California Stem Cell, Inc. (CSC) recently announced that the company has secured Series A financing from private investors. The company further announced that the proceeds from the financing will be used to expand its laboratory and manufacturing facilities here, allowing mass production of FDA compliant cells and pre-clinical development of treatments for cardiac and central nervous system disorders.

CSC has intellectual property surrounding techniques for producing scalable volumes of several human cell types, including cardiac, neuronal and motor neurons, at high purity in its Irvine facility.

“CSC has begun deriving high purity, clinical grade human cell populations from human embryonic stem cells,” said Dr. Chris Airriess, Chief Operating Officer of CSC. “The funding will enable CSC to continue the expansion of its GMP manufacturing capabilities and proceed toward the development of our lead therapeutic candidates.”

CSC is currently in the pre-clinical development stage of stem cell based therapies for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s Disease), spinal cord injury (SCI) and coronary heart disease.

“This milestone is a major step toward an eventual stem cell therapy for people suffering from motor neuron loss due to disease or injury” according to Dr. Hans Keirstead, chairman of the CSC Scientific Advisory Board. “Our initial research shows that transplanted motor neurons can survive and integrate into the central nervous system. The ability to produce specific cells in FDA compliant fashion, in clinically relevant numbers is a major step toward finding a breakthrough in treating ALS, SMA and SCI, plus many other debilitating diseases.”

Dr Keirstead will speak about the use of high purity human cell populations in research and therapy at the Stem Cell Partnering Series conference in La Jolla, Calif. this morning.

California Stem Cell, Inc. is a privately held company focused on the manufacturing of high-purity human cells for therapeutic development and clinical application. Since its founding in Irvine, Calif., in 2005, CSC has developed proprietary methods for scalable production of human motor neurons, neuronal progenitors, cardiac muscle and sino-atrial node cells.