US start-up NemaRx relocates to Calgary

Inno-centre Alberta (ICA) has reeled in a highly promising US pharmaceutical start-up to its business development mentoring program. NemaRx Pharmaceuticals Inc (formerly NemaGain) pushes the number of firms accepted into the program to nine in less than two years (R$, October 24/01). With less than five employees, NemRx possesses intellectual property with an impressive pedigree, including a Nobel Prize winner amongst its co-founders. Dr Robert Horvitz is co-recipient of the 2002 Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine. Co-founder Dr Andreas Wissmann has relocated to Calgary and will serve as the new firm’s president/CEO. NemaRx’s technol-ogy platform is based on screening technology considered well suited to treating neurodegenerative diseases. It is currently used to test compounds of nematodes. According to ICA president/CEO Susan Miller, the firm’s founders decided upon relocation based on her firm’s mentoring program, as well as potential support from Genome Prairie, the Industrial Research Assistance Program and the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research….