Can we assume that form this interview, there’s no way in hell that Follica are currently in Phase II, as the rumours claim?
I’m thinking they got nothing. They’re blowing a lot of smoke. I’m thinking that they’re still trying to figure it all out.
Keep in mind that Cots made a big push to get involved with GPR44 blockers that other companies are bringing to market. If Follica had anything on their own why would Cots have been trying to piggy-back onto GPR44 blockers owned by other companies?
Im sure it will be fine. It was never gonna come tomorrow and they have never stated that. All they have said is the have done some phase II trials offshore
“Hair transplants have been around for decades now and there is enough empirical evidence to conclude that transplanted hairs do not seem to miniaturize beyond what they would if it had remained in the donor area.”
Show me the study.
I had transplants thirty years ago.
The last three years the transplanted hairs are becoming shockingly finer–wispy, some are starting to look as fine as the thread from a spider’s web, while the hair remaining in the donor sites is more robust.
Show me the study that over a lifetime transplanted hair will last as long as the hair remaining in the donor area.
Show me.
So basically all of you are saying that nothing is gonna change since aderans is about to close, histogen did not show really interesting pictures and follica did not release any information? Moreover we still don’t know if the pgd2 could be considered a game changer…am i right?
I’m wondering now how legit those recent Follica patents are. Or whatever, how useful they will be to forum-goers hoping to replicate elements of them.
"Q: MPB hair follicles grow as normal on immunodeficient mice is this because they do not produce pgd2?
That would be one guess that is potentially true given what we know."
If it known if HIV/AIDS affects hair loss?
[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by Aran Linvail[/postedby]
I don’t believe his comment about FGF is accurate. I believe PGE2 has increased FGF in vivo.[/quote]
I think you’re right, Aran. Also, I don’t know why his answers were so short. They’re just basically, “Yes”, “No”, “Maybe” or “I can’t say”.
Immune suppression -
The immune system does affect hair loss but it’s not an easy understandable relationship. Simply suppressing the immune system does not help reduce MPB on its own.
Yep under new legislation small companies can also go directly go investors I think this is a plausible isea
I think HIV affects a different part of the immune system, not the more primitive prostaglandin mediated part.
[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by walrus[/postedby]
"Q: MPB hair follicles grow as normal on immunodeficient mice is this because they do not produce pgd2?
That would be one guess that is potentially true given what we know."[/quote]
Interesting, and to support Aran’s answer to walrus, I would have thought PGD2 levels would not be affected in people with HIV, because a completely different part of the immune system is being affected.
As to George’s citing of a study that supposedly shows “MPB hair follicles grow as normal on immunodeficient mice”, what study is George citing?
I would assume it’s a study by Dr. Garza, but it seems to me there would be another explanation for this, not the one Dr. Garza supported here.
George, perhaps you can enlighten us.
If you mean that MPB follicles grow “normally” (meaning they actually grow terminal hairs) on immunodeficient mice, I would have to assume:
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We’re talking about human follicles
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These follicles were grafted onto or into the skin of the mice
But remember, we’re still talking about human follicles that were previously affected by MPB.
By Dr. Garza’s own reasoning, expressed in an answer to another of George’s questions, whether or not neighboring tissue has PGD2 shouldn’t affect the MPB follicles one way or another, because PGD2 doesn’t travel outside of the tissues where it’s actually made.
So I don’t understand Dr. Garza’s answer at all. It looks like he’s contradicting himself.
George, can you tell us where in the research this was reported?
[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by Mr. Z[/postedby]
Follica has released all of it’s scientific staff. The remaining people involved are either part of the advisory board (which is distinct from the company, and don’t play a role in day to day operations of the company), part of the venture capital firm (again no role in day to day), or a CEO or VP. No one reamins to do any research. There is nobody to oversee clinical trials, and handle all the day to day stuff involved with that. So, how is it that anything would be happening? who would do the work? I don’t think it looks good at all.
And the latest article claiming they’re on the verge of going commercial is BS. Just another lazy article with no research behind it. The author probably saw the previous exconomy articles with thousands of comments and wanted to drive some page views for his own gain - figured he would go back to a topic that whipped up interest in the past.
