Microbiome startup sells off assets; Faron’s PhI/II data in bone marrow cancer; AM Pharma touts biomarker results

Mi­cro­bio­me start­up sells as­sets, goes dark: Fed­er­a­tion Bio sold some of its as­sets and erased its web­site three years since emerg­ing with $50 mil­lion. Kan­vas Bio­sciences, an­oth­er mi­cro­bio­me start­up, said Wednes­day that it bought two of Fed­er­a­tion’s in­ves­ti­ga­tion­al ther­a­peu­tics, a mi­cro­bial li­brary and oth­er IP. It al­so gained ac­cess to a cell bank­ing op­er­a­tion in South San Fran­cis­co and poached Fed­er­a­tion’s sci­ence chief Lee Swem, nam­ing him chief de­vel­op­ment of­fi­cer. Ven­rock, Hori­zons Ven­tures and oth­er firms had bankrolled Fed­er­a­tion’s plans to take gut bac­te­ria and poop to make ther­a­pies for in­flam­ma­to­ry bow­el dis­ease, a rare meta­bol­ic dis­or­der known as en­teric hy­per­ox­aluria and can­cer pa­tients who don’t ben­e­fit from cer­tain im­munother­a­pies. — Kyle LaHu­cik

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