Staff Writer Despite housing, credit, consumer spending and other difficulties affecting the broader markets in 2007, biotech companies raised $24.7 billion, up from $20.3 billion in 2006 according to data from BioWorld Financial Watch. Private companies brought in about a quarter of the total at $6.2 billion, up fairly significantly from $5.1 billion in 2006. Major fundraising efforts by venture firms brought more money into the space, which was gobbled up by the increasingly large rounds

Science Editor If variety is the spice of life, then 2007 served up quite the genomic gumbo: Science magazine named "human genetic variation" as the scientific breakthrough of the year 2007. Several large scale genomics projects – which look at variations one base pair at a time – made headlines and enabled an ever-increasing number of genome-wide association studies to uncover genetic risk factors for common diseases. In June, the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements or ENCODE Consortium – comprising

BioWorld Correspondent Europe still lacks a biotech champion, but 2007 saw the emergence of local heroes that are inspiring investors in national markets and providing the focus for the development of regional clusters. Belgium's biotech companies, for example, had a run of good news, with Ablynx NV sealing a $295 million deal with Boehringer Ingelheim, of Ingelheim, Germany, to develop up to 10 scaled down antibody products based on its nanobody technology platform and raising $127 million in

Washington Editor Congress last year finally tackled FDA reform by passing H.R. 3580, the Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 (FDAAA), a bipartisan bill that not only provided the agency with more funds to review drugs, biologics and medical devices, but stronger powers to improve product safety. FDAAA also reauthorized and expanded the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) and the Medical Device User Fee and Modernization Act (MDUFMA), programs where firms pay fees to the FDA

Assistant Managing Editor The hit-and-miss world of biotech investing sometimes can feel like trying to pick NCAA basketball tournament winners in the office betting pool. Prospective investors pore over stats, calculate odds and mull the advantages of eschewing the big name player in favor of taking a chance on a smaller unknown contender. Overall, biotech investment held steady for 2007. The Nasdaq Biotech Index rose 4.4 percent over 2006, while the AMEX Biotech Index gained 4.1 percent

Staff Writer Headline-stealing trouble for Amgen Inc.'s anemia drugs – safety concerns, reimbursement cutbacks – didn't keep the biotech sector from a strong year, nor did industry giant Genentech Inc.'s problems with the colorectal cancer drug Avastin, which garnered a narrow thumbs-down advisory vote of 5-4 from an FDA panel deliberating the drug's worth against breast tumors. With Avastin (bevacizumab), an antibody directed at vascular endothelial growth factor, approved in 2004 for

Managing Editor The year 2007 may perhaps be best remembered as the start of a downturn for the U.S. economy, as the sub-prime crisis and fears of recession created a giant case of the jitters. But for the biotech industry, it was, indeed, a very fruitful year. All the talk in recent years of the drying pharmaceutical company pipelines and some of its major medicines coming off patent came to fruition, with Big Pharma doling out major piles of cash and stocks to grab up the biotech products

The ultimate industry report measuring the progress of business, science and regulation in biotechnology. This status-check on the biotechnology industry, published by BioWorld Today, is a required reference for analysts, investors and biotech executives in need of factual data that will help show them which way the sector is heading.

BioWorld Financial Watch has tracked the price performance of biotechnology and biotech-related stocks on a weekly basis since July 1994. Since Aug. 8, 1994, BioWorld Financial Watch also has published data indicating the average percent change of all the stocks listed on U.S. exchanges both on a week-to-week basis and on a year-to-date basis. For the stocks included in BioWorld Financial Watch's 2006 stock indicator, see the list on page 395 The graph on page 407 plots the change in that

BioWorld ranked the underwriters of 2006's public offerings, both initial and follow-on, in two basic ways. First, BioWorld ranked the underwriters based on the total amount of gross proceeds raised in both initial and follow-on public offerings combined. If an underwriting firm acted as the sole placement agent for an institutional offering, then that firm was credited as "lead" underwriter. If more than one firm acted as placement agent, then each was considered to be a co-manager, and

