Expert Financial Analysis and Reporting

Overview of This Week’s Report This week I published a major report on Alimera Sciences and pSivida which led to my recommendation of pSivida. I also comment on Neuralstem’s press release on a rat study modeling the use of NSI-566 neural stem cells in an acute spinal cord injury which showed some encouraging data. The […]

Introduction I have started to write a newsletter on a weekly or bi-weekly basis to supplement my reports and blogs. In this week’s edition, I start with some thoughts on financing strategies for biotechnology companies. This can have an impact on stock prices second only to product development news. I follow this with some brief […]

Introduction I am beginning a new approach in my writing on biotechnology companies. As those who have followed my writing may appreciate, I try to do in-depth research reports on companies and most of my investment ideas are long term. I do not have a trading focus and try to not get overly caught up […]

Investment Thesis It is my hypothesis that dendritic cell cancer vaccines have the promise to be a major advance in cancer therapy. In October of 2011, Dr. Ralph Steinman was posthumously awarded one-half of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries of the dendritic cell and its role in adaptive immunity. His […]

Northwest Biotherapeutics (NWBO.OB) announced a 1 for 16 reverse stock split. This is a first step in a planned public offering of up to $25 million and listing of the common stock on the NASDAQ Capital Market. The reverse stock split will increase the price of the stock from the pre-split price of $0.30 per […]

ImmunoCellular (IMUC.OB) has issued a press release stating that Manish Singh has resigned as CEO. He will be succeeded in the interim by Dr. John Yu, a founder of the company. The reasons for the resignation were not explained, but there may be some relationship to recent activity on the part of bloggers questioning the […]

  I am starting my coverage of Northwest Biotherapeutics (NWBO.OB) with a Buy. I became interested in this small bulletin board company based on research that I did on Dendreon (DNDN) whose prostate cancer vaccine Provenge is the first approved cancer therapeutic that uses living dendritic cells. I came to believe that this technology had […]

Northwest Biotherapeutics’ (NWBO) DCVax-L and ImmunoCellular Therapeutics’ ICT-107 are dendritic cell cancer vaccines that are in phase II trials for the treatment of glioblastoma multiforme, the most malignant form of brain cancer. Their dendritic cell technology is the same as that used by Dendreon’s Provenge. Importantly, NWBO and IMUC both have much more efficient manufacturing […]

Investment Overview ImmunoCellular Therapeutics (IMUC.OB) lead product ICT-107 is a dendritic cell vaccine for treating glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). Its technology is a next generation version of that used by Dendreon to develop Provenge for prostate cancer. GBM is a relatively rare, but deadly primary tumor of the brain. While it only affects about 11,000 Americans […]