You Say You Want a Revolution. . .
Source: Patrick Cox, The Daily Reckoning  (12/13/12)
"As investors, we have a huge opportunity to invest in early-stage, revolutionary companies working on plant- and animal-based health solutions that bypass the lengthy and extremely expensive FDA approval process." More >

Two Biotech Names Without the Microcap Roller Coaster
Source: George S. Mack of The Life Sciences Report  (12/13/12)
Investors familiar with Zacks Investment Research know that the company is small-cap focused and that it leans heavily toward companies that don't get much coverage from Wall Street. The idea is to produce the kind of sophisticated research you might find in the more recognizable names that get aired on financial television and other media. Battered and forgotten names can be interesting for investors willing to take another look, and biotech can be a particularly rich field for investors looking for turnaround ideas. In fact, this is where Zacks Senior Biotechnology Analyst Jason Napodano is at home. He's not afraid to go all-in with ideas that are anathema to the Street. More >

Cliff Spells Danger for Biotechs
Source: Alex Philippidis, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News  (12/12/12)
"If Obama and Congress cannot agree, key agencies face cuts while tax changes would dampen new investment." More >

Top 14 Abused Prescription Drugs
Source: Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News  (12/11/12)
"Celebrities ranging from Michael Jackson to Rush Limbaugh and from Heath Ledger to Elvis Presley have battled (and, in many cases, lost the battle with) prescription drug addiction. So, which prescription drugs are the biggest culprits?" More >

Breaking Down a Biotech Winner
Source: Alex Daley, Casey Research  (12/11/12)
"The cancer research arena has been exploding over the past few years with the goal of developing more targeted, less-toxic therapies—in other words, to do a better job killing cancer cells while leaving healthy cells alone. More >

Ross Silver on How to Find the Perfect Combo of Biotech Science and Market Savvy
Source: George S. Mack of The Life Sciences Report   (12/6/12)
Many components go into building a successful biotech company, but excellent management is a keystone. Combine good management with an innovative product or service, and investors can possibly unlock big multiples over their original investments. So says Principal Analyst and Fund Manager Ross Silver, co-founder of Vista Partners. In this interview with The Life Sciences Report, Silver brings obscure micro-cap ideas to life and discusses why they may have mammoth potential. More >

Drug Companies Exert Greater Influence on Development
Source: Patricia Dimond, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News  (12/6/12)
"In the face of the extraordinary time and cost pressures, companies are making changes to improve R&D efficiency, addressing those factors within their control, such as dumping drug candidates that clearly don't have a chance of making it." More >

Letting Biotech Companies 'Patent Nature' Could Be a Huge Boon for Investors
Source: Michael A. Robinson, Money Morning  (12/6/12)
"Clearly the courts have a vested interest in making sure that American firms continue to get the protections they need to justify spending so much time, money and effort to design new products. On the other hand, the plaintiffs raise a point in this case that cuts to the heart of biotech research—can a company really lay claim to a gene?" More >

Open Innovation in the Pharma Industry
Source: Sue Pearson, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News  (12/5/12)
"As many big pharmas are maturing they have become more akin to manufacturing organizations with less internal innovation. This is where accessing science from academic centers of excellence and SMEs can help, and delegates at the conference believe many pharmas are now altering their business model and will increasingly access innovation in drug discovery from external sources." More >

Biotechs Urged to Weigh in as Supreme Court Considers Myriad
Source: Marie Powers, BioWorld  (12/4/12)
"A high court that is decidedly unfriendly toward patent rights also could be leaning toward arguments by the American Civil Liberties Union, on behalf of the Association for Molecular Pathology, and amicus briefs filed by numerous citizens groups contending that patenting gene technology will halt the movement toward personalized medicine." More >

Supreme Court Will Decide Whether Human Genes Are Patentable
Source: Bloomberg, Greg Stohr and Susan Decker  (11/30/12)
"Biotechnology companies say they have been getting patents on genes for 30 years and can't attract investment dollars unless they can protect their research from competitors. The central legal question is whether isolated DNA is a product of nature and thus ineligible for patent protection." More >

Testing, Testing: Analyst Kevin DeGeeter on Five Good Bets in Cancer Diagnostics
Source: George S. Mack of The Life Sciences Report  (11/29/12)
Because margins in diagnostics and life sciences tools tend to decline over time, the industry is all about scale. The goal is either to develop novel products or tests with high profit potential, or to acquire them. Another strategy is to develop economies of scale through consolidation. In this interview with The Life Sciences Report, Kevin DeGeeter, senior analyst and director of healthcare research for Ladenburg Thalmann, has singled out five important companies with exciting business models or products. More >

