follicept - what's this?

[follicept]

follicept is our last hope in the near future . greetings from germany
my hypothetical question:

follicept prove its effectiveness. it would be a big hype about it in the world. im pretty sure that the result will be a big supply issue.
how do you think about this?


sorry for my bad english skills

Your English is great! Already working to avoid this. Current supplier can handle pretty significant output, and we have identified a few companies that get get supplying within 6-12 months, which is basically the purpose of the indiegogo. Sell a batch to the early adopters with current supply chain and use the profits to scale up.

[follicept]

I could exchange the Eiffel Tower against a pack of bottle of Follicept if i can recover 50% of my hair. I could give you the Louvres against 100% of my hair lost.

Eiffel Tower in Florida... you can do it Devon!

Hahaha deal!

[follicept]

If for regulatory reasons, They can't ship Follicept to Europe, I will help in ordering it and shipping it to our European friends myself. Of course, we should wait until we find out if this even works first.

Was waiting for someone to think of this! Hopefully we can do it and make it easy...

[follicept]

I can set up a company in Berlin / Germany and handle some the EU distribution from here on. I just finished my Bachelors Degree and now im planing onto starting an Import / Export business, so i might as well help you guys to change the lives of hundreds of thousands if this stuff really works!

My major was law of international and european business transactons but have no clue about the regulations for cosmetics / medicine . i can look into that tho...

If this stuff is legit and the results are convincing, i'll shoot you a mail over your website and we talk business if you feel like it...

Sounds good...we can definitely discuss.

[follicept]

LOL!

I'll tell you again Devon, I only threw that BS about you "owing us" out there a few days ago as bait. The same as Swooping threw posts in the thread about believing Follicept will work, I threw stuff out there to see if I could trip you up. I know how hard that is to believe but it's actually true. I figured that if you were scamming you would at perhaps in a way that a scammers act and I would perceive that and make an issue of it. Or the bait would open up possibilities I could explore further to sniff out any evidence of scamming.

I'm sorry, but it's true. The same as you tell us that you have gone through a lot of trouble regarding your potential hair loss treatment, we have seen a lot of scams and frauds and some look for evidence of scamming.

You have to understand that many many scammers have told bald people nice things out of one side of their mouths while they were tried to cheat us out of the other side of their mouth. I do NOT trust anyone in the baldness-cure business.

I even warned you at one point that I was "keeping score" on Follicept and that should tell you that I was looking for any proof I could find to flush out any scam intentions on the part of Follicept. In a way I'm like Arishi in that I will do whatever I have to do to expose what I think are bald cheats; except I'm smarter, more polite, more reasonable, more fair, and more thoughtful than Arishi.

Finally, I see not one shred of evidence that you're a scammer. I firmly believe that if your treatment doesn't work it won't have anything to do with any scamming. It will simply be that the treatment isn't able to reverse hair loss. Nothing more.

Thanks for that. Totally fair and understandable, and definitely the case.

[FrenchNewbie]

Can a moderator may intervene for Arashi? We all understood what he meant. So now stop.

You can verify my IP adress. I'm in France. I'm not under a VPN. My Internet Service Provider is Free (one of the 3 biggest in France). You can verify it or ask Noisette (he is french). I'm not a fake. I came here after seeing the french topic on Follicept (40 pages today) on Doctissimo (the biggest french forum on health where Noisette is active). There is an other topic in France on International Hair Loss.

I made some research about Promethon before coming here. They are very serious. You can go verify their campaign "No Prick". Health is not a joke for them. They do not deserve defamation from Arashi.

Please excuse my english. But i can't let Arashi telling defamation. I want Devon staying here.

Translation in french if you want a proof that i'm not a fake:

Est-ce qu'un modérateur pourrait intervenir pour Arashi? Nous avons tous compris ce qu'il voulait dire. Maintenant, merci de bien vouloir arrêter.

Vous pouvez vérifier mon adresse IP. Je ne suis pas sous VPN. Mon FAI est Free (l'un des trois plus gros FAI français). Vous pouvez vérifier ou demander à Noisette (il est français). Je n'ai pas créé un compte fake. Je suis venu ici après avoir vu le topic Follicept (40 pages aujourd'hui) sur Doctissimo (le plus grand forum français sur la "santé", où Noisette est actif). Il y a un autre topic en France sur International Hair Loss.

Merci de bien vouloir excuser mon anglais, mais je ne peux pas laisser Arashi diffamer. Je souhaite que Devon reste.

PS: Dédicace à Noisette. Je ne suis pas inscrit sur Doctissimo. Mais ça fait super plaisir de vous lire. Ca donne de l'espoir.

