Dart will close its doors on Feb. 9 due to poor progress on its therapeutic goals and little return on hundreds of millions of dollars in R&D.
Privately-held Dart NeuroScience and its quest to develop therapies intended to improve cognitive vitality will close its doors on Feb. 9 due to poor progress on its therapeutic goals and little return on hundreds of millions of dollars in research and development.
In a letter to employees, Dart Chief Executive Officer Kenneth E. Johns Jr. laid out his decisions to shutter the company, which includes the failure to advance therapies as well as financial concerns.
“Despite the continued effort of an extraordinarily capable and dedicated team of scientists and the investment into research and development of well in excess of seven hundred million dollars, the company has not generated adequate signs of any human memory improvement or motor rehabilitation,” the letter said, according to the San Diego Union Tribune.
Johns’ letter indicated that there were some questions as to whether or not company leadership had any hope of actually achieving its goals without investing billions of dollars more. Even with investments of billions of dollars, Johns said in the letter there were “questionable odds of success.”
This morning the Union Tribune reported the company filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) with the California Employment Development Department. The notice, which was signed by CEO Johns, indicated the closure will affect approximately 265 employees. Those employees will be permanently laid off, the Union Tribune said. Employees are expected to receive benefits through the Feb. 9 closure.
The news came as a shock to employees. The announcement was internally made last week during a company-wide meeting. Tatiana Galvez, who had been with the company since June of this year, told the Union Tribune that they were under the impression the mandatory meeting would address the wildfires plaguing San Diego and much of Southern California. There may have been concerns about possible evacuation of the facility, much like what med-tech company Medtronic was forced to do in the fall when fires threatened its Northern California operations.
Dart NeuroScience was founded in 2008. On the company website, the company pointed to its hopes for a robust future and “vigorous growth” as it sought to build “strong connections and collaborations with other pharma/biotech companies in the region.” When it was founded, Dart hoped to discover and develop new mechanisms of action for drugs targeting memory disorders. Dart researchers were focused on targeting genes involved in the memory formation of mammals with hopes of strengthening memory in humans battling certain diseases that affect cognitive skills.
