Abcuro Inc. raised $42 million in a series A-1 round to progress preclinical programs in autoimmune disease and cancer involving a largely overlooked immune checkpoint receptor, killer cell lectin-like receptor G1 (KLRG1).
Immuneering Corp., a bioinformatics specialist that has for years helped big companies like Teva Pharmaceutical Ltd. and Bristol Myers Squibb Co. better understand their own medicines, has landed $62 million in an oversubscribed series B financing that will help it leverage lessons learned in that journey to build out its own pipeline, starting with IMM-1-104, a dual inhibitor of MEK and a related target.
Iconovir Bio Inc., of San Diego, raised $77 million in a series A financing to develop differentiated oncolytic virus candidates the company said it believes could potentially be I.V.-administered, tumor-selective and could broadly infect tumor cells.
A metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC) trial once expected to pave a path to registration for the Calithera Biosciences Inc. candidate telaglenastat failed to show a benefit from the drug in a new analysis of the pivotal phase II study, Cantata. While company executives voiced confidence in the drug's prospects in another indication, non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), analyst and investor faith appeared less sturdy, as company shares (NASDAQ:CALA) fell 44.6% to $2.72 on Jan. 4.
Sutro Biopharma Inc.’s stock-perking news in early December with STRO-002, a folate receptor alpha-targeting antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) to treat ovarian cancer, reminded investors of potential in the class, which has been more than realized in recent years and could yield more upside in the near term. As of the Oct. 30 cutoff date, STRO-002 tallied one complete response and nine partial responses in the challenging indication, which works out to an overall response rate of 32% (10 out of 31) in evaluable patients.
Following a record-shattering year, terms were set for the first two biotech IPOs of 2021 in deals that could generate up to $300 million. Cullinan Oncology LLC, of Cambridge, Mass., set terms Jan. 4 for raising about $150 million by pricing 8.3 million shares in the $17 to $19 range. Gracell Biotechnology Ltd., of Shanghai, also set the terms for its U.S. IPO Jan. 4. The CAR T-cell developer looks to raise $150 million by offering 8.8 million American depositary shares in a range of $16 to $18 each.
HONG KONG – Hutchison China Meditech Ltd. (Chi-Med) earned approval from China’s National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) for Sulanda (surufatinib) for the treatment of non-pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (NETs), marking what CEO Christian Hogg called a “major milestone” as the first drug to be discovered and developed by Chi-Med without the support of a development partner.
And just like that, it’s over. Bristol Myers Squibb Co. on Jan. 1 confirmed what many suspected, that FDA approval for lisocabtagene maraleucel (liso-cel) did not happen by the Dec. 31 deadline, thereby automatically terminating the contingent value rights (CVR) agreement issued as part of its acquisition of Celgene Inc.
Scientists at Duke University School of Medicine in Durham, North Carolina, have developed a small-molecule inhibitor of the cellular stress-protective transcription factor, heat-shock factor 1, which showed developmental promise against treatment-resistant prostate cancer and other cancers.
The challenging mucositis space chalked up another failure in dusquetide, the innate defense regulator from Soligenix Inc., which fell short in a pivotal, phase III study that enrolled 268 patients to test the small-molecule peptide. “We sort of thought so,” Dawson James analyst Jason Kolbert in a Dec. 22 report, with a neutral rating and no price target.
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