BioSilta Ltd, the privately-held company that utilizes its unique, proprietary EnBase(R) technology platform to develop innovative, reagent-based EnPresso(R) bacterial and yeast expression culture systems, today announces it has acquired a license to worldwide exclusive rights to CyDisCo™ (Cytoplasmic Disulphide bond formation in E. coli) protein production technology from the University of Oulu. 

This license agreement will enable BioSilta will combine its EnPresso culture systems technology with CyDisCo protein production technology to make EnPresso-CyDisCo expression systems available to scientists and bio-processing engineers. As part of the agreement, BioSilta will also have future access to those that invented and enhanced the CyDisCo protein production technology for future R&D consultation - Prof. Lloyd Ruddock and his group from the University of Oulu Faculty of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Future intellectual property will be shared between both parties. 

The EnPresso-CyDisCo expression systems will provide scientists and bio-processing engineers with a tool set to produce difficult and hard to produce proteins. These proteins can be produced in any strain of E. coli, including full size antibodies and antibody fragments. In addition, these technologies enable and enhance the production of many other proteins containing multiple disulphide bonds, such as hormones and bioactive peptides. The EnPresso-CyDisCo technology will also provide a system that will deliver proteins with higher yields, level of quality and consistency.

The BioSilta EnPresso-CyDisCo technology will be essential towards five major industries that need production of difficult and hard to produce proteins. These industries include life sciences, where small to medium scale production of proteins in a short time scale is essential to support research. The diagnostic industry will also benefit, with proteins essential for early detection of critical diseases, and the therapeutics industry, for the development of novel biologic drugs and lowering the cost of production of bio-similar and bio-better drugs. As many as 7 of the top selling drugs in any recent year are protein based.

Other industries that will benefit from protein production using BioSilta EnPresso-CyDisCo technology are household care, where pressures are increasing to produce high efficiency detergent systems effective at lower temperatures to reduce energy and environmental impact, and the food and beverage sector, to reduce costs of healthier food products whilst increasing shelf life using natural additives. BioSilta also has the option to explore future production in brewing and bio-fuel industries. 

“This is a critical deal for BioSilta, enabling the combination of two technologies that will become a major part of future efforts of the company. This will enable us to address multiple, critical unmet needs in protein production that will be applicable to a wide variety of industries,” said Paul Whitaker, Managing Director, BioSilta. “As a former spin-out of the University of Oulu, BioSilta already has maintained extensive links with the academic institution, and this has resulted in access to a technology which provides an essential solution to wide ranging problems across a variety of sectors. BioSilta’s on-going research & development is directed to solving other critical problems within these sectors through a series of future efforts.”

Producing proteins in bacterial expression systems like E. coli are simple, stable, productive and highly scalable with low production costs. However, production has been limited to certain types of proteins that are easier to produce. Proteins produced in mammalian cell line expression systems have to date been unreliable and unstable, with increased time and costs of production, increased by considerable and complex intellectual property rights. Improving bacterial expression systems by mutating E. coli strains to express difficult and hard to produce proteins has often resulted in low yields and low protein quality.

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