Forgot your password?

Forgot your username?

database > company
Dance Pharmaceuticals
Biotech Specialty Pharma
2 Mint Plaza, Suite 804
San Francisco, CA 94103
phone:650 740 9625
fax:415 369 9415
Symbol Private
Exchange
Founded 2009
Employees 4
Research Sector Biotech Specialty Pharma
Summary Description
See below
Management
The current management and advisory group are composed of some of the top leaders from the original inhaled insulin programs with deep experience in diabetes and drug development. There are many additional inhaled insulin experts in all areas waiting in the wings until Dance is ready. John Patton (CEO) ? Board member, Co-Founder, CSO Inhale/Nektar (nktr), Directly participated in multiple public and private financings, mergers and business development deals, founding investor in Halozyme (halo) and Pleiades Cardiotherapeutics Samantha Miller (CBO) ? Board Member, Numerous global and regional partnership deals, pulmonary and non-pulmonary, 20 years experience drug delivery Truc Le (SVP Manufacturing) - Nektar, global mfg, lead Nektar inhaled insulin manufacturing effort. Dr Mei-Chang Kuo (VP chemistry) ? 15 years insulin formulations Dr. James Fink (VP Product) ? 25 years pulmonary development including inhaled insulin Key Advisors Dr Joe Brain (Harvard) ? 20 yrs inhaled insulin safety expert Dr Peter Byron (VCU) ? Leading academic inhalation expert Dr Robert Gerety ? Former FDA, regulatory expert Dr Linda Hakes ? (VP UCB) ? former Lilly, insulin chemistry John Howard (Apple, Nektar) ? Lead Exubera device development Dr. Ralph Niven (APT Bio) ? 25 years inhalation delivery Dr. Paul Norwood - >100 patients on Exubera Dr Andreas Pfutzner ? top diabetes opinion leader in Europe Dr Marsha Testa ? (Harvard) ?inhaled insulin patient preference expert
Keywords
Inhaled insulin Diabetes Treatment

Comment | Printable Version | Modify profile |
Updated: Apr. 27, 2012

Description
Dance Pharmaceuticals is a San Francisco based, global company that is exclusively focused on bringing a line of low cost, patient friendly inhaled insulin products to the diabetics of the world. Painful treatment regimens and patient compliance are a major concern in the treatment of diabetes, and the company�s products aim to address these highly unmet clinical matters. In addition to providing products for those who have become or are about to become insulin dependent, the company is also developing a low fixed dose product for those first diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. The company plans to leverage a large 20 year safety and efficacy data base on inhaled insulin that is in the public domain, to quickly bring their first product to market through an abbreviated regulatory pathway.
Products / Services
There is strong consensus that a better way to deliver insulin is desirable. A non-invasive way to give insulin has been a holy grail in drug delivery ever since insulin was discovered in l922. Although many have tried to develop oral insulins the gastrointestinal tract is destructive and impermeable to insulin. The lungs are the only naturally permeable port of entry. Dance understands pulmonary delivery of insulin better than anyone. Exubera, the first inhaled insulin product was deemed a large and cumbersome device with confusing dosing, and although shown to be safe in long term studies, doctors were hesitant to be the first to prescribe it. Despite these drawbacks patient preference studies with Exubera showed that it consistently and significantly beat injectable insulin in all measurements of patient satisfaction. However, the economics of Exubera were unfavorable because it had to be sold at a small premium over the leading injection products, and still the product margin was too low to adequately drive marketing investment. Pfizer admitted to doing a poor job of marketing and most diabetics didn?t know the product was available. Dance will fix a number of the problems with the original inhaled insulin products. Foremost, the Dance product will be low cost so that it can be priced competitively with injections. Dance?s proprietary technology selection has been strongly driven by this need to be cost competitive. Second, the device will be small, patient friendly, discrete and with convenient dosing features. Dance will commercialize multiple products tailored to treat patients with various stages of diabetes. Finally Dance will partner with star regional sales and marketing partners who know their territories well and want to help build a strong brand.
Technology / Differentiation
With more than 40 companies involved in the development of insulin inhalation systems throughout the 90s and 00s, there is a mountain of old and current IP in the field. So there is plenty from which to choose. Dance has carefully selected the patented technologies and know-how to license that will enable it to produce a superior product and be tough to beat on cost. In addition, as in the development of all drug delivery products, new IP will be filed and licensed during development of the products. Both Europe and Japan provide 10 year market exclusivity to those who bring a new product to the market and we believe that our inhaled insulin will be quite distinct from Mannkind?s ultra fast acting product. Dance intends to quickly follow its initial products with follow-on devices with improved and new features.
Market / Customers
Diabetics can be stratified into a number of target markets depending on the type, severity and duration of their disease. Dance?s initial target market for its first inhaler products will be patients who are insulin dependent. For example, in 2007 the US insulin dependent population was ~4.8 million (27% of the total). Our second target market will be those patients who are failing oral medications and need to be on insulin. There are ~3.6 million patients in this group in the US (20% of the total). Finally our long term goal is to have a 2nd inhaler product line for a third target market, those first diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. These patients today, with current medical practice, would be 10 years away from initiating insulin therapy even though insulin would be the best therapy for them. In 2007 there were ~6.6 million of these patients in the US alone. Market size and growth rate: Dance?s global market forecast takes into consideration the following assumptions. Starting with a WW diabetic population today of ~250 million, we expect that ~ 100 million patients will be accessible and receiving regular healthcare. As mentioned above our initial target populations will be those failings orals or on insulin (~47% of the 100 million). Of these ~30% will be excluded because they are smokers in which there are no clinical safety or efficacy studies. Later targeting will be expanded to include all non-smoking diabetics except those at very early stage who are only prescribed diet and exercise. Assuming a 3% annual growth rate, a penetration of 10% of the target market, an average wholesale price (AWP) of US $3/day/patient and a time to peak of 8 years, yields a market of ~$8B in 8 years
Competitors / Substitutes / Alternatives
See above
Strategy
The idea of inhaled insulin remains medically sound and compelling. Inhaled insulin technology works well and only needs expert refinement. Dance and its team understand in detail the reasons why the large inhaled insulin effort collapsed. They believe that all of the issues are addressable or have already been addressed. Although the media used the metaphor of the Titanic and Hindenburg to refer to the demise of Exubera, this is not correct. Unlike those projects that were destroyed in their failure, the massive inhaled insulin investment is intact. With the appropriate approach, safety and efficacy studies do not have to be repeated. The program simply needs to be ?rebooted?.
Funding
Dance is close to completing a first round of angel funding of $2M. This initial funding is being used to secure licenses and developing final product form factor.
Status
See above