BioScale Announces Company Name Change to ProterixBio and New Focus on Pulmonary Diagnostics and Disease Management

BILLERICA, Mass., May 3, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- BioScale, Inc. today announced that the company is changing its name to ProterixBio, Inc.   The name change reflects a new strategic direction centered on high value clinical applications including diagnostics products and disease management services.

ProterixBio is developing innovative products to transform the management of chronic diseases, with the initial applications focusing on pulmonary diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), cystic fibrosis and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). 

Chronic diseases such as COPD - which affects over 12+ million people in the US alone - impact the productivity and quality of life of millions of individuals and represent a significant portion of global health care spending.

"ProterixBio seeks to transform chronic disease management by integrating novel bioclinical analytics with supporting digital health technologies," said Grace E. Colon, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of ProterixBio.  "New approaches are needed to improve both the effectiveness and the efficiency of caring for these patients.  At ProterixBio, we are striving to improve health outcomes by combining our proprietary, comprehensive biological assessments with tools that proactively engage patients, clinicians and caregivers in the management of disease."

The company has made significant progress toward these new goals, including:

• Recruitment of a world-class scientific advisory board composed of experts in pulmonary and inflammatory diseases and diagnostics
• Establishment of a number of collaborations with leading institutions to gain access to high quality retrospective and prospective patient samples supporting development of a pipeline of complex diagnostic tests
• Rapid development of a growing number of validated, high quality pulmonary and inflammatory biomarker assays
• Plans for conversion of assay development facilities into GLP- and CLIA-ready labs
• Engagement with thought leaders and providers of digital health technologies and new health care delivery and disease management models

"I am excited to be working with the ProterixBio team to develop next generation pulmonary disease management approaches," said Dr. Patricia Finn, Professor and Chair of Medicine of the University of Illinois, Chicago School of Medicine and former President of the American Thoracic Society. "The community needs additional tools to assess pulmonary patients and to provide more integrated healthcare solutions."

"Clinicians and investigators are continuously looking for new ways to better phenotype our patients with serious pulmonary diseases, including COPD and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis," said Dr. Fernando Martinez, Executive Vice Chair of the Joan and Sandy Weill Department of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College.  "We look forward to collaborating with ProterixBio on clinical studies designed to test their biomarker hypothesis in order to better assess our COPD patients and manage their disease.  These approaches will enhance the evolving view highlighting the importance of personalized or precision medicine."  

To advance this important mission, ProterixBio has assembled a Scientific Advisory Board consisting of leading international physician scientists and experienced industry leaders in the pulmonary and related disease space. In addition to Dr. Finn the other members of ProterixBio's SAB are Drs. Paul Billings (formerly Chief Medical Officer of Life Technologies, Carlsbad, CA), Craig Gerard (Chief of Respiratory Diseases at Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA), Robert Stockley (Professor of Medicine, University Hospital Birmingham, U.K.), Christian Weber (Professor and Director, Institute for Cardiovascular Prevention, Munich, Germany) and Wisia Wedzicha (Professor of Respiratory Medicine, Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College, London, U.K.).

In addition to a number of other leading technologies, ProterixBio is leveraging the ViBE® platform, a novel protein measurement technology enabling clinically sensitive and specific automated Acoustic Immunoassays™, to enable its bioassay infrastructure.   The platform's solution phase assay, sensitivity, reproducibility, automated detection process and unique ability to measure biomarkers directly in complex samples (such as sputum) provide key competitive advantages in the rapid development and validation of complex biomarker panels.  In addition to in-house development efforts, ProterixBio is leveraging its pulmonary infrastructure to collaborate with biopharma companies developing new treatments for pulmonary disorders.

While ProterixBio is currently focused primarily on pulmonary diseases, the company's unique platform and expertise are easily applied to other disease areas.  In particular, other diagnostic opportunities are currently being explored in neurodegenerative and oncologic diseases.

About ProterixBio

ProterixBio develops and commercializes disease management solutions that integrate novel bioclinical analytics with digital tools to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of chronic disease care.  The company is dedicated to leveraging its innovative approach and differentiated expertise to build transformative disease management platforms.  ProterixBio's initial focus is on pulmonary diseases such as COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), which affects more than 12 million Americans.  ProterixBio is headquartered in Billerica, Mass. For additional information, please visit www.proterixbio.com.

Contact:

Cook Williams Communications, Inc.
Jennifer Williams
[email protected]
(360) 668-3701

SOURCE BioScale, Inc.

Related Links

http://www.proterixbio.com