VANCOUVER, British Columbia, April 22, 2010 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- biOasis Technologies Inc. (BTI) (TSX-V:BTI) is pleased to provide an update to shareholders on some of its achievements and advances made during its fiscal year ended February 28th, 2010, which was a pivotal year for the Company. Our two programs which are based on proprietary applications of the p97 molecule; Cognitest™, the development of a blood test for Alzheimer's disease, and Transcend™, the development of a carrier for shuttling drugs across the Blood-Brain Barrier, both emerged out of the "Proof of Concept" phase in 2009. This signaled the time to commence the building of the corporate team to advance the two programs into product development. Management started by appointing a seasoned Life Sciences -- Biotech expert, Mark Godsy, as Chief Strategist.
TEAM: As the high level strategy was developed, we added several key personnel to the biOasis team. Dr. Mike Shannon, former Deputy Surgeon General for The Canadian Forces and a biotech industry veteran with clinical trial experience, was appointed as an advisor. Mike provides medical advice and insight into the clinical application of our technologies. Dr. Avi Livnat also joined the team and brought vast clinical expertise from another perspective. Avi, while running Quintiles Israel Ltd. as its founder and CEO, had overseen more than 200 clinical trials and a large number of drug regulatory submissions. Then Hugh MacNaught, a highly experienced biotech executive, joined the Company, initially as a consultant, but now in the full-time role of Executive Vice-President. Hugh is no neophyte when it comes to experience with p97. Several years ago, Hugh was introduced to p97 when he was asked to review the technology for a venture capital firm. Hugh never forgot about the technology and when biOasis approached him to join and to play a significant role in mapping the business development strategy for the Company, he jumped at the opportunity. Hugh also introduced David Browning as a consultant to the Company. At the time David was the CEO for Philips Oral Diagnostics, but more recently has moved to the position of CEO for Philips Somasigns. David, like Hugh, has vast experience in clinical diagnostics and has managed agreements in the area of diagnostics in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Dr. Delara Karkanwas the next member of the team to join. Delara was one of the lead scientists on the p97 project back in the early 2000's and left the project to work in Health Canada, where she is a Senior Science Advisor to the Office of Science and Risk Management, Health Products and Food branch.
As we closed out the year, we commenced the expansion of the Board of Directors with the addition of Dr. Chris Fibiger. Chris has held a number of senior positions within biopharmaceutical companies including the Global Head of Neuroscience for Amgen and Vice President of Neuroscience Discovery Research and Clinical Investigation, at Eli Lilly and Company. He is currently the Chief Science Officer for Biovail Laboratories International SRL.
DIAGNOSTIC PROGRAM-Cognitest™: In December 2009 we announced that we had entered into an agreement with Fleet Bioprocessing (UK) to develop a p97-based assay for the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. This agreement is highly significant for biOasis for a number of reasons, but primarily it marks the transition from research to product development. The Fleet team has broad expertise in building world-class diagnostic assays. Most of the Fleet team were previously key scientists at Johnson and Johnson's Ortho Diagnostics and several years ago left Ortho to start Fleet. During their careers the Fleet team has created assays for top tier diagnostic companies that have achieved substantial revenues. The team at Fleet is highly discerning and selective about the projects they embrace and with whom they collaborate. Fleet has provided us with additional validation for this area of our science and we are extremely pleased that we now have a world-class team working with us. Fleet has reported to us that the early results of the p97 immunoassay are very good. Alistair Dent, managing director of Fleet says, "we have the first phase of the assay up and running and it is performing extremely well for the initial pass." This development program is proceeding on time and within budget, and the team anticipates being in the position of approaching potential commercial partners later this year.
