T&R Biofab has signed a licensing agreement with iPS Academia Japan to secure marketing rights, which will allow the company to supply induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived cardiomyocyte to researchers.

IPS Academia Japan holds iPSC-related patent licenses of Kyoto University and several research institutes, including the Center for iPS Cell Research Application of Professor Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University, which won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for developing iPSC in 2012.

T&R Biofab has signed a licensing deal with iPS Academia Japan to win the right to supply induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived cardiomyocyte to researchers. (T&R Biofab)

The iPS Academia Japan has been carrying out technology licensing for iPSC-researching institutes and companies worldwide. IPSC is derived from skin or blood cells reprogrammed into an embryonic-like pluripotent state that allows the development of an unlimited human cell source for therapeutic purposes.

T&R Biofab has secured several iPSC lines that won Institutional Review Board approval from Kyungpook National University Hospital in April. The company has developed a technology to produce cardiac muscle cells from cell lines that can be commercialized. The company obtained the rights to distribute cardiomyocytes derived from iPSC as products through the marketing licensing deal signed with Academia Japan.

“We will produce 50 safe and stable iPSC lines that do not use virus and animal-derived contaminants by 2021,” T&R Biofab CEO Yoon Won-soo said. “We will expand the range of products by developing various cell production technologies starting with the sales of recently licensed cardiac muscle cells.”

T&R Biofab plans to expand its iPSC business through the contract with iPS Academia Japan. The company will also use it to develop three-dimensional bioprinting tissue and cell therapy products in the research and development team.

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