EU – Baltic States, Funds, Good for Business, Latvia, Medicine, Technology

Latima, a company of Rigvir holding, which develops and promotes cancer virotherapy worldwide, has received the grant under the EU’s Horizon 2020 program “Dedicated support to biotechnology SMEs closing the gap from lab to market”, Rigvir’s CFO Karlis Urbans announced.

“There are millions of cancer patients around the world who are in need of this unique cancer medicine. At the moment Rigvir is approved in three countries so far, however other patients can get virotherapy with Rigvir via medical tourism. I hope that this grant will make cancer virotherapy more available for everyone who would benefit from it. Cancer patients deserve this safe, effective and humane cancer treatment,” he said.

Oncolytic virotherapy is a cancer treatment using a virus that finds and destroys malignant cells in the human body. Rigvir is the world's first approved oncolytic virotherapy medicine for the treatment of melanoma, local therapy of skin and subcutaneous metastases of melanoma, prevention of relapse and metastases after surgery. Rigvir (Riga Virus) was discovered by Latvian professor Aina Muceniece in the 1960s.

Rigvir, founded in 2014, posted EUR 533,055 in turnover for 2015 and earned a profit of EUR 160,312, according to Firmas.lv. The company belongs to several Latvian individuals.