Oncor

Oncor Inc., a Gaithersburg company that markets gene-based tests for cancer and other diseases, yesterday posted a first-quarter loss of $8 million, or 32 cents a share. The company said revenue fell to $3.3 million in the quarter, which ended March 31.The loss includes $2.2 million in noncash interest expenses. The company said it was able to reduce its loss from operations in the first quarter of 1997 to $4.1 million, compared with $4.5million in the corresponding period last year, through "streamlining initiatives."

OncorMed Inc., a Gaithersburg biotechnology company, said yesterday that it will collaborate on research and development with Incyte Pharmaceuticals Inc., a California-based gene research company.As part of the deal, Incyte is taking a 10 percent equity stake, valued at $3 million, in OncorMed, and can purchase additional shares of stock that would raise its equity stake to 20 percent.Oncor Inc. of Gaithersburg, which financed OncorMed's creation in 1993, is its largest equity holder with 30 percent.

Gaithersburg-based Oncor Inc., which develops and makes gene-based tests for detecting cancer, announced yesterday that it has expanded its board of directors to eight members by naming two new directors.The new directors are Jose Coronas, 54, and Dr. Derace Schaffer, 49.Coronas is the former president of Johnson & Johnson Clinical Diagnostics Inc. He has also worked for the Clinical Diagnostics Division of the Eastman Kodak Co.Schaffer is a clinical professor of radiology at the University of Rochester School of Medicine, and president of Ide Group P.C., a group medical practice in New York.

Gaithersburg-based OncorMed Inc., which markets genetic tests for diseases, said yesterday that it has obtained the rights to use information about certain genetic mutations linked to breast cancer to improve its tests for cancer.The mutations were discovered by University of California researchers.OncorMed officials declined to disclose how much the company paid the university for the rights to use the discovery. But Oncor-Med executives said the discovery will be used to broaden the number of gene mutations that the company's test for detecting breast cancer, called the BRCA1 test, can spot.

OncorMed Inc., a biotechnology company that has developed genetic tests for cancers and other diseases, says it will begin marketing next week a breakthrough test that can predict whether some women with family histories of breast and ovarian cancer have a strong genetic predisposition for the diseases.The company says the new test can detect more than 60 percent of mutations in a recently discovered gene, called BRCA2. Research has shown that mutations in the BRCA2 gene can lead to breast and ovarian cancers.

Talk about turning up the heat. Investors in Maryland-based stocks have been feeling it this week.Shares of many Maryland-based high-technology and biotechnology companies have taken a licking as one spirited round of selling on Wall Street after another has driven technology-related issues down.But the recent blood-letting for Maryland stocks hasn't been limited to technology-related issues. Shares in financial institutions such as Alex. Brown & Sons, and service providers, such as Sylvan Learning Centers, Inc., have also taken a hit in the downturn.

The Food and Drug Administration plans to approve a Maryland-based company's highly specific test for the human papilloma virus, which is associated with an increased risk of cervical cancer, for marketing in the United States.A spokeswoman for the FDA Center for Devices and Radiological Health, the arm that regulates medical devices and diagnostics, said yesterday that Gaithersburg-based Oncor Inc. was notified in a May 13 letter that its test merited approval subject to final labeling and inspection requirements.

Oncor Inc., the Gaithersburg-based biotechnology company, said yesterday that it is entering the race to develop a way to control obesity by targeting one of its genetic causes, in this case a mutation in a gene that controls how calories are stored."

Oncor Inc., the Gaithersburg-based biotechnology company, got a year-end boost yesterday -- $10 million from institutional investors.The closing of that deal gives the company $16 million to work with as it struggles to get its first product approved in the U.S.The investment comes as good news to the company on the heels earlier this month of a Food and Drug Administration panel's rejection of its request to market in the U.S. a gene-based test for the...

The stock of Oncor Inc, a Gaithersburg-based biotechnology company, took a beating yesterday as the market absorbed news that a federal advisory panel had shot down its request to market a gene-based test.In heavy trading yesterday, the company's stock dropped $1.875 per share, or 32 percent, to $4 per share. Oncor's stock price has dropped 36 percent since the FDA decision became public on Thursday.Angus Macdonald, an analyst who tracks the company for Fahnestock & Co. in Boston, said yesterday that the panel's decision was "a very negative event for the company.