QualityStocks Small-Cap and Micro-Cap Blogs

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

VistaGen Therapeutics, Inc. (VSTA) Tackling Expensive Problem of Drug Failure with Human Clinical Trials in a Test Tube™

With diseases such as Alzheimer’s, type 2 diabetes, and rheumatoid arthritis on the rise, there is a growing need for new and more effective treatments. But as an editorial by the Washington Post on new drug development initiatives by the National Institutes of Health makes clear, the cost of drug development failure is staggering—and widespread. According to the editorial, “taking a drug candidate from early discovery through Food and Drug Administration approval takes a decade and has a 95 percent failure rate.” Plus, with the cost of drug development being known to be able to exceed $1 billion, it is clear that pharmaceutical companies face a very uphill challenge in bringing blockbuster, high-therapeutic-potential drugs to market in today’s “drug approval climate”.

VistaGen Therapeutics, a California-based biotechnology company, meets this problem head-on with its Human Clinical Trials in a Test Tube™, a human pluripotent stem cell technology that enables biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies to identify unexpected heart or liver safety concerns before a drug candidate has journeyed far into its development process. With this “drug rescue” capability, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies also become able to renew their bring-to-approval efforts of once-promising-but-now-backshelved drug candidates that were discontinued due to heart or liver safety issues.

According to a Forbes article in 2012, the sunk cost of a failed drug candidate for a big pharmaceutical company can be huge. The article notes that the cost of an average drug developed by a major pharmaceutical company is at least $4 billion. That is where the drug rescue potential of VistaGen Therapeutics’ technology becomes clear. VistaGen Therapeutics believes that conventionally used toxicological testing systems, such as animal testing and other nonclinical methods, do not closely approximate human biology enough to account for initially undetected liver and heart toxicity and metabolism issues. Human Clinical Trials in a Test Tube™, in contrast, enables the differentiation of human pluripotent stem cells into mature human cells. With these resources in hand, therapeutic solution developers then become able to identify any emerging liver or heart safety issues before a drug candidate has generated huge sunk costs in research and development.

Mr. Shawn Singh, J.D., Chief Executive Officer of VistaGen Therapeutics, has described the disruptive potential of Human Clinical Trials in a Test Tube™ as “game-changing”. Having noted that he has not seen anything like the ways VistaGen Therapeutics is applying stem cell technology in his broad professional career, Mr. Singh has signified his confidence that the human pluripotent stem cell technology could change the face—and cost dynamics—of American drug development and approval.

For more information, visit: www.vistagen.com

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Innocent, Inc. (INCT) Poised For Growth with Experience at the Helm

With its focus on reserve properties in North America, Innocent has geared its business strategy for profitable gains by way of acquisitions of proven petroleum reserves and formation of strategic joint ventures.

The company looks to reduce costs associated with property exploration by targeting petroleum reserves that are proven assets. Currently, the company is focusing its energy on the Powder River Basin of Wyoming located in southeast Montana and northeast Wyoming. This area spans around 120 miles east-to-west and 200 miles north-to-south, and is already well-known for its role in American energy production. Hundreds of millions of tons of coal are exported from this area annually, and that amount accounts for over 40% of the United States’ total coal production per year. In addition to the River Basin of Wyoming, the company is engaged in exploration efforts in other parts of Wyoming and South Dakota for prospects. For general management, Innocent has hired Evergreen, a company with over 150 years in the oil and gas business.

Innocent’s efforts toward sustained profitability are managed by a knowledgeable and diverse team with over 140 years of combined experience. The company is led by Director and CEO Wayne Doss, an executive with over 25 years of C-level management at public and private companies. Before Innocent, Mr. Doss served for 9 years as CEO of Keller Industries, a $250,000,000 building products company with over 4,000 employees. Over the past 5 years, Mr. Doss has also consulted with and served in various capacities in a few small public companies, assisting with start-up activities, holding interim officer positions and addressing regulatory filings.

The other members of Innocent’s management team have backgrounds in communications, C-level management across multiple industries, petroleum engineering and geology, operational finessing, drilling and production operations, and business relationship development. With this diverse and experienced team in place, Innocent looks to build up its production levels and generate predictable, sustainable value for the long term.