[follicept]

I actually took the time to read through the whole topic, it's quite entertaining indeed Just a quick summary:

* Although this company supposedly can not only cure hairloss, but has a superior vehicle that could be applied to tons of meds and thus must be literally worth billions, they couldnt convince any investors to put money into it, even in a climate of negative interest and all time highs in the stock market (the best possible environment to attract investors)
* Dr Hsu, the driving force behind this, put this product out there for sale: http://www.amazon.com/Camellix-ReviT.../dp/B00ESZBNJA Haven't tested it but looks like a typical scam product to me
* Several people insist dr Hsu graduated at Harvard but his LinkedIn only says he was a physician at a hospital associated with Harvard: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/stephen-hsu/37/9b5/776
* They don't want the FDA to oversee their trial.
* Tons of new accounts, that appeared since only a few months, keep pumping the product and keep throwing personal attacks at anyone who even dares to challenge it.

It all really looks like a huge scam to me. But I know, we've been down that road, people like me call it a scam, other people will throw in insults at those people and we'll be along 100 pages more of fighting in this thread without any progress. So I thought, how can we make this thread useful and actually get somewhere. And then I read this comment from Swooping: https://www.baldtruthtalk.com/showth...l=1#post201869

I think this really is a wonderful way. Look, if Follicept is honest and really believes in their product and REALLY only wants to sell it when it works, then they must be interested in convincing as much people as possible. Of course they can run their own trials, that no one oversees, but how can we know they didnt cheat ? We simply can't, no one oversees their trial, they could post anything they like.

So, the BEST and ONLY way (besides FDA overseen trials) to convince even the biggest doubters (like me and Swooping) is Swooping's idea. We select 10 TBT users, who have been visiting this forum for years, who are neutral and who we can trust. No, not me, not Swooping nor those 'new' accounts here, just other long term users we all agree we can trust. Devon sends out his product to them and they agree to put it onto their scalp for one month and document their progress.

This really is a common goal: if follicept really wants to prove that the doubters are wrong, then this simply is THE best way to do that ! If follicept comes up with some BS reason why they won't do it, we all know it's because they can't control the situation and thus can't cheat and ergo, we can all agree it's a scam.

What do you say Devon ?

We have raised over $1M. We have won global business plan competitions. We are in discussion with several major pharma companies. These things just take time. And we have decided to do it the hard way and not go public because we don't want to be responsible to shareholders worried about quarterly performance and profits only when we are trying to change the world long term, and help people in disease areas that may not be profitable or big enough to be attractive like it needs to be to big pharma. You have no clue what it takes to build a business, or how long it takes. All about strategy and the long term.

Different Dr. Hsu, as noted.

Our Dr. Hsu is Harvard trained. Degrees from Albert Enstein college at Yeshiva, fellowship/residency at Harvard/ MGH.

Something to clear up on the FDA issue: as others have noted, and you seem satisfied, it's not that we don't want them, but we are happy we can go to market without the time and expense required for their extensive clinical trials. However, the FDA is in no way involved with us. There is/was no application, and no express decision from them. We are basically a homeopathic treatment given our concentrations and ingredients, and so are not involving the FDA. I don't want anyone to have the impression that the FDA gave a stamp either way.

Again, these accounts are not ours. I have one account, this one. No time to praise myself in imperfect English (many of these users are European and quite fluent but some minor errors- much better than my French/German/etc.!). If you don't believe me, nothing I can do about that. Maybe ask the mod for IP addresses?

I am open to giving some users a sample, gotta talk with Dr. Hsu. I am not entirely sure that the very few very loud people like you would be convinced by any amount of evidence, no matter where it's coming from, so not sure how much it will truly help.

If we run our trials, which we will publish and which will be replicable, and we are convinced of efficacy, we will launch indiegogo and get the product out for users to test and post results. If we turn out to be a scam as you accuse, we make off with a few thousand (which given the time I spend on here, would probably be less than minimum wage) and our reputations are destroyed forever, and our grander aspirations for our products are shot. Frankly, if we are convinced, we can release it without your individual approval. I understand your skepticism, and am not dismissing the idea, but as other users have noted, it doesn't really matter.

[Arashi]

You can verify my IP adress. I'm in France.

LOL, like an IP means something these days. I used VPN's or TOR network to stream content that's IP locked, anyone these days knows how to do that. Give me a country and I'll post from that IP.

Furthermore, 'so now stop'. Tell me: why would a consumer NOT want an independent forum test ? Give me 1 good reason why a forum test, among 20 long term forum users (some will be on meds, which they will have to state, that will also be an excellent indication to see if the combo has any impact, some will not be on meds) is a bad idea.

[oppenheimer82]

I guess you have a point, maybe it's not fair to say they don't WANT it. But it most definitely doesn't speak in their favour or makes their product credible.

Look it's really simple: do that 10 person forum trial and even the biggest doubters here will shut up and empty their pockets for their product ! win-win for everybody !

you know what, compatriot, i really like this idea. even that chinese guy, liu, who claimed chlorine dioxide could regrow hair, gave out free samples of his product to forum members to test them out. very good of you for bringing this up.

[follicept]

They sell a cosmetic product, they can claim basically anything and then post with small letters "These statements weren't verified by the FDA". It's what happens with those hundreds of scam cosmetic products out there which supposedly grow hair, clear wrinkles, make you look 10 years younger etc.