Staff Writer The winds of regulatory change picked up speed in 2006. Whispers about issues from safety to biogenerics took on gale force intensity. The question no longer seems to be if changes need to be made, but what changes and how they will affect the process of bringing new drugs to market. In the wake of public concerns about Vioxx and Tysabri, safety changes are probably imminent. Jason Kolbert, analyst at Susquehanna Financial Group LLP, predicts they'll take the form of Phase IV

West Coast Editor Pipeline jitters made big pharma and biotech more eager than ever to make deals, and consolidation surged inside both sectors as well as between them, though opinions regarding the arrangements didn't always match. The biggie in terms of cash turned out to be the springtime merger of German pharma giants Bayer AG and Schering AG. Bayer disclosed in late March its plan to make an offer of €16.3 billion (then US$19.6 billion) to Schering stockholders, paying €86 in cash for

Science Editor In medical research, seeing changes is easy; dissecting their meaning is hard. This goes for all stages of the enterprise, as six previously healthy volunteers learned this year when they participated in a Phase I trial that sent them to the intensive care unit within hours and left them with permanent disabilities. Rather than inhibiting T cells, as the drug's maker TeGenero AG had predicted from preclinical data, the compound in fact superactivated them, leading to a massive

European Correspondent Europe’s biotechnology industry enjoyed, for the most part, another year of steady progress in the clinic and growing investor confidence in the public markets. A shift in the balance of power with big pharma has rewritten the rules of engagement and provided well-funded European biotechnology companies that have attractive molecules and technologies more strength than they’ve ever had before in striking deals. An increasing number of companies are entering co-promotion

Washington Editor Last year’s biggest news from the capital came with less than two months remaining in the calendar: the Democrats’ November victories at the polls. And it was evident immediately after these outcomes that the change in congressional leadership would change a number of things for drugmakers, who largely supported GOP candidates in campaign contributions before this and other recent elections. In short, the industry began bracing for more scrutiny and oversight by the

Managing Editor Getting a handle on the state of biotechnology is akin to standing in a circle of mirrors. No matter where you glance, things look similar, yet different. The numbers used to measure industry activity didn't change a lot in 2006, but the variations are telling. By the end of the year, $20.3 billion had been raised by public and private biotechnology companies, in whispering distance of the $20.1 billion raised in 2005, and easy shouting distance to the total from 2004

Underwriter (Number of IPOs As Lead Underwriter/ Number of IPOs As Lead Or Co-Manager) Percentage Change In Stock Price Post-IPO to Year-End Piper Jaffray & Co. (3/4) +46% RBC Capital Markets (0/2) +39% Ardour Capital Investments (0/1) +35% Deutsche Bank Securities (3/3) +34% Cowen & Co. (4/8) +20% JMP Securities (0/4) +19% Pacific Growth Equities (3/7) +18% Morgan Stanley & Co. (4/4) +15% Merrill Lynch & Co. (3/3) +7% First Albany Capital (1/4) +2% Fortis Securities (0

Underwriter (Number of IPOs As Lead Underwriter) Percentage Change In Stock Price Post-IPO to Year-End Cowen & Co. (4) -3% Bear, Stearns & Co. (1) -13% Roth Capital Partners (1) -16% Sunrise Securities (1) -16% First Albany Capital (1) -20% Stifel Nicolaus (1) -20%

Underwriter (Number of IPOs As Lead Underwriter/ Number of IPOs As Lead Or Co-Manager) Gross Proceeds (M) RBC Capital Markets (0/2) $157.0 Jefferies & Co. (1/2) $148.0 Deutsche Bank Securities (3/3) $143.9 First Albany Capital (1/4) $126.7 JP Morgan Securities (2/2) $122.2 Ardour Capital Investments (0/1) $109.5 UBS Investment Bank (3/3) $109.4 HSBC Securities (0/2) $107.5 Leerink Swann & Co. (0/2) $78.1 Oppenheimer & Co. (0/1) $39.6 A.G. Edwards (0/1) $36.8