Somewhat ironically, I have only heard one fund manager be critical of the Stoll era management of Cortex. The ironic part is that his complaint went as follows: Cortex should have bitten the bullet, raised $30 million regardless of the costs, so that they would not have been hamstrung by budgetary limitations, and could have advanced more projects in parallel (including an inlicensing). So--he was looking at 'dilution' as investment, and felt Cortex had been too timid.
Regarding an earlier question about whether how Ampakines are seen by the larger neuro field: It varies widely. Some reasons:
1) Relatively few companies have done work with Ampa-modulation. That is partly due to the patent estate Rogers, Lynch etc. assembled early on, which posed the risk that competition might be barred. That's in contrast, for example, to the nicotinic area (e.g. Targacept) where use patents did not prevent competition, it has been a battle for the best composition of matter.
2) The early take on Ampa modulation was that it would be epileptogenic--and indeed Lilly has had substantial problems in that area. So fears of side effect issues have been slow to abate.
3) No Ampa modulator has made it far into the clinic, so the potential is largely in theory, and proven only in animals. Again in contrast: everyone has a pretty good idea what nicotine can do, and there have been nonselective modulators around for decades (mecamylamine). Now Pfizer has a successful Chantix, whose clinical progress over the years has validated the principle, allowing R&D groups to have their expenditures funded by their companies.
4) The references to Ampa modulation as more than just shortterm memory enhancement have increased over the years (that was the initial 'buzz'), so that in reviews of neuroprotective/regenerative candidates, Ampakines are usually mentioned. But again, without human proof of concept, it's still viewed as early. Yet having been around for years, it's viewed as 'not new.' CX516 killed some interest, Lilly's problems killed some interest, CX717's clinical hold attenuated some interest. Human POC, like the ADHD trial, is what is required to raise the profile again.
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