Financings
1315 Capital LLC said it closed 1315 Capital II, a health care growth equity fund, at over $300 million, exceeding its $250 million target.
Adverum Biotechnologies Inc. closed its underwritten public offering for gross proceeds of $69 million.
Affimed NV priced its public offering with net proceeds expected to be approximately $21.6 million.
Bioxcel Therapeutics Inc., which is using artificial intelligence to repurpose existing compounds for new uses, has filed to raise up to $69 million in an initial public offering.
Catalyst Biosciences Inc. priced an underwritten public offering with gross proceeds expected to be approximately $100 million.
Celgene Corp. priced four series of senior unsecured notes for a total amount of $4.5 billion.
CTI Biopharma Corp. closed its underwritten public offering for expected proceeds of approximately $64.2 million.
Evolus Inc. closed its IPO for $60 million in gross proceeds.
Medicinova Inc. closed its underwritten public offering generating gross proceeds of approximately $40 million.
Miragen Therapeutics Inc. priced a public offering for gross proceeds of about $38.5 million.
Ra Pharmaceuticals Inc. said it priced an underwritten public offering with gross proceeds, excluding any exercise of the underwriters' option to purchase additional shares, expected to be $50.4 million.
Sage Therapeutics Inc. priced an underwritten public offering for gross proceeds of about $575 million.
Deals
Allergan plc is acquiring Elastagen Pty Ltd., a company with a tissue repair platform that complements Allergan's aesthetic and dermatology franchise.
Astellas Pharma Inc. acquired Universal Cells Inc. for up to $102.5 million in up-front and potential milestone payments.
Moleculin Biotech Inc. said it inked an agreement with Emory University to enable expanded cancer research on its WP-1066 molecule for the possible treatment of medulloblastoma, a pediatric malignant primary brain tumor.
Nektar Therapeutics Inc. signed a potential $3.63 billion deal with Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. The companies will evaluate the potential of NKTR-214 with Opdivo (nivolumab) or Opdivo plus Yervoy (ipilimumab) in registration-enabling trials in more than 20 indications across nine tumor types.
Pieris Pharmaceuticals Inc. signed an immuno-oncology deal with Seattle Genetics Inc., which brings in $30 million up front and potentially up to $1.2 billion more in milestones spread across three programs.
Proqr Therapeutics N.V. and Foundation Fighting Blindness entered a partnership to develop QR-421a for Usher syndrome 2A caused by an exon 13 mutation of the causative USH2A gene.
Santhera Pharmaceuticals Holding AG and Polyphor Ltd. inked a license agreement covering POL-6014, a selective inhibitor of human neutrophil elastase, for the potential treatment of cystic fibrosis and other neutrophilic pulmonary diseases.
Sirenas LLC entered into a multi-target research collaboration agreement with Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. to deploy Sirenas' drug discovery platform against certain undisclosed therapeutic targets to identify potential drug candidates.
The Accelerated Cure Project for Multiple Sclerosis and the Regeneron Genetics Center have agreed to sequence the entire exome of all DNA samples in ACP's biospecimen repository.
. . And More
Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH is giving up on BI-409306, a phosphodiesterase 9 (PDE9) inhibitor, but not on its mechanism of action, and will keep pursuing work on the same compound in schizophrenia.
Canada's Genomics Enterprise and its partners are embarking upon the Canada 150 Sequencing Project, which aims to sequence 150 new genomes to support sequence-based genomics research in Canada.
In 2017, Australia's Therapeutic Goods Administration approved the lowest number of new molecular entities since 2012 – just 34, compared to 42 in 2016 and 45 in 2015.
Janssen Research & Development LLC's apalutamide has become the first FDA-approved therapy to treat patients with non-metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.
Jazz Pharmaceuticals plc said the National Comprehensive Cancer Network added Vyxeos (daunorubicin and cytarabine) liposome for injection to the Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology for acute myeloid leukemia.
Novo Nordisk A/S said the European Commission granted marketing authorization for Ozempic (semaglutide) for the treatment of adults with type 2 diabetes.
Prometic Life Sciences Inc. said the FDA granted orphan drug designation to its inter-alpha-inhibitor-proteins to treat necrotizing enterocolitis.
Shield Therapeutics plc suffered a surprise setback, with its oral iron replacement therapy Feraccru failing in a U.S phase III trial in the treatment of anemia in chronic kidney disease patients.