Bone Therapeutics joins biotech name change rage, rebranding as BioSenic

Belgian biotech Bone Therapeutics is no more as the inflammation and cell therapy company transforms into BioSenic.

The name change, which comes following the majority buyout of the company’s stock by French biopharma Medsenic, also comes with a ticker change from “BOTHE” to “BIOS” and a new corporate website.

The new name—think Bone and the latter part of Medsenic joined together—is designed to show the mix of the two companies as one new biopharma. Bone Therapeutics brings its work in orthopedics, while Medsenic brings its projects in autoimmune diseases. The majority buyout came in August and was formally completed this week, with the BioSenic name coming as everything became official. 

News of the merger came after Bone Therapeutics was forced to slash its C-suite and eviscerate its pipeline, leaving just one asset—an allogeneic cell therapy using bone-forming cells—in midstage testing.

The company was expected to run out of cash by the third quarter and was essentially saved by the Medsenic deal in August. Bone Therapeutics' woes came after data, out late summer of 2021, showed its then leading candidate known as JTA-004 failed to improve knee pain in a phase 3 trial and was tossed out, leaving the company's future in the balance.

“We are excited to bring a new equity story to the market,” said François Rieger, newly appointed chairman and CEO of BioSenic, in a release, adding that the newly combined company is now “planning to meet current shareholders as well as potential new investors in order to present the new equity story.”

BioSenic becomes the fourth biotech to rename itself in the past two months. In late September, CytRx became LadRx as the biotech looks to shrug of years off trial setbacks and embrace a new leader and a new, and earlier, clinical focus.

Just a week prior, smoking cessation health tech company Respira, tired of competing with so many similarly named companies and drugs, rebranded to Qnovia to differentiate its business.

That came a week after COVID drugmaker Adagio changed its name to Invivyd, a decision it made amid a series of setbacks in its pipeline this year.