Bioinvent International AB is banking an up-front payment of $25 million as part of an option and license agreement with Exelixis Inc., which aims to discover antibodies acting on new immuno-oncology targets. Further financial details were not disclosed, but the alliance entails the discovery of three novel targets and their associated antibodies, identified through Bioinvent’s F.I.R.S.T. screening platform and its n-Coder antibody library.
Daiichi Sankyo Co. Ltd.’s quizartinib met the primary endpoint of overall survival in the pivotal phase III Quantum-First study, which tested the addition of quizartinib to chemotherapy vs. chemotherapy alone for adults with newly diagnosed FLT3-ITD-positive acute myeloid leukemia (AML).
Day One Biopharmaceuticals Inc.’s phase II data with tovorafenib from the Firefly-1 study in pediatric brain cancer dazzled Wall Street, and shares (NASDAQ:DAWN) closed $14.96, up $8.34, or 126%.
Everest Medicines Ltd. has picked up its first marketing approval in China for Trodelvy (sacituzumab govitecan), a medicine licensed from Gilead Sciences Inc. It was approved to treat adults with unresectable locally advanced or metastatic triple-negative breast cancer who have received two or more prior systemic therapies, at least one of them for metastatic disease.
Imcheck Therapeutics SAS raised €80 million (US $83.5 million) in a series C round to maintain the momentum of its lead development program, ICT-01, an immunostimulatory antibody that activates gamma-delta T cells.
Singapore’s Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) has inked a deal with Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH to develop and commercialize targeted cancer therapies.
Jiangsu Hengrui Medicine Co. Ltd., its subsidiary Shengdi Investment Management Holding Co. Ltd., and Hengrui Group are to invest ¥2.01 billion (US$301 million) to jointly set up an equity investment company targeting pharmaceutical and health care companies.
Profoundbio Inc. closed a $70 million series A financing round that will see it advance its two lead antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) programs to the clinic. The Suzhou, China, and Woodinville, Wash.-based company has raised a total of more than $138 million in the past two years.
New and updated preclinical and clinical data presented by biopharma firms at the American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting, including: Ascentage, CNS, PMV.
Ariceum Therapeutics GmbH is picking up where Ipsen SA left off and taking forward the targeted radiopharmaceutical drug satoreotide, developed by the French pharma to phase II but subsequently divested when it ditched its radiation therapy portfolio.