Multimillion Dollar Carrots for Stem Cell Research in California

Posted: May 23, 2013 at 6:30 pm

Directors of the California stem cell
agency approved an $80 million business-friendly plan that will
dangle multimillion dollar carrots before biotech firms in an effort
to push therapies into the marketplace.

The upfront payment effort will allow
CIRM to take part in early stage clinical trials at no risk and could
generate a list of achievements that will be useful in creating
support for fresh funding after CIRM's money runs out in 2017.
The proposal is the first-ever from
CIRM that involves no upfront payments. Instead, recipients will have
to meet agreed-upon criteria to receive either grants or loans.
A CIRM staff document said,

“The major development milestone and
success criteria will be mutually agreed upon between CIRM and the
applicant at the beginning of the project(s) and at a minimum will
require completion of a clinical trial that shows some level of
biological activity/clinical efficacy and safety. The advantage to
CIRM of this...is that CIRM funds will only be applied to projects
that are successful.”

The proposal was wrapped into what the
agency calls its strategic partnership plan, which also has a more
conventional aspect, providing loans and grants in advance.
As part of the program, the CIRM board
also today approved a $6.4 million award to Sangamo BioSciences of
Richmond, Ca., to help develop a therapy for
beta-thalassemia. The firm will have to match the amount of the
award.

Source:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/uqpFc/~3/uJidDBHhPdI/multimillion-dollar-carrots-for-stem.html

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