GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE:GSK) has started a new $50 million venture capital fund that will invest in companies pursuing innovative medical treatments using electricity.
The British pharmaceutical company announced Thursday its launch of Action Potential Venture Capital (APVC) as well as the fund’s first investment – California company Setpoint Medical. Setpoint develops implantable devices to treat inflammatory diseases.
“We want to help create the medicines of the future and be the catalyst for this work,” Moncef Slaoui, GSK’s chairman of R&D said in a statement. “GSK can play the integrating role that is needed to drive this new type of medical treatment all the way from the bench to the patient and this fund is a key part of our efforts.”
The use of electricity in medicine is not new. Pacemakers use electric signals to regulate heart rhythms. Electrical stimulation has been used to treat the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, some neurological disorders and to improve bladder control.
But GSK, which operates its U.S. headquarters in Research Triangle Park, is looking to go even further with the therapeutic applications of electricity. The new fund and its Setpoint investment follows GSK’s April announcement of a $1 million prize to support “electroceutical” research. That funding is expected to support up to 40 researchers working in external laboratories. Key leaders in the field would identify a key hurdle. The research group deemed the best able to overcome that hurdle will win the $1 million prize.
GSK is already doing its own work with its Bioelectronics R&D unit, which was created last year. Bioelectronics are the electrical signals that pass along the nerves in the body; irregular or altered patterns of these impulses may occur as part of some diseases. GSK said it believes that tiny devices can be designed to recognize these patterns and change them or generate electronic impulses as “treatment.” Targets could range from inflammatory bowel disease, rheumatoid arthritis, respiratory diseases such as asthma and COPD, and metabolic diseases such as Type 2 diabetes.
APVC, which will be based in Cambridge, Mass., plans to build a portfolio of five to seven companies over the next five years. The funds will focus on new startups; existing companies with technologies that can stimulate or block electrical impulses; and companies advancing technology platforms that will support these approaches to treatment.
Setpoint is developing implantable devices that stimulate the body’s vagus nerve. The work follows research findings that show that immune system can be influenced by the nervous system. Setpoint’s devices are being developed as potential treatments for inflammatory diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease. GSK said it believes that Setpoint’s technology also holds potential for developing new bioelectronic medicines.
