Cardium Announces Patent Award For Rights To Cardiovascular Gene Therapy For The Treatment Of Heart Disease

Resolves Long-standing Competition with Boston Scientific Corporation Over Rights to Cardiovascular Gene Therapy in the U.S. and Europe

Commenting on the October 25 approval by the European Commission for its gene therapy, Glybera®, Dutch biotech company uniQure said Monday it plans to start selling Glybera in Europe by mid-2013 and predicted a boom of similar therapies.  The EC approval marks Glybera as the first gene therapy to be approved in the Western world.

“We believe that after Glybera’s approval gene therapy is at the beginning of a period of rapid growth similar to the development of the antibody business in the last decade,” said Joern Aldag, Chief Executive Officer at uniQure.

Late in September, a comprehensive report by Global Industry Analysts, Inc. stated that the global nutraceutical market will cross $243 Billion by 2015, “owing to consumer desire for leading a healthy life and increasing scientific evidence supporting health foods.”

The research firm also attributes the strong growth rate to an aging population and rising healthcare costs as catalysts for the neutraceutical industry that it calls “one of the brightest spots in a global market suffering from its worst economic crisis.”