Israeli company opens office in Rockville

Announcement highlights state’s trade mission

BioLineRx USA, a wholly owned subsidiary of BioLineRx of Jerusalem, has hired a vice president of business development for its new office, according to the announcement.

O’Malley (D) met with BioLineRx CEO Morris Laster at the Israel Biomed 2008 Conference in Tel Aviv. The company was co-founded in 2003 by several venture capital firms and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, one of the largest manufacturers of generic drugs in the world, according to Teva’s Web site. In January, Teva acquired CoGenesys of Rockville. Other Israeli companies in Maryland include Controp Precision Instruments, Verint Systems, Vuance, Compugen and Medispec.

‘‘Our wealth of cutting-edge bioscience companies, our world-class public- and private-sector research centers and our highly educated and talented workforce makes Maryland a natural fit for a company on the move like BioLineRx,” O’Malley said in a statement. ‘‘We look forward to working with BioLineRx to further its mission of developing new drugs that offer hope to millions of people around the world.”

Besides its schizophrenia drug, BioLineRx is developing a treatment for heart disease.

‘‘At this point it has become essential to strengthen our business development efforts to help us evolve to the next stage,” Laster said in a statement. ‘‘Maryland, with its leading research institutions and biomedical industry, was a natural choice for opening our US subsidiary.”

Among those accompanying O’Malley in Israel is Jonathan Cohen, president and CEO of 20⁄20 Gene Systems of Rockville.

‘‘It’s a very vibrant, innovative industry community here, and a robust investment community as well,” Cohen said in a statement.

Cohen’s company is involved in the development and commercialization of protein biomarker based diagnostics useful for both early disease detection and personalized medicine.

A significant number of Maryland venture capital firms have invested in Israeli companies, including high-tech and biotech players such as EMZA, Defensoft, Icaros, FiberZone Networks, ClassifEye, Innovea, eBIZmobility, LifeBond and Flexicath, according to state government information. In addition, Maryland exported more than $44 million of goods and services to Israel in 2006, representing a 45 percent increase over the previous five years. Nearly 30 Israeli companies maintain offices in Maryland.

In 2005, the latest year for which data are available, investment by foreign-owned companies in Maryland totaled $11.9 billion. About 105,000 jobs, or 5.5 percent of the state’s private-sector employment, can be attributed to Maryland’s foreign-owned firms, according to O’Malley’s office.

O’Malley speaks atbioscience conference

Before leaving for Israel, O’Malley spoke last week at the Bioscience Industry Initiative Conference at the University of Maryland Biopark in Baltimore. The conference, part of the Governor’s Workforce Investment Board’s Center for Industry Initiatives, attracted business leaders and government officials to discuss the industry’s increasing workforce needs.

Among the recommendations made at the conference to aid workforce goals were improving outreach to untapped talent sources, including veterans leaving the military; developing better competency and training models, especially focusing on basic work skills; and creating a pipeline of young entry-level workers, according to Eric M. Seleznow, the board’s executive director.

‘‘We are focused on maintaining our highly educated workforce to meet employer need, while providing employment opportunities for all Marylanders,” Seleznow said Tuesday in an e-mail. ‘‘The Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation employment projections for the bioscience industry from 2004 to 2014 shows that the employment rate should grow at 1.5 times the rate for other occupations.”