Belgrade biotech company, Bacterin, making waves in biofilm research excellence

Thirteen officials from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration dropped by a Belgrade company recently.

The company wasn’t in trouble and the officials weren’t auditing or inspecting it for problems.

By KAYLEY MENDENHALL Chronicle Staff Writer

On the contrary, Bacterin, http://www.bacterin.com/cgi-bin/bacterin/index.html
a local biotechnology facility, was chosen by the FDA for an educational visit.

"They only really go out like this for one company every two to three years," said Guy Cook, CEO and founder of Bacterin. "We were recognized for our leadership and expertise" in the biofilm industry.

The FDA visited Bacterin to discuss how medical-device companies test for bacteria, Cook said. The officials spent two days at the biotech lab last week.

The visit was exciting for John O’Donnell, sort of a proud parent who helped Cook formulate his business plan. O’Donnell is the executive director of TechRanch, a local business incubator, and Bacterin is a TechRanch graduate.

Since leaving the TechRanch last winter, the company is growing rapidly, helping people educated at Montana State University stay in Montana and building a mutually beneficial relationship with the MSU Center for Biofilm Engineering.

"Bozeman is ground zero for this kind of research," Cook said. "Bozeman is the Harvard for biofilm research."

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Bacterin Inc.

600 Cruiser Lane

Belgrade, MT 59714

Phone: 406.388.0480

Fax: 406.556.0969

http://www.bacterin.com/cgi-bin/bacterin/index.html

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Biofilms are collections of microorganisms that form on surfaces where water and bacteria meet, according to MSU’s Web site. Common biofilms include tooth plaque and river slime.

Colonies of bacteria can also form on medical devices placed in the human body such as catheters and cardiac stents.

"Anytime you put a foreign thing in your body, there is an infection rate associated with it," O’Donnell said.

Bacterin conducts tests on those devices to see how much bacteria sticks to them.

"We test other people’s medical devices and other people’s anti-microbial technology to see how efficient they are," explained Shane Stenerud, Bacterin business development manager.

Cook started Bacterin in 1996 after working at the MSU biofilm center and managed on his own for several years. He decided a couple of years ago that he wanted to push Bacterin from a strictly service company into developing its own products.

Now, along with testing medical devices, the company coats them with an anti-microbial solution to keep bacteria from sticking.

The goal is to reduce the infection rate by coating the devices with a solution that kills infection-causing bacteria.

"Ours is the highest kill rate in the industry," Stenerud said. "Ours is the most effective and it lasts the longest."

Bacterin is also the only biofilm laboratory in the world that meets the FDA’s "good laboratory practice" standards, Cook said. Any company that wants to remain FDA-approved has to meet those standards.

At this time last year Bacterin had only two employees, Cook said. Now the company is tracking $3 million in sales for the year and has 14 employees, with four working as part-time lab technicians.

"We are really proud of Bacterin," O’Donnell said. "It’s really fun to have such an early success story."

http://bozemandailychronicle.com/articles/2003/07/28/news/02bacterinbzbigs.txt