CONCORD, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--
Cerus Corporation (NASDAQ:CERS) announced today that it has been awarded
two cash grants totaling approximately $489,000 under the U.S.
Government's Qualifying Therapeutic Discovery Project (QTDP) program.
"This funding will be helpful to support the development of our
INTERCEPT Blood System for platelets and red blood cells, which both
qualified to receive a grant," said Claes Glassell, Cerus' president and
chief executive officer.
The QTDP was created by Congress as part of the Patient Protection and
Affordable Care Act in March 2010. The program provides a tax credit or
grant equal to 50% of eligible costs and expenses for the tax years 2009
and 2010. The grants are a tax benefit targeted to therapeutic discovery
projects that, among other things, show a reasonable potential to result
in new therapies to treat areas of unmet medical need, prevent, detect
or treat chronic or acute diseases and conditions, or reduce the
long-term growth of health care costs in the United States.
ABOUT CERUS
Cerus Corporation is a biomedical products company focused on
commercializing the INTERCEPT Blood System to enhance blood safety. The
INTERCEPT system is designed to reduce the risk of
transfusion-transmitted diseases by inactivating a broad range of
pathogens such as viruses, bacteria and parasites that may be present in
donated blood. The nucleic acid targeting mechanism of action enables
INTERCEPT treatment to inactivate both established transfusion threats,
such as hepatitis B and C, HIV, West Nile virus and bacteria, and is
designed to inactivate emerging pathogens such as influenza, malaria and
dengue. Cerus currently markets and sells the INTERCEPT Blood System for
both platelets and plasma in Europe, Russia, the Middle East and
selected countries in other regions around the world. The INTERCEPT red
blood cell system is in clinical development. See http://www.cerus.com
for more information.
INTERCEPT and the INTERCEPT Blood System are trademarks of Cerus
Corporation.
Source: Cerus Corporation