Really sucks when you think that this was huge news in 2007. 6 years later and we haven’t seen not even one photo demonstrating a new human hair.[/quote]
Mr. Z
We on BTT are very interested to know what your source for such information is.
Or are you just guessing?
Well, let me preface this post with the following: I have no inside info on this, so, nobody should be getting worked up over my post. However…
Over the years i was able to locate a lot of the scientists working at Follica on linkedin. I dug quite a bit and found numerous scientists associated with Follica. Being that they are a small company, and never had a very large staff (i think i recall reading staff count was under 20), i feel i was able to find a decent percentage of scientists who’ve worked for them. As of now, not one of the scientists that i tracked work for Follica any longer. Furthermore, if you try to find someone who has Follica as the current employer (at the staff level), you come up empty handed. There are none that i can find, which wasn’t the case just a short while ago.
Interestingly, most of the employees left within the same 1 - 1.5 year window of time. This includes the VP of pharma development and the VP of Research - which to me, is the biggest “tell” that nothing research-wise is happening with them now; other than shoring up their intellectual property with patent filings. That they haven’t filled these vacancies in the upper level postions is not encouraging. Companies will usually not operate a research department without a head guy in place i.e. VP.
They were supposed to have been engaged in multiple avenues of research outside of MPB. I know for a fact they were looking at hair removal at some point in the past. What happened to that and How does that go on if you don’t have a VP of Research or pharma development? The simple answer is, that it doesn’t go on, it stops.
I’m not saying they’re dead as a company. I just think that, at the moment, nothing is happening. And it could be due to funding, could roadblock in their research, or maybe their tech works great and now they shopping it around to a bigger player? I don’t know.
My hope is that they’ve got something great and are working out a deal now to transfer it to a bigger company that will have the cash to push their wounding/lithium protocol through phase III and to continue their line of research with the PGD2 and FGF9 angles. That’s my dream, becasue if that’s not the case, then it could be back to the phase I drawing board, or worse…lights out.
GREAT research, Mr. Z! Well done.
Now watch, someone at Follica will read what you posted and they’ll slap a bunch of new “staff” up on LinkedIn suddenly.
Thanks, Roger.
I see the baldies over at BTT are losing their sh*t over my post. Haha morons.
FYI: The employees at Follica are not “banned” from social media - as one of the retards over there suggested. They were all on Linkein for years, as is their CEO, currently. Follica can be found in the ex-follica employees past work histories. Their new employers, of those who have left the company, are there for all to see as well. This includes their VPs of research and pharma development who are NOW AT DIFFERENT COMPANIES. Unless you’re a mouth breathing, troglogdyte with the IQ of a turnip, you should know that it’s not an inconsequential thing - to lose multiple VP’s at a single time - for a company. For it to happen at a company that is supposedly on the verge of a commercial breakthrough, as the article suggest, or pushing into phase III, is not at all likely. Furthermore, when you see that a major percentage of the employees have jumped ship all within a narrow time frame, the same time frame as the VP’s (this is not speculation, it’s an easily verifiable fact) you should know that this is a company that is not a engaging in research or are gearing up to make a commercial break through. They are going through or have gone through a major upheaval. All the wishful thinking in the world doesn’t change that.
As i said before, the only real positive that can be speculatively associated with Follica’s employees bailing, at this point, is that maybe they’re gearing up to sell the company to a bigger player with more money. Maybe…
To be fair, this is not recent news, most of them left in the 11-12 period. I’m not exactly sure what William Ju does during the day.
Perhaps if anyone is in Jersey they can go “visit” the HQ.
However it’s also true that PureTech Ventures, one of Follica’s unitholder,has still Follica in its pipeline.
However why not writing to Follica in order to understand something new?
[quote][postedby]Originally Posted by AleMB81[/postedby]
However it’s also true that PureTech Ventures, one of Follica’s unitholder,has still Follica in its pipeline.
However why not writing to Follica in order to understand something new?[/quote]
What new “information” do you expect from them? If they answer, it’ll just be company spin.
My question was sarcastic…In my opinion we can not speculate on this company because we just don’t know anything of what’s going on… This “reverse engineering” job made by Mr. Z could be useful but does not mean anything…You really wanna believe that Follica does not work or is not able to produce visibile results just only because the employee profiles on Linkedin changed?