For biotech stocks like Ocean Biomedical (NASDAQ:OCEA), a new patent can mean great things. It just did today, in fact, as it gained over 9% in Thursday’s trading thanks to a fresh patent the company landed. Rather, a notice of allowance, which generally precedes a full patent.
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The notice in question went to co-founder Jack Elias, who landed the patent for a kind of molecule that will aid in treating patients with a certain kind of lung disease. It’s already being adapted to reach clinical settings for pulmonary fibrosis, Ocean noted, and the patent actually extends to cover several diseases. Most of these are connected to pulmonary fibrosis in some way, including genetic, idiopathic, and chemotherapy or radiation-induced. It even stretches to cover asbestosis or silicosis, which are related to exposure to certain materials.
The full patent should arrive in the coming months, Ocean figures, but the current notice is enough to get started with. With idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis impacting roughly 100,000 people every year just in the United States—and about 15 out of every 100,000 people worldwide—having an effective treatment could represent a lot of lives saved. That and some solid revenue in Ocean’s coffers. Ocean noted that its treatment will specifically target a substance known as Chitinase 1.
Hedge funds are already on board with Ocean’s new developments. In the last quarter, hedge funds added 43,400 shares to their holdings, enough to move confidence a little above neutral. This represents the second quarter in a row that hedge funds added to their Ocean Biomedical share holdings after two consecutive quarters of no movement at all.
