Or-Genix Therapeutics hopes to tap into $5B skincare market
Yael Schwartz
Or-Genix Therapeutics, a Worcester-based dermatology company, has scored a partnership with Spain-based Fission Labs for the transfer and development of a topical skin care solution for the treatment of acne in the Latin American market. In an interview, CEO Dr. Yael Schwartz spoke about the company’s hopes for the product.
What are Or-Genix’ main product candidates?
We have a partnership with a company called Ferndale Pharma Group in Michigan, which was our first deal. We licensed the rights to one of our proprietary compounds for aging skin for women over the age of 45. That product is currently marketed as Emepelle. That was our first deal.
We’re in two different spaces. We tackle the non-prescription cosmetic market and those compounds that are only available through physicians, dermatologists and plastic surgeons.
One the other side of the company, we have a prescription-based endeavour, but we don’t have anything in that market yet. That’s in clinical development.
On what side is the compound in the Fission agreement?
The deal we did with Fission was for a non-prescription compound for the treatment of oily skin, acne and hair thinning.
What does the partnership with Fission accomplish?
It enables us to have cash flow into the company. We invested no money in that deal. They’re the ones who acquired the compounds from us. As we help them start to develop it for the non-prescription market, it will enable us once it hits that market to have a steady cashflow of royalties and milestone payments.
Why are you targeting Latin America?
It’s a population where personal wealth is growing. It’s a population where men and women like to look and feel better. Latin America is becoming a very large market for the U.S.
What other products do you have lined up for similar partnerships?
We expect in the next several months to put out several other interesting press releases.
Will this help the company expand beyond incubator Massachusetts Biomedical Initiatives and hire new employees?
We’ll definitely hire more people. In fact, I’m interviewing for another position shortly. We don’t have lab space because because we’re a research and development company. We don’t have to discover anything. All of the assets we have have already been discovered. We just have to develop it for certain products.
We don’t need office space yet. We’re a global reach company. I’m based in Central Massachusetts, my chief scientific officer is in the Seattle area and my chief business officer spends her time between Europe and Latin America.
Where does that money go?
At this point, any money we bring in goes to hiring people with decades of experience in dermatology. I’ll put that into hiring and developing our prescription line of products, which takes significantly more money.
How much more?
Non-prescription products take a couple million to develop plus marketing and branding, for which we partner with Fission and Ferndale. For prescription products, just to get them into people can take between $5 million and $7 million. That’s how we’ve spent our money.
We’re developing a very novel topical product for the prescription acne market right now. We anticipate that market globally to be about $5 billion.
This interview was conducted and edited for length and clarity by WBJ Staff Writer Zachary Comeau.
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