Lessons from the Liver Meeting: Sagient's John Tucker Names Companies that Could Reignite the Hepatitis C Industry
Source: George S. Mack of The Life Sciences Report   (11/29/12)
The hepatitis C (HCV) market was white hot in 2011 and through the beginning of 2012, but investors have gotten the message that new HCV drugs are not going to rival cancer and cardiovascular drugs for profits. In this interview with The Life Sciences Report, analyst John Tucker of Sagient Research discusses a handful of stocks that could benefit from new, patient-friendly HCV therapies with enough revenue to propel shares upward. More >

Invest in the Great Progress of Hepatitis C
Source: George S. Mack of The Life Sciences Report  (11/29/12)
There are a lot of drug candidates in company pipelines for hepatitis C (HCV). In fact, your head could spin as you recite the product code number and letter combinations. I spoke with Sagient Research Analyst John Tucker who had just gotten back from Boston where he attended the 63rd Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD), known as "The Liver Meeting." Of course the focus and buzz around the conference was the most recent developments surrounding HCV. "There has been tremendous progress in that particular area and a lot of interest in that progress," he says. "At the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) meeting six months ago we really saw the first detailed presentations of treatment regimens without interferon, which is a very lengthy, uncomfortable and unpleasant process. This was an almost watershed moment at EASL." More >

Gilead Leaps to First with Phase 3 Success for All-Oral Hepatitis C Drug Program
Source: Ryan McBride, Fierce Biotech  (11/27/12)
"Gilead Sciences is sprinting ahead with initial positive results from a Phase 3 study for what could be a first all-oral combination therapy for certain patients with chronic hepatitis C virus in the U.S." More >

As Pharmas Seek Innovation, Biotechs Eye Bigger Stick
Source: Marie Powers, BioWorld  (11/26/12)
"Pharmas have a five- to eight-year period to 'maximize the molecule' by translating their R&D programs into value in the marketplace or risk obsolescence. That's an area where biotechs can potentially enhance the return on investment, particularly in technologies such as therapeutic vaccines, stem cells and tissue replacement." More >

Is Genetically Modified Food Killing Us?
Source: Alex Daley, The Daily Reckoning  (11/26/12)
"Opinion papers like this—while not to be confused with conclusions resulting from solid research—are a critically important part of the scientific process. Professors Carman and Heinemann provide a very important public good in challenging the strength of the due diligence process for RNAi's use in agriculture." More >

FSD Drugs Advance as Women Push for Equal Access
Source: Alex Philippidis, Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News  (11/26/12)
"The market for female sexual dysfunction (FSD) drugs is believed larger than the market for male sexual dysfunction treatments (estimates range from $4-5B), since the percentage of women with FSD between ages 18 and 59 (43%, according to some studies) is higher than that for men (34%)." More >

As Drug Industry's Influence over Research Grows, So Does Potential Bias
Source: Peter Whoriskey, Washington Post  (11/24/12)
"The New England Journal of Medicine is not alone in featuring research sponsored in large part by drug companies—it has become a common practice that reflects the growing role of industry money in research." More >

Michael Berry Applies His 10 Discovery Investing Factors to Biotech
Source: George S. Mack of The Life Sciences Report  (11/20/12)
Discovering how and why a famed natural resource investor would begin to apply himself vigorously to biotechnology stocks is fascinating. Take Michael Berry, founder and managing director of Discovery Investing, for example. Berry doesn't shy away from high-risk biotech plays because he loves the feel of hitting a grand slam right out of the park, even if that doesn't happen often. Berry brings his expertise toThe Life Sciences Report in this interview, sharing his best ideas and describing how he applies his Ten Discovery Investing Factors to some very sophisticated biotech companies. More >

When I Saw This Bionic Skin, All I Could Say Was 'Wow'
Source: Michael Robinson, Money Morning  (11/20/12)
"The potential for products--and profits--is tremendous. We're talking applications in medicine, electronics, construction and even aircraft." More >

The Long and the Short of DNA Sequencing
Source: Patricia Dimond, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News  (11/20/12)
"With advances in second-generation sequencing technologies, genome studies have produced an explosion of sequence data at a fraction of earlier costs." More >

Breakthrough Nanoparticle Halts Multiple Sclerosis in Mice, Offers Hope for Other Immune-Related Diseases
Source: Science Daily  (11/18/12)
"Nanoparticles have many advantages. They can be readily produced in a laboratory and standardized for manufacturing. They would make the potential therapy cheaper and more accessible to a general population." More >

One (Biotech) Ring to Rule Them All
Source: John Mauldin, Investor Insight.com; Patrick Cox, Breakthrough Technology Alert  (11/17/12)
"We are just at the beginning of a biotech revolution that will astound and amaze. Enough said." More >

Getting Cancer Immunotherapeutics Approved
Source: Patricia Dimond, Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News  (11/15/12)
"While biologically based therapeutic cancer vaccines and other cancer immunotherapies have great promise in treating certain cancers, getting to 'yes' for FDA approval is likely to remain challenging." More >