3D生物打印材料公司Organovo(NASDAQ:ONVO) has announced that it is exploring “strategic alternatives” for its business after deciding that its liver tissue requires redevelopment. California-based private investment banking firm罗斯资本合作伙伴has been engaged as the company’s financial adviser as it pursues its options.
“After a rigorous assessment of our liver therapeutic tissue program, we’ve concluded that the variability of biological performance and related duration of potential benefits presents development challenges and lengthy timelines that no longer support an attractive opportunity given our resources,” stated Taylor J. Crouch, Organovo’s CEO at the time of the announcement.
“As a result, we’ve suspended development of this lead program and have engaged Roth to explore strategic alternatives focused on maximizing stockholder value.”
克劳奇还表示，该公司将采取行动来重组公司并减少支出以保留现金。由于公告，Organovo还取消了其2019财年的第1季度收益电话，最初定于8月8日。
Organovo’s challenge
Organovo于2007年在圣地亚哥成立，专门研究3D可打印的治疗组织。最初目的是用于药物筛查，视觉是，这些材料有一天将足够可行，可以产生人造组织以植入体内。
The company reported its商业运营的第一年2016年，在原代人肝细胞（其第一材料产物）释放之后。同年晚些时候在活动物模型中进行了测试，肝细胞先前已显示鼓励通畅for early pre-clinical testing. However, with this latest announcement it has become apparent that the company has not generated enough decisive scientific data to support the prolonged functionality or therapeutic benefit of these cells. Commenting on R&D progress at fiscal year end 2019 in May, Crouch said, “The most recent data we’ve generated from a much larger group of animal studies provides differing results from what we observed in our earlier pilot studies. […] in these and other animal models, we are also seeing evidence of shorter tissue duration than we observed in previous studies, as measured by human protein output and the quantity of hepatocytes,”
“我们将继续研究制造过程的各个方面，目的是提高耐用性并优化组织的功能。”
Since release of the liver cells, Organovo has also worked to introduce other organ cell materials to the market. Early 2017, the company published a paper demonstrating the successful development of a 3D bioprinted vascular structure made using akidney cell product。
潜在的战略替代方案
Strategic alternatives currently being sought by Organovo include potential acquisition, a merger, reverse merger, business combination, the sale of assets and licensing though, as the the company states “There can be no assurance […] that this process will result in any such transaction.”
Within fiscal Q1 2018, Organovo previously reported revenue of $0.7 million, 30 percent less than Q1 2017. This was, the company stated, “primarily driven by lower revenue from liver tissue disease modeling research services.” Net loss for Q1 2018 was reported at $7.4 million, a $2.7 million improvement on net loss in Q1 2017. Net proceeds generated in Q1 2019 equated to approximately $3 million from the issuance of 2.1 million shares of common stock at a weighted average price of $1.44 per share.
在撰写本文时，Organovo尚未就其第1季度的2020年收入呼叫进行重新安排。
为了进一步，与行业有关3D打印行业通讯, follow us onTwitter和我们一样Facebook。寻找工程工作？启用您的个人资料3D打印作业， 或者广告在您所在地区找到专家。
Featured image shows Organovo’s NovoGen Bioprinter™ fabricating tissue into a 24-well plate. Image via Organovo
