Start Up Companies

Axion International, Inc. (www.axionintl.com)

Axion International designs. develops, and manufactures a new generation of eco-friendly structural building materials that are unlike virtually anything currently available. Axion's patented technologies, developed at Rutgers University, transform recycled consumer and industrial plastics into a myriad of structured products. Compared to traditional infrastructural materials such as wood, steel or concrete, Axion's American-made products are more durable, significantly longer lasting, and formulated using proprietary processes comprised of 100% recycled plastic.

Blueberry Health, Inc. (www.herbalist-alchemist.com)

Washington Township, NJ is home to Blueberry Health Inc., a spin-off company founded by Rutgers and New Jersey blueberry farmers. Blueberry Health’s chief commercial products are its Jersey Blues Iced Tea™ and its Herbalist and Alchemist™ Blueberry Solid Extract. Both are sold in health food stores and specialty retailers throughout New Jersey. The market for Jersey Blues sweetened and unsweetened iced tea extends into Delaware, Maryland, and Pennsylvania and the extract product is sold nationwide. Blueberry Health got started after several New Jersey blueberry growers approached Rutgers, well known for its blueberry and cranberry expertise, for help in improving farm profitability. Today, Blueberry Health is managed by Herbalist and Alchemist Inc.

Brighter Ideas, Inc. (www.brighterideasinc.com)

Brighter Ideas, Inc. (Bii), a biotechnology company, was incorporated in New Jersey in 2003.  This multi-faceted company offerspremium proteins and high quality antibodies (specializing in antibodies to native GFP, horseradish peroxidase and aequorin) for sale, contract protein production services, and consulting and beta testing services for the biotech/bioprocessing industries. Bii began commercial manufacturing operations in New Brunswick, New Jersey in January 2007.

Bii manufactures the highest quality proteins and antibodies available, for use in diagnostics, manufacturing, and biopharmaceutical research. These high quality proteins are purified using Bii’s proprietary patent-pending purification process, ensuring 99% or greater purity. Bii provides the most complete protein characterization in the industry. At a minimum, each lot includes a packet of chromatographic data, a HPLC SEC profile, and the trace of a SDS PAGE analysis. As Bii builds upon its current inventory, the company will conditionally accept special orders with no up-front investment by the client.

Connotate (www.connotate.com)

Connotate goes beyond search to create actionable business intelligence and collect unique and valuable data from the Web and Enterprise. As a leading provider of Web-monitoring and Web-mining solutions, Connotate uses knowledge management tools and machine-learning Intelligent Agents that can be trained to do anything a human can to harvest, monitor, extract, mash up, repurpose and integrate disparate sources of information and data. Located in New Brunswick, NJ, Connotate is rapidly expanding both its client base and employee staff. Our clients include large hedge funds, financial firms, global publishers, healthcare and pharmaceutical companies, energy and Internet businesses, and federal and state government agencies.

Nexomics (www.nexomics.com)

Nexomics' is a recently established company whose mission is to give its customers a competitive-advantage in the drug discovery process using  know how and intellectual property developed by a large scale structural genomics project.  This business offers a fully integrated gene-to-structure platform providing contract research services such as gene construct engineering, large-scale sample protein production and  purification, high-throughput crystallization screening, NMR spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, model building, and functional discovery through structural analysis.

Nexomics aims to build a portfolio of intellectual property associated with structure-based assay development and drug discovery. The long term goal is development of a proprietary pharmaceutical discovery program based on characterizing disease related proteins and their molecular functions, and by identifying potential drug target binding compounds.

Phytomedics Inc. (www.phytomedics.com)

Phytomedics has a broad and innovative proprietary technology platform that enables it to discover, develop and manufacture novel botanical therapeutics, including botanical drugs and nutraceuticals. This platform overcomes major technological and economic obstacles to developing a new generation of efficacious, safe and standardized botanical therapeutics for humans. This broad technology platform allows Phytomedics to generate revenues and licensing fees from a variety of healthcare business segments including nutraceuticals/dietary supplements, cosmeceuticals, functional/medicinal foods, and plant-produced biologics, while taking its lead botanical drugs through the FDA approval process. Launched in December of 1996, Phytomedics is a privately owned Company that operates from its corporate headquarters in Jamesburg, NJ

REVA Medical (www.teamreva.com)

Founded in 1998, REVA Medical is dedicated to developing interventional medical devices that leverage the Company's novel stent designs and biomaterials to improve the treatment of vascular disease. The Company's flagship product is a bioresorbable coronary stent that is designed to fulfill the temporary need for a stent and then fade away, leaving only the healed vessel behind. This product promises to revolutionize the treatment of coronary artery disease.

Trident Biomedical

Rutgers University and Trident Biomedical, Inc. (Trident), have announced an extensive license agreement covering a portfolio of more than 50 biomaterial patents and patent applications. The portfolio is based on the inventions of Professor Joachim Kohn and his students at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, over the past 20 years. These polymer-based biomaterials safely degrade predominantly into naturally-occurring nutrients and metabolites within the body. These new biomaterials have the potential to provide dramatic improvements over existing therapies in a broad range of medical applications including orthopedics, tissue regeneration, surgery, infection prevention and drug delivery. To fund the development of these second-generation polymer technologies, Trident has raised $1.26 million in its first round of financing from a group of private investors. Trident was assisted in this endeavor by Conexus Capital Advisors, Inc., a New Jersey-based financial advisory firm focusing on mergers, acquisitions and capital raisings. Robert Marcus, chairman of the New Jersey law firm of Norris McLaughlin & Marcus, will serve as the chairman of Trident’s board of directors.

