Thinking of the what to call this week's blog, I was brought back to the times when one would watch an old mystery show on TV (and no I am not THAT old, but still remember this) when each episode would end saying, "And now, here is the aftermath of their story." Sort of has a dark connotation to it but in our case, it could not be further from that thought. You may ask how does BioSurfaces follow up a productive and eventful week that saw the company receive the prestigious KidneyX award and learn that our graft technology was accepted for presentation at a major surgical conference. Hard to top that, right? In reality, last week is setting off a lot of work to make sure that what we do on a daily basis gets out to you (well, what we can share). Let's face it, it's what kicked off this blog (thanks to my son Cameron for giving me a kick in the butt to get this started).
To start this week, we really focused on spreading the word about these honors. In a small company, you wear many hats from President to researcher to taking out the trash, etc. You get the gist. A portion of this week required us to put on our marketing hat, reaching out to many online and traditional news outlets along with state and local representatives. I truly believe that being the only MA company selected for this award and having 2 applications in the top 15% is a great accomplishment and really exemplifies the great work that the folks at this company are doing. Tina and I are very proud to be part of this group. We have a few irons in the fire and will update in a future blog should some things come to fruition.
We continue to seek potential strategic partners/investors for different aspects of our technology such as the access graft. Raising capital is one of the largest obstacles that faces any small medical device business. We had a promising meeting with a leading dialysis company this week. Coming on the heels of the news, it could not have happened at a better time. We also scheduled a meeting with a medical device investment group next month and have several more meetings with potential strategic partners lined up. While nothing is a given by any stretch, it is great to have various groups interested. Stay tuned!
We also spent a significant amount of this week focused on our ongoing research and development efforts with Takeda (gastrointestinal), the National Institutes of Health (in vitro diagnostics), Edwards Lifesciences (cardiac), and Children’s Hospital/NanoGraphene (neuromodulation). We have other programs that are starting to take shape but are early in the process. No details about the specific programs can be shared, but all of these programs are at different stages, from prototype development through preclinical assessment. We also met with our clinical partners from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center to initiate planning for the KidneyX program. Great progress made from this meeting. We look forward to executing on the plan.
Looking forward to see what next week brings...
Have a great weekend!
Matt