Protiva BioTherapeutics

Protiva BioTherapeutics was a Canadian biotechnology company based in Vancouver, British Columbia.

To improve prospects of successfully advancing gene therapy techniques, a team of scientists at the University of British Columbia (UBC) led by Dr. Pieter Cullis developed and patented a new form of lipid nanoparticle designed to deliver genetic material to host cells.¹⁾ From 1994 onward, a series of patents were filed describing the technology Cullis and his colleagues created, including the addition of a chemical called polyethylene glycol (PEG) to further increase the LNP’s ability to pass into cells.^{2) 3) 4) 5)}

This included a variation on the LNP design that Cullis developed in 2000 with several colleagues including Dr. Ian MacLachlan, which became the basis for a spinoff company the team named Protiva Biotherapeutics, focused entirely on gene therapy.^{6) 7)}

In 2001, Protiva received a $14.5 million investment from Lumira Ventures.⁸⁾

Protiva partnered with Roche subsidiary Alnylam Pharmaceuticals in Cambridge, Massachusetts to collaboratively develop products using RNAi to inhibit, or “turn off”, target genes (compared to mRNA, which turns on production of proteins), which bore fruit in a 2006 study demonstrating success silencing genes in monkeys.⁹⁾

The Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) participated in multiple rounds of investing into Protiva, including $4,950,000 in 2006 and $3,300,000 in 2007.¹⁰⁾ The BDC is wholly owned by the Government of Canada, meaning the federal government has a potential financial conflict of interest in the COVID-19 vaccines that later used lipid nanoparticle licenses associated with Protiva.

On March 30, 2008, Protiva announced it was combining its business with Tekmira Pharmaceuticals, reuniting the intellectual property that had become scattered across several startups out of the University of British Columbia (UBC). The new joint company signed a new deal with Alnylam Pharmaceuticals to allow access to their lipid nanoparticle patents - a key component of achieving their self-described “Alnylam 2020” strategy.^{11) 12)}