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AAIPharma Raises $30 Million through Rights Offering
Chapel Hill-based AAIPharma Inc. (www.aaipharma.com) has raised $30 million by way of a rights offering to existing shareholders and option holders. The offering was backstopped by a group of principal shareholders led by JPMorgan. The proceeds will be used to accelerate and enhance the development and growth of the company’s core service business.

AAIPharma Inc. is a global provider of product development and support services to the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device industries. From a single test through a range of integrated service offerings, we create value to an industry in search of productivity and innovation.

AAIPharma is a CED member.

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Hosted Solutions Acquires Boston Datacenters, Inc.
Raleigh-based Hosted Solutions (www.hostedsolutions.com), a provider of managed hosting and data center services, has acquisition Boston Datacenters, Inc.  The acquisition will bring one of the fastest growing East Coast managed service providers into the Boston area and will provide New England companies with one of the only facilities able to handle the power and cooling needs of a wide range of companies. 

Hosted Solutions also runs three SAS 70 Type II certified data centers located in Charlotte, Cary and Raleigh.  Not only will the company provide managed hosting and collocation services to Boston Datacenter customers, but Hosted Solutions will also offer dedicated servers, managed storage, managed load balancing, business continuity and managed security services.  The technical infrastructure of the Boston location will be interconnected with Hosted Solutions’ North Carolina sites at the network core. 

Hosted Solutions is a CED member.

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N.C. Biotechnology Center Launches New Grant Program
The RTP-based North Carolina Biotechnology Center (www.ncbiotech.org), the world's first government-sponsored organization dedicated to developing the biotechnology industry, has announced a new grant program that will provide up to $75,000 in individual grants to universities and non-profit institutes throughout the state.  The program is designed to help bioscience researchers in the state to “kick-start” their work.

The purpose of grant revenue is to help generate preliminary data that will attract investors with the ultimate goal of commercializing their technology.  Biotechnology Research Grants are available to principal investigators at any North Carolina academic or nonprofit research institution, except those at the main campuses of Duke University, North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. 

The North Carolina Biotech Center is a CED member.

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Inspire Expands Allergy Product Portfolio with Phase 3 Compound
Durham-based Inspire Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (www.inspirepharm.com) and FAES Farma, S.A. has signed a licensing agreement for the U.S. and Canadian development and commercialization of bilastine, a Phase 3 oral antihistamine compound for the treatment or prevention of allergic rhinitis, a condition affecting approximately 40 million people in the United States. Under the terms of the agreement, Inspire has acquired exclusive rights to further develop and commercialize oral formulations of bilastine in the United States and Canada, as well as the exclusive right to develop and commercialize the ocular formulation in various markets worldwide.

The agreement provides that Inspire will pay FAES an upfront license fee of $7 million and up to an additional $82 million of payments, contingent upon achievement of various development, regulatory and sales milestones. Inspire will also pay a royalty of 14-16% on net sales of the oral formulations of bilastine in the United States and Canada, if approved by regulatory authorities.

Inspire Pharmaceuticals is a CED member.

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Argos Therapeutics Awarded NIH Contract to Further Develop HIV Immunotherapy Candidates
Durham-based Argos Therapeutics (www.argostherapeutics.com), a private biotechnology company, was awarded a $21 million contract to develop novel HIV immunotherapy candidates from the National Institutes of Health.  Personalized, RNA-loaded dendritic cell immunotherapy products designed to train the patient’s immune system to target and destroy unique features of their disease are being developed by Argos. 

The goal of the multi-million dollar contract is to determine the immunogenicity of Argos’ HIV immunotherapy candidate, currently in clinical trials, and subsequently develop even more potent next-generation product candidates. 

Argos Therapeutics is a CED member.

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Covelight Systems and Digital Resolve Form Strategic Alliance
Cary-based Covelight Systems (www.covelight.com), a provider of actionable user information, and Digital Resolve have entered into a strategic partnership providing financial services institutions with the industry’s most non-intrusive solution for fraud detection and user authentication.  With this combined approach, financial services organizations will have a crystal clear picture of both current and previous online user behavior, enabling the highest level of fraud prevention for online transactions. 

The technological partnership combines Covelight’s Inflight online monitoring solution with Digital Resolve’s Fraud Analyst risk-based authentication platform to deliver the most in-depth, yet non-intrusive, solution for real-time fraud detection and user authentication. The combination offers benefits such as proven, enterprise-wide threat detection capabilities in real-time, non-invasive deployment and preservation of the normal user experience. 

Covelight Systems is a CED member.

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Peak 10 Renews Agreement with LendingTree
Charlotte-based Peak 10 (www.peak10.com), a data center operator and managed services provider, has renewed its service agreement with LendingTree, LLC. The leading independent data center operator and managed services company will continue to host the LendingTree online lending exchange out of its data center in Charlotte. 

Since inception, LendingTree has facilitated more than 20 million loan requests and $152 billion in closed loan transactions.  Peak 10 provides data center services that improve reliability, lower costs, and maximize internal resources while keeping an organization’s valuable information technology assets close to the business. 

Peak 10 is a CED member.

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Announcing the Establishment of the North Carolina Association for Advanced Learning Technology (NCALTA)
North Carolina educators, scientists and business executives have joined together to provide thought leadership and collaboration in this area through the formation of a new organization known as the North Carolina Association for Advanced Learning Technologies (NCALTA).  NCALTA will provide a vital network and bridge between educators, legislators and technology developers regarding the use and creation of Advanced Learning Technologies. 

NCALTA aims to advance research and multidisciplinary collaboration on the innovative paradigms, architectures and implementations of learning systems for adaptive learning related to STEM education (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), mobile learning, life-long learning, just-in-time, and on-demand learning. 

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Events Update

10/07 Entrepreneurs Only Workshop™: Marketing vs. Selling
10/07 FastTrac® TechVenture™ - Training and Mentoring for Startups
10/16 Member-only Backyard Barbeque

 

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