For more information visit www.innocentinc.com

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Great East Energy, Inc. (GASE) to Expand Ukrainian Natural Gas Holdings Substantially, Eyes Underperforming Assets in Dnieper-Donets Basin

Great East Energy, which acquired its wholly-owned local Ukrainian natural gas operating subsidiaries, NPK-KONTAKT and LISPROMGAZ (processing gas since 2003 via two owned facilities, with around 8.4 miles of pipelines to their clientele already in place), reported today that they are now looking to obtain greenfield licenses in the surrounding area, with plans to acquire enough territory to expand their holdings by over 517%, to some 1k square miles.

Given the securing last year of a five-year extension of its permit from the Ministry of Environmental Protection to continue producing methane gas and for further development of its properties (Lysychansko-Toshkovskaya area of southeastern Ukraine), this announced evolution by GASE seems a natural one, as they move to scoop up underperforming existing operators in the area. Clearly doubling down on the premium Ukrainian natural gas market dynamics, where gas is three times the price it is back here in the states and a natural drive is on domestically to free Europe’s second largest country (by land mass) from dependence on Russian gas, GASE is now hungrily eyeballing the abundant, underutilized acreage in their surrounding area.

GASE has big plans for developing gas in Ukraine and is eager to grow their whopping 47B cubic feet of estimated gross total reserves under their current license area (southeastern Dnieper-Donets Basin), which is flanked by rich, uniform drill targets and assets severely neglected by former operators. Shell’s Yuzivska field was actually the key asset in a $10B contract inked at the 2013 Davos in early January by Ukraine, an asset with a preliminary resource estimate in the neighborhood of an astounding 300 trillion cubic feet. With evaluation on the GASE block reserves and resources from 2007 confirmed by Marathon Oil’s analysis, as well as a subsequent NI 51-101 report, things are looking quite good for the company’s now growing footprint of operating and distributing unconventional gas companies in the southeastern Dnieper-Donets Basin.

Looking at the seven major dome structures already identified on the existing property, in conjunction with the reported 1B or so cubic feet of gas already produced from the site (prior owner), as well as strong reads on the target via twelve core wells and five vent wells, GASE is extremely confident of the production profile. This is prime DD-Basin acreage and there is plenty of it, amid some unprecedented underlying Ukrainian gas market dynamics, with the state-run oil and gas company, Naftogaz, now slashing imports from Russia’s Gazprom by an incredible 80% in February as part of a clear bid for independence (so bold it has many analysts wondering if it will backfire and send prices through the roof). Ukraine’s strategy to bolster production from their rich DD Basin and the Carpathian Foldbelt in the west with the help of Shell is inescapably apparent and the savvy investor will find some really good in-points here to play the events as they progress.

CEO of GASE, Timur Khromaev, recently told Stock Market Media Group in an interview that this first stage of the company’s plan for expansion to 1k square miles of territory would be focused on creating a solid base for more rapid expansion in later stages, signaling to markets that the real game has yet to even kick off.

More info on Great East Energy, Inc. at www.GreatEastEnergy.com

Intelligent Living, Inc. (ILIV) Subsidiary Launches Flagship eCommerce Health Website

Intelligent Living subsidiary Health and Beyond Nutra Company LLC has launched its flagship ecommerce website at http://drlarrydirect.com, home of the Health and Beyond brand of formularies and bio-nutritional evaluations. The website also publishes articles and information pertaining to healthy living and education on nutrition and health conditions.

“We are very excited to bring this website to the market. It will begin our revenue program for Intelligent Living Inc. in a substantial way. Drlarrydirect.com is a flagship for Intelligent Living Inc. and we look forward to the healthy success that it will create for customers that use our products,” Victoria Rudman, CEO of Intelligent Living, stated in the news release.

A new market report published by Transparency Market Research Nutraceutical Product Market: Global Market Size, Segment and Country Analysis & Forecasts (2007-2017) estimates that the global nutraceutical product market reached $142.1 billion in 2011 and will increase to $204.8 billion by 2017, growing at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.3 percent in through 2017.

The increasing growth in the global nutraceutical market is fueled by advances in the dietary supplement segment. North America has the highest market share for nutraceutical product markets, which is primarily supported by the growing U.S. health-conscious consumers segment.

Dr. Larry LeGunn, president of Health and Beyond Nutra Company, explains how the new website will cater to the health-conscious population.

“Re-launching our website with some updated products is the first step in creating the healthy future that we are looking to for our customers. With the Advanced Nutritional Panel we are able to test Ph levels in the body and determine the deficiencies in nutrition that someone may have and then treat those with our prescriptive formulas. I am very excited at the prospects of our new website,” he stated.