So, if the FDA doesnt supervise, how they we know they won't cheat ? The only way would be such a small trial. I can't think of a valid reason why they wouldnt do that. It's in EVERYBODY's interest here: in our interest, to find out the truth and in their interest, to convince the world. It's a win-win (if follicept aren't scammers)

This is true. It's a benefit in the sense that we can get to market faster but obviously harder to prove efficacy, which is up to us and we will do.

Oh, also, we just received a notice of allowance that our patent will be issued on the core transdermal technology. This should help our credibility with you and more importantly with investors and pharma partners...

[follicept]

The funny thing is the high bar set by the FDA has killed so many potential upgrades to fin and minox that it's dizzying. Lots of conversation about other chemicals have happened.... and not gone past conversations... because somebody inevitably reminds the discussion participants that they don't have $500M to get past the FDA trials. Boom Done. And so, here we are in 2015.

All of that said, let's be thankful that follicept can get by the FDA and test this stuff. Of course that means that we have to be extra skeptical and keen-- but we all know that. I'm fairly certain everyone understands that follicept has not demonstrated anything yet--- even follicept confirmed this. What I am getting at is:

1. Lets be thankful this doesn't need the fda was formed in 1906 when scammers could only be caught as fast as a horse could get to the next town to warn the citizens of the traveling snake oil salesman. While still relevant, the FDA isn't the greatest thing in the entire world and is pretty outdated in its processes.

2. We are all on the same page as far as the need for follicept to provide evidence of effectiveness. There isn't really a need to say "the need to show proof" over and over and over and over. And there is definitely no need to call them scammers at this point

Yes, the FDA has a very important mandate but can be quite slow to respond to innovation. They are working on it, but not there yet.

[follicept]

Arishi they submitted their application to the FDA and the FDA said Follicept does not have to do clinical trials. It's like your faulting Follicept because the FDA said Follicept does not have to do clinical trials. What do you want Follicept to do - send a letter to the FDA demanding that the FDA order Follicept to do standard FDA clinical trials?

They did say they are going to do a small trial *if" their convenience trial shows positive results. They have already agreed to what you are demanding.

I responded to Arashi but want to reiterate that the FDA did not and does not have an active role in this. They didn't guide us one way or another. We reviewed criteria and have determined we can market as a cosmetic.

Yes, we will do a small but statistically significant trial under conditions that will allow us to publish data in respected peer-reviewed journals.

My job is not to convince Arashi, or any of you for that matter. My job is to test efficacy and then help get an effective, safe product to market. The proof is in the pudding, not in Arashi's opinion.

[noisette]

Can a moderator may intervene for Arashi? We all understood what he meant. So now stop.

You can verify my IP adress. I'm in France. I'm not under a VPN. My Internet Service Provider is Free (one of the 3 biggest in France). You can verify it or ask Noisette (he is french). I'm not a fake. I came here after seeing the french topic on Follicept (40 pages today) on Doctissimo (the biggest french forum on health where Noisette is active). There is an other topic in France on International Hair Loss.

I made some research about Promethon before coming here. They are very serious. You can go verify their campaign "No Prick". Health is not a joke for them. They do not deserve defamation from Arashi.

Please excuse my english. But i can't let Arashi telling defamation. I want Devon staying here.

Arashi wants to help us, our community. I understand him and I respect him. But We can't tell (now) that Follicept is a scam until there are results... Yes, perhaps a member of Baldtuthtalk can test it (or many members too)... BUT I'm not agree with him in so many points.
Calling a product as a scam before there are some results and BEFORE they sell it
This is not a Liu's product or a product from the DR HSU (the other one ^^) with his shampoo for hairloss

Yes, Frenchnewby is a friend of mine of the French community (International Hairloss and Doctissimo). On forum doctissimo I am Ryuteam, and on the forum International Hair loss I am Noisette.

[follicept]

Hellouser is a pro photographer, a trusted forum member and he's been around and will be around for a while (unless this really works of course, then there's no more need for hair loss fora LOL) And I'm sure there are more like him, I can think of gc83uk for example who's not only proven sincere but also a good photographer.

This is THE way to prove it works. I don't care about any testing they do themselves, way too easy to manipulate. But a test here, that's a situation they can't control and thus can't cheat.

Devon said it themselves, they're a small company and really appreciate the help of forum users. Then why not seize this tremendous opportunity for them, to convince even the most doubtful members ?

Like I said, open to it, will run it by Dr. Hsu.

[NeedHairASAP]

you know what, compatriot, i really like this idea. even that chinese guy, liu, who claimed chlorine dioxide could regrow hair, gave out free samples of his product to forum members to test them out. very good of you for bringing this up.

yeah becuase that worked out so well...

Testing by forum member never works: Bad photos, people disappear, people dont follow complete protocol... etc etc

I'd rather just see what follicept comes up with. If there evidence doesn't seem fake, then I'd rather just buy the stuff and try it myself (as I'm sure others would). If it works, users can post results.... but I could really care less about forum members getting free trials. If it is snake oil, we'll know soon enough.