Likarda scaling up biotech research firm with $4M angel boost, new lab
Summary
They cant hold their urine.Likarda, a Kansas City biotech research startup, has developed a better way to manage diabetes in dogs, using an injectable transplant and patented coating system, Stehno-Bittel said. The moves allow Likarda to significantly scale up its operations as it prepares to take its technology to market.Our biggest competitor for our animal product is euthanasia. Stehno-Bittel said.Likardas cell therapy treatment works to counteract diabetes destruction of insulin-producing islet cells within an animals pancreas, said Karthik Ramachandran, vice president and co-founder of Likarda.Theres actually a way to take a pancreas from a donor, process out those microscopic cell clusters, and we turn it into an injectable, Ramachandran said.The reaggregated transplant clusters, which Likarda has patented as the Kanslet, can be infused into animals with diabetes annually or more frequently, depending on the specific situation of the individual pet, he said.We were looking at basically reinventing the islet taking something thats native, but re-engineering it for success, Ramachandran said.An outgrowth of the Bioscience and Technology Business Center on the KU Medical Center campus, Likarda was founded in 2012. It quickly began turning a profit thanks to the firms work as a contract researcher for other companies from startups to Big Pharma, Ramachandran said.Using automated technology and the firms in-house expertise, Likarda is able to outsource work that customers cant do internally because of their own manpower, financial and time restraints, he said.Thats really where Likarda excels as a small business: Keeping costs low and yet being able to produce a final product at a quicker rate, Ramachandran said.Having that revenue stream along with the support of family and friends allowed the regenerative medicine firm not only to establish itself, but to develop its technologies and methods more quickly and efficiently, Stehno-Bittel said.You walk through that lab, and were not writing an app on a computer here, she said. The coating in the form of a tiny, caviar-like bead prevents the bodys immune system from destroying the transplant before it can take effect, Ramachandran explained.Not only can we use it for our treatments, but other companies can make large strides in bringing their cell therapies to market using our gels, he said.Internally, Likarda also is working to develop methods of creating its diabetes-treating cell clusters from stem cells, rather than relying on donor pancreata, Ramachandran said, which could increase production from hundreds of doses a year to thousands.One limiting factor with transplants is that you need a donor, just like in humans, he said, noting a single transplant could require two or three donors.