Arteriocyte, a leading clinical-stage biotechnology company with offices in Cleveland and Hopkinton, Mass., has been awarded a $1 million grant by the Ohio Department of Development's Third Frontier Commission. The company, which develops proprietary stem cell and tissue engineering based therapies, will use the grant for the development and commercialization of hematopoietic stem cell expansion for clinical applications.

The move is part of the Ohio Third Frontier Biomedical Program to accelerate the company's Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP) of its NANEX technology for clinical use under the product name HemaEx.

"The technology takes a small amount of stem cells and gets a large amount of stem cells," explains Adam Sorkin, Arteriocyte's director of research and development. "We are converting our existing process that is suitable for research to a process that is suitable for use in humans.".

Arteriocyte's therapies help find cures for chronic heart disease and peripheral artery disease, among other diseases.

The company, which was founded in 2004 as a spin-off out of CWRU, has seen rapid growth in the past couple of years, going from four employees to 80. The expansion will create between 15 and 20 jobs in the production facility.


Source: Adam Sorkin
Writer: Karin Connelly