About

Orthox is founded on Oxford University research that has been nurtured for over 20 years to deliver a range of unique clinical implants

WHO WE ARE

Orthox is a privately held UK company developing tissue regenerative implants which enable patients who have suffered injuries to their knee cartilage to return to a fully active, pain-free lifestyle.

Founded on superlative science, developed by industry experts

Orthox was founded in 2009 by life scientist, Dr Nick Skaer, and knee surgeon, Professor Oliver Kessler MD, to exploit the potential of research into silk proteins by Professor Fritz Vollrath’s Oxford Silk Group at The University of Oxford.

Based on findings published in Nature in 2001 Vollrath and co-researcher David Knight identified the mechanisms by which spiders achieve the exceptional mechanical properties in the silk fibres they spin and postulated how this could be emulated using silkmoth silks to create commercial quantities of super-strong fibres.

As Chief Scientist and then CEO of Vollrath and Knight’s spin out company, Oxford Biomaterials, Dr Nick Skaer co-invented and developed the FibroFix™ technology platform. In 2009 he secured the exclusive licenses to exploit FibroFix™ in orthopaedic tissue repair and founded Orthox with Professor Oliver Kessler, a leading knee surgeon and orthopaedic industry veteran.

Originally seeded through awards from the Wellcome Trust, Innovate UK, NIHR and the EU, Orthox secured first Series A finance in 2015 and built a Board and Management team with  validated FibroFix™ technology in key safety and efficacy trials before launching clinical trials of lead product FibroFix™ Cartilage in 2022.

March 2001

Professor Fritz Vollrath and Dr David Knight at the University of Oxford publish their seminal paper on the Liquid Crystalline spinning of Spider Silk

January 2002

Vollrath and Knight spin out Oxford Biomaterials Ltd to further their work on commercialising silk protein solutions for biomedical applications.

March 2005

Dr Nick Skaer appointed CEO of Oxford Biomaterials and secures €1.6m award from the EU to develop “Silkbone”: A silk based orthopaedic tissue repair platform.

May 2008

Dr Skaer secures licenses to the Orthopaedic technology developed at Oxford Biomaterials and founds Orthox with Prof Oliver Kessler, MD a leading knee surgeon and former Director of Orthbiologics at global major, Stryker Orthopaedics.

January 2009

Orthox secures a £1.6m award from UK Healthcare Charitable foundation Wellcome Trust to seed the Company and launch operations. See press release here

May 2009

Orthox featured on BBC1’s ‘The One Show’ alongside Sir David Attenborough, broadcast to over 7 million viewers.

June 2010

Orthox secures £469k in multiple awards from the Technology Strategy Board to progress FibroFix™ Meniscus and FibroFix™ Cartilage development programmes. See press release here

February 2011

Orthox featured as part of the ‘Innovation!’ series on EuroNews broadcast to over 8 million viewers.

May 2012

Orthox led consortium are awarded a £411k grant under the Technology Strategy Board Advanced Materials funding programme to further develop and evaluate Orthox’s FibroFix™ composite materials technology.

October 2013

Orthox Secures Funds Approaching £3 million from Wellcome Trust and Technology Strategy Board to Support Clinical Development Programme. See press release here

February 2014

International News Station CNN feature FibroFix technology on their“Make, Create, Innovate” broadcast.

October 2014

Orthox receives patent approvals in key territories with grant of patents no. 2619693 (Canada); 5603857 (Japan); ZL200980125230.8 (China).

May 2015

Orthox and FibroFix™ technology featured in the Guardian Newspaper and Guardian Online and the BBC website

November 2015

Orthox relocates to enlarged manufacturing and office facilities on Milton Park. The bespoke facility at 66 Innovation Drive has been fitted out to accommodate Orthox’s unique manufacturing process and allows for expansion of the workforce.

January 2016

Orthox receive further grants of lead product patent WO/2007/020449 in key territories, the United States (9229662) and China (1849712) and the first grant of WO/2013/057497 which has been awarded in Australia (2012324641).

April 2016

Orthox completes first close of £4.25m Series A finance from a syndicate of experienced life sciences investors including Oxford Investment Consultants, Parkwalk Advisors and Atmosclear Investments.

July 2017

Patent WO/2007/020449 granted in the UK, Germany, France, Switzerland and Ireland under registered grant no. 1948256 completing grants in all global territories for the patent family.

August 2018

Orthox extend their Series A finance round with a further £1.5m investment led by existing major shareholder Atmosclear Investments.

October 2018

Orthox secure a major £1.1m funding award from the NIHR i4i programme to take lead product FibroFix™ Cartilage into clinical trials.

June 2020

Orthox secure prestigious €2.5m EIC Accelerator Award to deliver a European Clinical Study of FibroFix™ Cartilage.

July 2020

Apatech founder and experienced orthobiologics industry expert, Dr Tom Buckland joins as Commercial Strategy Director and medtech industry veteran and former World-wide VP of R&D at Depuy, Dr Allan Ritchie, is appointed to the Board of Directors.

August 2020

EIT Health select Orthox as one of 11 recipients from 121 applicants for a €500k award from their Pandemic Start Up Rescue Programme

February 2021

Orthox receives first grants for 3 new patent families WO/2018/215752, WO/2018/215756 and WO/2018/224800 providing protection for these novel inventions with multiple further patents pending in these families across other global territories.

September 2021

Orthox is selected from over 1100 applicants to be one of the 25 strong cohort of companies on the $500,000 US Medtech Accelerator program with Orthox’s promotional video selected as a finalist in the MedTech Innovator Accelerator Best Video competition.

February 2022

Orthox completes a further close of $4.3m on its $12.5m Series A Financing for Clinical Trials of Knee Cartilage Repair FibroFix™ Product Platform. See press release here

July 2022

Orthox Announces MHRA Authorisation for Clinical Trial of Knee Cartilage Repair FibroFix™ Product Platform. Key patent on implantable tissue repair devices granted in major economies. See press release here