Life sciences briefing: Thursday, Feb. 14, 2008

TODAY’S HEADLINES:

• Arbor Surgical draws another $5.5M for heart-valve replacements (VBLS exclusive)
• AstraZeneca spinout Albireo raises $27M for GI drugs (release)
• Knee-implant maker MAKO Surgical slashes IPO price range (release)
• eScreen takes in $8M for automated drug screening (peHUB)
• GlucoLight gets undisclosed funding for glucose monitoring (release)
• Oddo et al. order $4M for odor-sniffer Odotech (release)
• Baird Capital Partners acquires med-device manufacturer Ellman Int’l (peHUB)
• Cancer biotech BiPar names Hoyoung Huh as CEO (release)

AstraZeneca spinout Albireo raises $27M for GI drugs — AstraZeneca spun out a new biotech startup, Albireo (no Web site), with the help of venture backers who provided $27 million in a first funding round. Investors included Nomura Phase4 Ventures, TVM Capital and Scottish Widows Investment Partnership.

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Albireo, which will be based in Gothenburg, Sweden, will focus on unspecified gastrointestinal diseases. The company will take over one experimental drug that is already in clinical testing, plus a number of other candidates at earlier stages of development. Albireo anticipates expanding its first round of funding to as much as $40 million.

Knee-implant maker MAKO Surgical slashes IPO price range — Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.-based MAKO Surgical, a developer of knee implants and associated robotic-surgery systems, slashed its expected IPO pricing by 30 percent. The company now expects its shares to price between $10 and $11 apiece, down from an earlier range of $14 to $16.

MAKO now stands to raise no more than $63.8 million, down from as much as $93.8 million under its previous expectation. Following the offering — if it takes place — the company could have a market capitalization of as much as $202.4 million.

The retrenchment is the latest sign of trouble brewing in the life-sciences IPO market, which wasn’t actually all that healthy to begin with. Should MAKO fail to price its offering, it would become the eighth life-science startup to yank its IPO this year — assuming no other company gets there first, that is.