LONDON – The Gates Foundation and Wellcome Trust have joined forces with financial services specialist Mastercard in establishing a $125 million seed fund to accelerate development of drugs to treat COVID -19.
South Korea's Bridge Biotherapeutics Inc. has enlisted San Francisco-based AI drug discovery shop Atomwise Inc. to help it identify up to 13 small-molecule inhibitors of Pellino proteins and other targets in an effort to develop new therapies for inflammatory diseases. Atomwise stands to receive an up-front payment of undisclosed value, as well as milestone and royalty payments under terms of the deal. Presuming success, it estimates the partnership's payoff could reach up to $1.08 billion.
Pharma has not gotten terribly serious yet about integrating digital health tools into clinical trials, let alone into their product offerings, despite the potential benefits they could offer when it comes to patient adherence, compliance and experience. Still, oncology giant Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. has made a small step in that direction by partnering with Paris-based digital therapeutics company Voluntis SA.
TORONTO – Newpro3D Inc., of North Vancouver, British Columbia, is making its ultra-fast 3D printing technology available to Düsseldorf, Germany-based Henkel AG & Co. KGaA to help it expand into production scale, additive manufacturing of medical devices. Newpro3D’s digital light processing (DLP) system enables its customers to manufacture hard and soft anatomical models used in surgical planning “at record speeds,” said Newpro3D COO Gabriel Castanon, eliminating the slow mechanical processes in more conventional 3D printing techniques.
AI-based, digital pathology startup Proscia Inc. has partnered with the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) to advance the practice of pathology via artificial intelligence (AI). The pair will start with prostate cancer and then plan to move on to validate approaches in several additional pathology subspecialties.
Vir Biotechnology Inc. and Alnylam Pharmaceuticals Inc. are expanding an infectious disease collaboration begun three years ago to take on the coronavirus. The effort now includes developing and commercializing RNAi therapies targeting SARS-CoV-2, the virus that triggers COVID-19, by developing siRNAs identified by Alnylam.
Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., of Waltham, Mass., has made a bold play in the molecular diagnostics market, including infectious disease testing, with its proposed $11.5 billion acquisition of Qiagen NV, of Venlo, Netherlands. Word of the deal comes after reports late last year that named Thermo Fisher as a potential suitor for Qiagen. However, in late December, Qiagen said it had wrapped up a review of potential strategic alternatives and decided its standalone business plan represented the best opportunity for value creation.
Abpro Therapeutics Inc. has granted an exclusive license to Abpro Bio Co. Ltd., the former Ugint Co. Ltd., to develop and commercialize two bispecific antibodies in Asian markets, including greater China, Japan and South Korea.
Gilead Sciences Inc. will acquire Forty Seven Inc. for $4.9 billion, or $95.50 per share in cash, bringing Gilead magrolimab, an anti-CD47 monoclonal antibody being developed to treat several cancers, including myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL).
SAN DIEGO – At the Biocom 10th Annual Global Life Sciences Partnering Conference, panels of pharma executives highlighted what they're looking for to supplement their pipelines and offered advice that ran the gamut from company formation to the courting process to strategies for partnering pipeline drugs and platforms.
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