Blood-Brain Barrier Compound Delivery Platform-Transcend™: In 2009 we also announced that we had entered into an agreement with a major US Biotechnology company to review and perform a number of experiments on the use of p97 to shuttle compounds across the Blood-Brain Barrier. These experiments are ongoing and are following our expectations. As previously mentioned, in late 2009 Dr. Delara Karkan joined our team, specifically to work on the Blood-Brain Barrier program. She played a key role in the initial research behind the use of p97 to shuttle compounds across the Blood-Brain Barrier and is a major contributor on a number of papers describing this use of p97. Delara is really excited to once again be working on p97 as she feels that this remarkable molecule may help Physicians to combat a number of Neurological diseases. The interest in the p97 molecule as a shuttle for drugs continues to grow and we are expecting that over the coming few months that significant advancements will be made within this program.
Thus in early 2010, biOasis is very well positioned with a strong commercial partner regarding the development of a proprietary blood test (Cognitest™) for the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. Our contract research agreements with The University of British Columbia are well under way and proceeding to plan and within budget. This work on moving the Blood-Brain Barrier research forward is advancing quickly, thus we believe that we will be in a good position to pursue additional collaborations in 2010. We are currently in the process of selecting candidate drugs that will be attached to p97 for delivery across the blood brain barrier, some of which are considered "blockbuster" drugs with annual revenues exceeding $1 billion. Once attached to the p97 carrier the drug is considered to be a new compound and will qualify for patent protection. Our team expects to begin generating pre-clinicaldata for several of the candidate molecules, as an important step towards securing regulatory approval.
Over the next year, biOasis will continue to expand its in-house management and scientific team to fill a number of key roles as we advance the development of our diagnostic product and accelerate the development of the drug delivery platform-Transcend™. We expect that 2010 will be a watershed year for the company and our valued shareholders.
ABOUT BIOASIS: biOasis Technologies Inc. is a Canadian Biopharmaceutical company focused on the Health Care & Life Sciences market, and is engaged in the development and commercialization of diagnostics and therapeutic delivery systems related to neurological diseases. It has extensive and comprehensive intellectual property ("IP"), which it obtained from The University of British Columbia. The Company's initial area of focus has been on the utilization of the IP to pursue a biomarker for the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. This IP has been corroborated in double- blinded and successive multi-site clinical trials.
The Company is also accelerating its work on its Blood-Brain Barrier Compound Delivery Platform that has been independently verified to shuttle compounds across the Blood-Brain Barrier. Our research and that of others has shown that p97 can be linked to molecules, both large and small, and act like a Trojan horse to shuttle those molecules across the Blood-Brain Barrier.
Forward Looking Statements
Certain statements in this press release contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 or forward-looking information under applicable Canadian securities legislation that may not be based on historical fact, including without limitation statements containing the words "believe", "may", "plan", "will", "estimate", "continue", "anticipate", "intend", "expect" and similar expressions. Such forward-looking statements or information involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause our actual results, events or developments, or industry results, to be materially different from any future results, events or developments express or implied by such forward-looking statements or information. Such factors include, among others, our stage of development, lack of any product revenues, additional capital requirements, risk associated with the completion of clinical trials and obtaining regulatory approval to market our products, the ability to protect our intellectual property, dependence on collaborative partners and the prospects for negotiating additional corporate collaborations or licensing arrangements and their timing. Specifically, certain risks and uncertainties that could cause such actual events or results expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements and information to differ materially from any future events or results expressed or implied by such statements and information include, but are not limited to, the risks and uncertainties that: we may not be able to successfully develop and obtain regulatory approval for p97 as a Physician's Aid to Diagnose Alzheimer's, or future products in our targeted corporate objectives; our future operating results are uncertain and likely to fluctuate; we may not be able to raise additional capital; we may not be successful in establishing additional corporate collaborations or licensing arrangements; we may not be able to establish marketing and the costs of launching our products may be greater than anticipated; we have no experience in commercial manufacturing; we may face unknown risks related to intellectual property matters; we face increased competition from pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies; and other factors as described in detail in our filings with the Canadian securities regulatory authorities at www.sedar.com. Given these risks and uncertainties, you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements and information, which are qualified in their entirety by this cautionary statement. All forward-looking statements and information made herein are based on our current expectations and we undertake no obligation to revise or update such forward-looking statements and information to reflect subsequent events or circumstances, except as required by law.
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