With Bioteknet, cancer treatment also involves fennel waste.
D'Agostino: "Committed against covid and on new diagnostic biomarkers"
“Our focus is on industrial biotechnology, everything that concerns the development of biotechnological processes and new products. In particular, we have focused on relevant sectors where we have seen a greater demand for innovation from companies, such as the production of both pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals and cosmeceuticals using fermentative technologies”.
Amleto D'Agostino, sole director of BioTekNet, Regional Center of Competence in Industrial Biotechnology, explains this to Dire. The company, founded on December 14, 2007, is made up of a series of public bodies with strong expertise in the biotechnology sector: the University of Campania Luigi Vanvitelli, the University of Naples Federico II, the University of Sannio, Aorn Cardarelli, Cnr, Fondazione Pascale and Ao dei Colli.
“It's a company – he clarifies – under total public control, but which lives on the market without contributions from the members. We started with a regional investment of 15 million euros in 4 years in the startup phase, after which we continued with our own resources and we always closed the budget in profit. The resources go into new investments and contracts for young people, without distribution of profits to the members”.
“We worked a lot – says D'Agostino – also on the topic of new immunotherapies both in the oncology field and in relation to Covid-19. Due to the pandemic emergency we have focused a lot on both the prevention and therapy of covid and we are doing it with two different lines of research. On the one hand there is the development of new RNA vaccines capable of targeting not only the Spike protein, but also other proteins of great interest that can be found in many variants of this virus.
This is to increase the coverage of current vaccines. On the other hand, the development of a simple test to apply, a skin test that can highlight people's cell-mediated immunity. Today there is a lot of talk about people's antibody titers and this data is taken as information on the degree of immunity of the subjects. In reality, from a scientific point of view, this is not the case because the actual immunity is the cell-mediated one given by C lymphocytes and which cannot be measured through a sample and the measurement of the antibody titer. This is why we are working on a first experimental phase and if the results are significant, our intention is to develop this skin test".
Among the projects in which BioTekNet is involved is one that will lead to the use of new diagnostic biomarkers, detectable in biological fluids, such as plasma and serum, capable of allowing an early and reliable diagnosis of squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck (HNSCC).
“Yet another sector – D'Agostino highlights – is that of the development of biosensors both in the clinical and environmental fields and also the theme of the circular economy with the valorization of production waste from the agri-food industry to extract bioactive molecules useful both in the therapeutic and cosmetic fields. In this sense we have a project on fennel waste that reaches 90%, in Campania it reaches 200 tons per year that must be disposed of as special waste. We are trying – concludes the sole director of BioTekNet – to turn these costs into opportunities by seeking and finding in these wastes interesting substances for the prevention of tumors and for maintaining people's well-being".
Altergon has brought Asia to Irpinia and focuses on hyaluronic acid
Cincotti: “we pay great attention to the territory and corporate welfare”
“Altergon Italia is a pharmaceutical sector project born in the early 2000s designed to create the first production hub in Europe for transdermal products, drugs that act through the skin, an activity that in previous decades was the prerogative of Asian countries, Japan in particular. We have done an engineering operation in reverse because instead of moving to Asia we went to steal their technologies to build this plant”.
According to Dire, Salvatore Cincotti, CEO of Altergon, added: “we had the idea of setting up this plant in Irpinia, my homeland, after returning from my experiences in China, the United States, Switzerland, and we immediately connected with the university world of Campania with the idea of finding talents to be able to enter and diversify the business: a mature sector where we can grow with turnover, therefore transdermals, and move from the beginning also into biotechnology”.
"In the pharmaceutical sector – explains Cincotti – a company that was founded 15 years ago is still considered to be in the startup phase because pharmaceutical products need 10-15-20 years to enter the market. We are a startup, however, in a very advanced stage because we have reached a significant size, in 2021 we had a turnover of 50 million euros, we have about 250 employees, and since the laying of the first stone we have invested 120 million euros. We are entering a further development phase, we will have to be able to invoice 80-90 million per year”.
A long-time partner of BioTekNet, a regional centre of expertise in industrial biotechnology, says the CEO of Altergon, “with them we founded the Campania competence center for the healthcare sector.
In this development contract – which for us represented an investment of approximately 27,5 million euros and we are around 83% of the way through its implementation – BioTekNet, as it has been since the beginning, was a partner of assistance and collaboration for the research and development activity with an investment of approximately 10% of the total.
With BioTekNet we have developed since 2004 the commissioning of the first biotechnological production plant of hyaluronic acid. Ours is a virtuous cycle because about twenty graduates and PhD students from BioTekNet between 2004 and 2006 were then hired by Altergon and about ten are still within the group having made a career.
In this development project that saw us collaborate, there was the expansion, after 8-10 years, of all the initial industrial activity, we had the Aifa authorization to double the production of hyaluronic acid of which we already produce several tons per year”.
Cincotti is keen to underline the importance that Altergon has of paying attention to the territory, which is evident, he points out, “not only in this synergy with the Campania universities, but we have collaborators who come from Basilicata, Puglia, Calabria: we have become a pole of attraction for the South. It was difficult to think that in an internal area like that of the earthquake crater a pharmaceutical excellence like ours could be created. To attract highly qualified personnel we also adopt very important welfare policies: we are in an advanced planning stage, and will soon begin construction, of a nursery with 60 places open to our employees, to the companies in the district and to the territory. We have also decided to invest a good budget to give a holiday bonus to our employees”.
Epicare helps cancer patients return to their living environment
Gilblas: “we provide non-invasive tools and technologies”
“The goal of Epicare is to respond to the needs, currently unmet in our opinion, of cancer patients. In particular, those patients who, after an acute phase, have started a therapeutic path with frequent returns to the hospital”.
Federico Gilblas, CEO of Mate Consulting, an IT company in Campania with 60 employees that dedicates 10% of its turnover to research and development, tells Dire. Epicare “foresees an investment of approximately 2 million euros, 60% covered by the company and the remaining 40% by the Department of Medicine at the Vanvitelli University”. The Regional Centre of Competence in Industrial Biotechnology BioTekNet is also taking part in the project.
“With this project – explains Gilblas – we provide a series of non-invasive tools and technologies, easily accessible to patients and doctors - smartphones, apps and an information dashboard - to facilitate the return of patients to their living environment by allowing health professionals to monitor their health status, quality of life, nutrition, and facilitate clinical decisions through artificial intelligence tools. An integrated system of this type requires commitment and willingness to participate both on the part of the patient and on the part of the hospital structure which is often undersized and does not have staff to dedicate.
In any case, these are technologies that the patient already has: everyone has a smartphone, we provide the smartwatch on free loan. So it becomes easy, the important thing is to make people understand its value. Hospitals understand why these solutions – concludes the general manager of Mate Consulting – allow to reduce the pressure on healthcare facilities and promote better patient management”.
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