You always have to be skeptical when an institute pushes news of a discovery that has not been published yet. There are definitely inherent problems with current stem cell work (embryonic and non-embryonic), but we're getting better. However I don't think we've even thought about the largest hurdles and how to get over them. The biggest problem I see with this and other stem cell work is it involves transforming cells with multiple genes (often these genes are integrated into the host genome) which a number of them are usually potent oncogenes (c-myc is a good example used often). The result you typically get is a cell with similar phenotype to the tissue that the researcher is trying to grow, but these cells often aren't normal karyotypically. Karyotypic change is one of (if not the major) driving force of tumorigenesis and is involved in a number of other diseases, but most of the stem cell labs never check karyotypes. They are always assumed to be normal when they aren't. Unstable karyotypes are one of the reasons that embryonic stem cell research has been problematic. For some reason, when put into culture especially for extended periods of time embryonic stem cells are less stable than somatic stem cells. Hence embryonic stem cell therapy often results in cancer.