TyRx Pharma Inc. (www.tyrxpharma.com)

TyRx was organized in 1998 to commercialize a novel combinatorial chemistry-based biomaterials technology licensed exclusively from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, using substances such as tyrosine to build medical-grade biodegradable polymers. Using proprietary polymerization processes, TyRx efficiently creates customized polymers to meet precise product specifications. TyRx is deploying its capabilities across a broad range of combination products. The combination products sector (products incorporating both a drug & a device component) is expected to be the highest growth segment of the medical products industry and TyRx is positioned to be an innovative applications leader in the space. TyRx is dedicated to the innovation, development and commercialization of high-value combination medical devices and pharmaceutical products, utilizing robust tyrosine-based resorbable polymer systems developed by Dr. Joachim Kohn.

UV Solutions, Inc. (http://www.uvsns.com)

UV Solutions, Inc. (UVS) has developed an innovative and efficient method for the generation of photons for use in surface photochemistry. Applications for the company’s technology are varied and span several industries including LCD and semiconductor manufacturing, water and wastewater treatment, curing of paints and adhesives, laser-based radar (lidar), and medical therapeutics. These markets together represent s multibillion dollar opportunity fro the company’s products. UVS’ proprietary technology, licensed from Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, provides several technical, operational and economic advantages over existing methodologies. Moreover the company’s intellectual property portfolio includes four issued and three pending patents.

The company was incorporated in the State of Delaware in 2004. Its offices are housed in EDC III, a technology incubator operated by New Jersey Institute of Technology and located in the Innovation Zone in Newark, New Jersey. To date the company has been funded by a Springboard Grant from the New Jersey Economic DevelopmentAuthority, by Technology Commercialization Grants from Rutgers University, and investment by UVS founders.

WellGen, Inc. (www.wellgen.com)

WellGen is an early-stage company founded in 1997 as a spin-off from Rutgers University. The company develops health and wellness ingredients using proprietary technology. WellGen has identified several bioactive compounds found in food that alter the expression of genes associated with inflammation, arthritis, obesity and cancer. The company has exclusive license to over twenty patents in various stages of progress, and devote significant resources to protecting and expanding our intellectual portfolio. They are conducting human pilot studies on several of their bioactive products. With offices in the Center for Advanced Food Technology at Rutgers University, WellGen is uniquely positioned to participate in collaborative university research programs.

WellGen is discovering and developing nutrigenomics ingredients that will provide health benefits to consumers and satisfy significant market needs. We will sell our proprietary products as nutritional ingredients with scientifically validated benefits to the major markets that include functional foods, dietary supplements, pet foods, cosmeceuticals and drugs.

XStream Systems, Inc.  http://www.xstreamsystems.net/

XSTREAM SYSTEMS, Inc. produces next-generation equipment for material identification. Their patented systems are based on energy-dispersive X-ray diffraction (EDXRD), a highly sensitive and accurate technology previously available only in expensive, high-end systems used by major laboratories. The company brings on-site, real-time material identification within the reach of nearly any organization, with products that are as easy to use as they are affordable. The company has locations in both Vero Beach, Florida and Ashburn, Virginia.

Energy Dispersive X-ray Diffraction (EDXRD), sometimes referred to as Coherent X-ray Scattering (CXRS), was first proposed in the 1960's as a simple and high speed way to analyze remotely the crystal structure of material within a vessel.  Among its first uses was the examination of material within a high pressure vessel or furnace. Later, the method was adapted for real-time analysis of materials being moved on high speed conveyor belt such as those at cement or chemical plants. In the mid to late 1980's, the method was investigated for possible use as a detection tool for explosives hidden within luggage. The first work took place at Philips Medical Systems in Hamburg, Germany, where a simple, non-tomographic device was built. In 1988, Philips teamed with researchers at Rutgers University to develop the first commercial scale unit, which then became the model for the full tomographic unit produced by Yxlon Gmbh (now marketed through its parent company - Invision). Later, in 2002, the same researchers at Rutgers collaborated with L-3 Communications to develop a similar, non-tomographic diffraction-based system.

In both the Invision/Yxlon and L-3 machines, the XRD method is used as a secondary scanner to investigate suspicious regions that were previously identified by a primary instrument such as a CT scanner. By having the XRD unit look at only a single spot (or at most a few spots), the speed problem of the XRD can be reduced. In return, the XRD unit offers high detection rates with single digit false alarm rates. When combined, the CT scanner and XRD promise to provide good throughput with good detection capabilities.

XStream Systems is currently marketing their XT250 System, which contains EDXRD technology, to the pharmaceutical industry. The unit can detect counterfeit drugs with accuracy rates up to 99.34%. Some of the many industries the XT250 Material Identification System can also be used are: border patrol, dry chemicals, mining, bulk processing, the cosmetic industry and more.

4C's Breeding Tech, Inc. (www.4cshellfish.com)

In the business of genetic research and development of shellfish, 4C’s was founded in 1997. Developers of 4Cs Natural Triploids, the company is located in Wildwood NJ and has partners in Australia, Europe, China and South America. The mission of 4c’s is to be at the forefront of research and development of new proprietary genetics technologies for shellfish aquaculture and to market these technologies to shellfish hatcheries and aquaculturists to improve the quality and marketability of hatchery products.