Healthcare investor Netscientific PLC’s (LON:NSCI) portfolio company ProAxsis has further strengthened its intellectual property portfolio after securing a second licensing agreement with the Queen’s University of Belfast.
The agreement gives ProAxsis the exclusive intellectual property rights for its ProteaseTag technology, which enables the measurement of active protease biomarkers of disease.
The new deal is expected to support ProAxsis in the development of additional point-of-care tests and assays.
NetScientific chief executive, François Martelet, said: “ProAxsis is approaching a point where it will be able to commercialise its NEATstik point of care test based on the ProteaseTags technology.
Deal ‘builds value’ of ProteaseTag
“This agreement, which strengthens the company's intellectual property portfolio, puts ProAxsis in a great position to launch further immunoassays and point of care tests and build the value of this technology.”
ProAxsis chief executive David Ribeiro added: “These modified ProteaseTags are more suited to some of our ongoing protease biomarker targets and the company looks forward to launching further immunoassays and point-of-care tests in the near future.”
Technology originally developed at Queen’s
A first licensing agreement was penned back in 2013 when ProAxsis was spun out from Queen’s, where the technology behind PoteaseTag was initially developed.
This allowed ProAxsis to commercialise its first product which measured neutrophil elastase, a leading indicator of lung infection and inflammation in patients with chronic respiratory diseases.