A Medical Device Daily

Proteus Biomedical (Redwood City, California) said it has raised $32 million in a series D equity financing. New corporate investors Medtronic and Itochu join existing investors St. Jude Medical, Adams Street Partners, The Carlyle Group, Essex Woodlands, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, Spring Ridge Ventures and others.

This round funds the company's cardiovascular therapeutic device programs through development and manufacturing, and advances its cardiovascular and other pharmaceutical systems programs through multiple human studies.

The company's current round of financing will remain open for a period of time to additional investors.

Proteus develops products that integrate its in-body electronics and sensor technologies into existing medical devices and pharmaceuticals to improve therapeutic outcomes.

BlueCrest Capital Finance (Chicago) has provided $15 million in new debt financing to superDimension (Minneapolis), a company commercializing what it says is the first minimally invasive system to access distant areas of the lungs.

"The BlueCrest Capital Finance team designed an effective venture finance transaction that will help us increase our sales and marketing efforts," said Daniel Sullivan, president/CEO of superDimension.

superDimension created a minimally invasive bronchial navigation system that it said represents a major breakthrough in the early diagnosis and potential treatment of lung cancer. Similar to GPS (global positioning system) technology, the inReach system provides a roadmap of the lungs and uses catheters to reach the distant areas of the lungs where early stage lung cancers can be found. The system is marketed to pulmonologists working in hospital-based bronchoscopy suites as well as to thoracic surgeons and radiation oncologists.

In other financing news:

• Cytori Therapeutics (San Diego) has entered into a $15 million loan facility with GE Healthcare Financial Services and Silicon Valley Bank. An initial term loan of $7.5 million, minus fees and expenses, funded Oct. 14.

Cytori will be able to exercise the additional $7.5 million term loan on or before Dec. 12, provided it meets certain financial prerequisites established by the lenders. GE Healthcare Financial Services' financing solution will be used to support the commercialization of Cytori's recently launched Celution System and StemSource Cell Bank in Europe and Asia. In addition, the funds will support product pipeline development and general corporate activities.

Cytori is developing new options for reconstructive surgery, treatments for cardiovascular disease, and banking patients' adult stem and regenerative cells.

• Response Biomedical (Vancouver, British Columbia) reported that it has entered into an agreement with a placement agent to offer for sale, on a best efforts basis and by private placement, an aggregate of 30,555,556 units at a price of 18 cents per unit, each unit consisting of one common share and one-half of one common share purchase warrant, for gross proceeds of about $5.5 million.

Net proceeds of the offering will be used to manufacture product for the launch of the flu test partnered with 3M Medical (Minneapolis) and the cardiovascular line partnered with Roche Diagnostics (Indianapolis), as well as the day-to-day operations of the company.

Under the rules of the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX), the private placement financing would ordinarily require that the company seek and obtain shareholder approval prior to completion of the transaction as a result of the fact that the transaction will result in the issuance of common shares representing more than 25% of the number of common shares issued prior to closing. However, pursuant to Section 604(3) of the TSX company manual, Response will be making an application to the TSX for an exemption from this requirement on the basis that the company is in serious financial difficulty, the transaction is designed to improve the company's financial situation and the transaction is reasonable in the circumstances.

Certain insiders of the company, comprised of some members of the board and senior management, are expected to participate in the offering for an aggregate of about 20% of the offering. The common shares and warrant shares potentially issuable to such insiders represent about 6.5% of the total number of issued and outstanding shares prior to completion of the transaction. Completion of the transaction will not materially affect control of the company, Response said.

"This ... financing is critical to our company's ability to continue as a going concern and to provide the means to move our enviable breadth of point-of-care (POC) products toward an expanded and market leading global presence," said S. Wayne Kay, CEO of Response.

The placement agent will be paid a commission of 7% of the gross proceeds of the offering, paid in cash on the closing date.