined to disclose financial terms of the deal.

Avail shut down last year for lack of funding. DeFonzo said Mendaera will support customers that were using the existing Avail technology and consoles as its R&D group works on the product roadmap regarding console size and/or features in the coming quarters. However, Avail’s partnership with Medtronic is not part of the transaction, he said.

“We certainly would be happy to work with Medtronic…

NVIDIA expands BioNeMo platform with new foundation models and microservices for AI-powered Drug Discovery

The most recent NVIDIA BioNeMo foundation models can help drug discovery groups design drug molecules virtually. [Credit: NVIDIA]

NVIDIA is putting the power of generative AI for drug discovery into the hands of more pharmaceutical and biotech companies with an expanded collection of AI models and flexible deployment options. More than 100 firms are already using the company’s biomolecular BioNeMo platform to accelerate the development of therapeutics.

“For the first time in history, we can represent the world of biology and chemistry in a computer, making computer-aided drug discovery possible,” said Kimberly Powell, NVIDIA VP of healthcare, in a press briefing. “By helping healthcare companies easily build and manage AI solutions, we’re enabling them to harness the full power and potential of generative AI.”

The latest additions to BioNeMo, announced today at NVIDIA G…

Johnson & Johnson MedTech partners with Nvidia on AI in surgery

Johnson & Johnson MedTech announced today that it plans to accelerate and scale AI for surgery in partnership with Nvidia.

The two companies paired up to support increased access to real-time analysis and global AI algorithm availability. They hope to affect surgical decision-making, education and collaboration across the connected operating room (OR).

This marks the latest medtech collaboration involving Nvidia, a leader in AI computing. Asensus Surgical linked up with Nvidia last year to deliver novel clinical intelligence to surgeons in surgical robotics. Medtronic also partnered with Nvidia to enable an AI Access platform to boost the GI Genius intelligent endoscopy module’s capabilities.

Read more on Nvidia and its use of generative AI in the pharmaceutical industry here.

According to a news release, the companies executed a memorandum of understanding to accelerate AI for Johnson & Johnson MedTech’s extensive surgical technolog…

Denmark teams up with Novo Nordisk Foundation, NVIDIA to launch visionary AI research center

A total of 15,128 NVIDIA H100 Tensor Core GPUs (pictured here) will be used in the Denmark AI Innovation Center. The hardware can support the development of advanced AI applications, from protein structure prediction to quantum computing research.

A collaboration between the Novo Nordisk Foundation, the Export and Investment Fund of Denmark (EIFO), and NVIDIA will establish a national AI Innovation Centre in Denmark focused on accelerating research and innovation in fields including healthcare, life science, and quantum computing. The initiative is led on the Danish side by the Novo Nordisk Foundation, which has committed roughly DKK 600 million (around $90 million) toward the initial costs of the center, and the Export and Investment Fund of Denmark (EIFO), which has contributed another DKK 100 million.

In a press briefing, Kimberly Powell, NVIDIA’s VP of healthcare, highlighted Denmark’s “…