Tissue Regenix H1 losses creep up as it ramps-up for US launch

8th Oct 2013 09:17

First half losses increased slightly at regenerative medicine specialist Tissue Regenix as it drove its products further towards commercialisation with several senior appointments made in the US. The pre-revenue company generated losses of £2.3m for the six months to July 31st that were in line with broker expectations and up from the £1.8m produced in the same period last year.Tissue Regenix increased development spending and made senior appointments in sales, marketing, clinical affairs and operations as it ramps up for the US commercial launch of DermaPure in the first half of 2014.DermaPure is the company's human decellularised dermis product for chronic wounds, where donor tissue from a human is decellularised to make it compatible with the tissue in the patient.With cash and equivalents standing at £21.7m at the period end, down from £26.1m a year before, Managing Director Antony Odell was well satisfied with progress."We have achieved a number of critical milestones in the past six months and we are focusing on taking the most effective route to open up new international markets for our dCELL products by working with our partners to develop new treatments using our decellularisation technology."Odell pointed to "significant strides" made in building the group's US subsidiary, Tissue Regenix Wound Care, with an agreement with Community Tissue Services, one of the USA's largest tissue banks, to manufacture DermaPure,.Broker Panmure Gordon was excited by news of positive final clinical data on DermaPure's technology in collaboration with the NHS, where more than half of patients involved in the first trial for chronic leg ulcers had their wounds completely healed. Analyst Savvas Neophytou said: "Chronic leg ulcer treatment is a large and fast growing market and should help DermaPure produce a compelling profile for market penetration in due course." The company also pointed to successful pre-clinical trials on pig dCELL meniscus cartilage that certified the product safe for use and pave the way for regulatory submission to secure approval to start clinical studies in Europe.Neophytou added that, with the tissue engineering market worth circa $1bn and forecast to grow at 6% driven by a shortage in donor organ supply and the need to treat chronic wounds, the company was a potential bid target in the future."The company's platform is essentially lower risk that many biopharmaceutical companies as it looks to solve well defined shortcomings in the tissue engineering field without relying on risky breakthrough technologies such as stem cell technologies or biomolecules (e.g. growth factors and proteins that stimulate cell growth). The company's platform is essentially a materials play in this exciting new field. "Overall, development in recent months seems to be taking slightly longer than had previously anticipated but the platform remains valuable and, in our view, will ultimately attract a trade bid."Shares in TRX were up 2.5% to 10.13p at 12:389 on Tuesday. OH