Directors of the $12 billion California stem cell agency will consider a plan on Wednesday to strengthen its support of emerging companies, expand its portfolio and effectively increase the size of its awards.
The proposal would further cement the agency’s and the state of California’s role as an early-stage “angel” investor in fledgling stem cell and gene therapy companies.
The effort involves changes in the agency’s co-funding program which requires companies to match a certain percentage (20 to 40 percent) of the total cost of a research award made to them by the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) as the stem cell and gene therapy research program is officially known.
The amounts of required co-funding can range from hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars.
The proposal would allow recipients to use stock warrants instead of cash to meet the co-funding requirements. That would ease the immediate financial impact on companies having to come up with cash to receive an award for clinical trials and translational stage research.
Warrants give the holder (CIRM) the right to buy a specific number of shares of a company’s stock at a predetermined price within a certain time frame. CIRM is banned by the state Constitution from owning stock. CIRM, however, can sell the warrants it holds.
(For the history of the ban, see this item on the California Stem Cell Report: “Tentacles, Railroads and California Stem Cell Finances: Looking for Greater Returns.”
The theory behind the warrant plan is that it would widen the net, drawing in more companies to increase the likelihood of creating the “miracle” treatments that voters were led to expect by the ballot campaign that created the research program in 2004. So far, CIRM has not yet funded a stem cell or gene therapy that is available to the general public.
The proposal grew out of discussions last year, including a meeting last December of the CIRM directors’ IP and Industry Subcommittee, chaired by CIRM board member Steve Juelsgaard, former executive vice president of Genentech. The subcommittee meets at 9:30 a.m. PST on Wednesday to consider the latest warrant proposal.
“The issue that we were seeing is that, particularly for some of the very young companies, those that are still in the angel investing round or whatever, some of them were simply not able to come up with the amount of money needed for co-funding to be able to participate in the cirm programs,” Juelsgaard told the subcommittee last year.
(The transcript of that meeting can be found here. The slides presented at the time, which are different than the latest ones, can be found here.)
One test of whether a warrant approach would be productive is whether companies publicly support the matter on Wednesday. Last December, only 82 persons viewed the subcommittee’s online meeting. No representatives from companies spoke in favor of the warrant concept. In fact, other than CIRM officials, no one spoke for or against it.
Of course, CIRM probably has some idea privately of companies that might be receptive to using warrants instead of cash.
Information about the warrant proposal, including a term sheet, has been available on the CIRM website since Oct. 30. While CIRM has not posted background information for some of its meetings in a timely fashion, the term sheet and presentation slides came well ahead of the Nov. 8 meeting.
It is unclear whether CIRM has notified any companies that the proposal is being considered. Instructions for participating in the online meeting can be found on the agenda.
From the California Stem Cell Report
Californians were stupid to approve this.
I have given up hope in America. Last night’s election results were terrible for the country and for conservatives. The whole country is majority liberal now, and that will only strengthen in years ahead. Look at the protests in favor of Hamas. Look at the rise of antisemitism. Look at the corruption in the Democrat Party that goes unpunished and ignored by elite media. This country has gone off the rails, and it’s not getting back on track.
In my opinion, conservative political campaigning by Catholics is a waste of time and effort and money. I will never donate money to a political cause again, and that includes pro-life political causes. It’s money down the drain, into the hands of nonprofit executives. It doesn’t attain the aim for which it is intended. I’d rather spend that money on myself like going out to a nice dinner or buying books than give it away to a political campaign that will fail.
RIP America.
What percentage of American colonists were in favor of independence from the Crown?
2/3 were pretty much in favor, 1/3 were not. A great many of the latter moved to Canada.
RIP, I’m not sure you are correct in your conclusions about yesterday’s voting results. In Ohio for example the vote to codify abortion in the state’s constitution won by 52% +\-. That means that a lot of Republicans voted for it. I doubt, however, that those same Republicans would vote for a Democrat governor or senator. In looking at recent votes about abortions, it might be more accurate to say that a majority of Americans are in favor of abortion – at least up to a point – but can still be staunch conservatives on a lot of other issues. Just my guess at this time.
It is pointless, even tedious, for Christians to waste their time complaining about the world, about society, about everything that is not right. Complaints change nothing. Let us remember that complaining is the second door that closes us off from the Holy Spirit, as I said on Pentecost Sunday. The first is narcissism, the second discouragement, the third pessimism. Narcissism makes you look at yourself constantly in a mirror; discouragement leads to complaining and pessimism to thinking everything is dark and bleak. These three attitudes close the door to the Holy Spirit.
Pope Francis
https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/homilies/2020/documents/papa-francesco_20200629_omelia-pallio.html
it’s been a waste of money from the beginning.
it will continue to be a waste of money to the bitter end.
ain’t no complaint – just fact. .