For more information, visit www.intelligentlivinginc.com

NanoLogix, Inc. (NNLX) Sets High Bar for Extended Shelf Life of Petri-Plates

NanoLogix, a biotech company focused primarily on the rapid detection and identification of live bacteria, and determination of their antibiotic resistance and sensitivity, reports that it has established a new world standard for petri plate shelf life and storage conditions. Based on ongoing tests by the world’s largest private research and development corporation, NanoLogix Tryptic Soy Agar (TSA) plates packed in patented FlatPack® packaging for 19 months have demonstrated their ability to perform as well as one-week old competitor’s plates.

With this achievement, NanoLogix’s petri plate shelf life has reached nearly 10 times the competition’s room temperature shelf life of slightly more than two months and five times the competition’s normal cold-storage shelf life. Additionally, in an additional milestone reached in internal company cold storage tests, NanoLogix TSA petri plates are approaching three years on the shelf with no loss of viability from when first manufactured.

“The importance of these results cannot be overstated — due to their traditional short shelf lives, agar-filled petri plates have historically been prepared in locations in the states, regions, or countries in which the users are located,” the company stated in the news release. “The long shelf life of NanoLogix products and the FlatPack’s virtual elimination of breakage in transit, regardless of distance shipped, are producing a paradigm shift on the part of those who are the product end users. Customers can now take delivery of NanoLogix products many thousands of miles distant from the production location and be assured that they have a product that significantly outlasts others made onsite, locally, or regionally.”

Several of NanoLogix’s FlatPack protected petri-based products can be stored at room temperature for months, a feature the company claims as unique and one that significantly reduces energy requirements on projects of all sizes without need for cold storage equipment for TSA: 19+ months (competition: 3-1/2 months); Nematode Growth Media (10+ months); and Chocolate Agar: 10+ months (competition 5 months). The company’s Middlebrook Agar petri plates for TB detection enable: 10+ months in cold storage, (competition: 3 months).

The company says it expects these times to be extended during the ongoing testing. Results of the ongoing study are expected to be submitted for publication sometime in 2014.

For more information visit www.nanologix.com

Victory Energy Corp. (VYEY) Receives $36 Million of Bank and Private-placement Funding

Today before the opening bell, Victory Energy shared a new company milestone: it obtained $36.4 million of bank and private-placement funding via its interest in its Aurora Energy Partners. This funding round represents an amount that is seven times greater than Victory Energy’s current market value of $5 million.

Victory Energy obtained $26.4 million of the financing from Texas Capital Bank (Dallas) and an additional $10 million in financing from its relationship with Navitus Energy Group (Austin), Victory Energy’s partner in Aurora Energy Partners. As a premier financier of hundreds of leading independent oil and gas companies, Texas Capital Bank is noted to have over $10.8 billion in total assets. Navitus Energy Group is composed of over 100 individual investors who provide funding to the company directly as well as through a private placement that was begun in October 2012. Navitus Energy Group also benefits from a relationship with Visionary Private Equity Group of Springfield, Missouri.

“We are tremendously excited to have a bank like Texas Capital recognize the strength of our management team and the value of our growing portfolio of Permian Basin assets. This funding round is a validation of our business model and will significantly accelerate our growth. Over the past year we’ve grown our proved reserves by 85% and by utilizing this current funding round to acquire proved, producing assets, we anticipate a significant acceleration in reserve growth. As we grow, we will continue to focus on creating shareholder value by rapidly growing unconventional oil, and liquids-rich natural gas reserves on existing properties and through the acquisition of new resource properties. Our Permian Basin focus offers better than 20% rates of return (ROR) and break-even points below $65 oil. This focus on returns is achieved by targeting the predictable resources plays, favorable operating environment, and consistent reservoir quality across multiple target horizons, and high drilling success rates of the Permian Basin of Texas,” said Kenny Hill, CEO of Victory.

Victory Energy signified its intention to use the $26.4 million credit facility from Texas Capital Bank and $10 million from Navitus Energy Group for swifter company growth via strategic acquisitions and property development. A publicly held, independent, growth-oriented oil and gas company, Victory Energy is headquartered in Austin, Texas, with additional key resources in Midland, Texas. The company’s efforts are steered by a savvy management team with over 120 years of combined professional experience. The Permian Basin, the 75,000-square mile area which Victory Energy has been targeting, is noted to be the most active play in the United States, in terms of rig count and recoverable resources. In 2013, the Permian Basin was noted to produce on average 1.32 million barrels per day, and its daily production is slated to grow to 1.8 million barrels per day in 2016.

More information about Victory Energy, asset highlights, and the oil and gas industry in general can be found at: www.vyey.com