Thursday, January 8, 2009

Acusphere’s top researcher Walovitch leaves

By Marc Songini

Watertown-based pharmaceutical development company Acusphere Inc. has lost its senior vice president of research Richard Walovitch.

This week, Acusphere (Nasdaq: ACUS) announced Walovitch had resigned “to pursue another opportunity.” Walovitch claimed in a statement he was “very proud” to have been associated with Acusphere’s efforts for its lead drug Imagify, a heart imaging agent.

Acusphere submitted Imagify’s New Drug Application to the U.S. Food & Drug Administration in April 2008. The company is currently awaiting the FDA’s review for the drug. Given that, Walovitch stated that “now is the right time for me to move to the next phase of my career.” Company president and CEO Sherri Oberg noted Walovitch had made “significant contributions to Acusphere’s success” in the past 11 years.

Boding poorly for the company, in December, the FDA’s Cardiovascular and Renal Drugs Advisory Committee rejected Imagify, citing concerns that the risks of the product outweigh the benefits of its diagnostic capabilities. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean the FDA itself will reject the drug.

In other Acusphere news, the company announced it had received notification that the Nasdaq Stock Market listing qualifications panel had decided to delist the firm’s common stock as of Friday, January 9.

The panel took this step because of Acusphere’s failure to meet the $2.5 million stockholders’ equity requirement. The company now expects its common stock to trade on the Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board (OTCBB) on the same day as the delisting.