IPOs from Alx Oncology Holdings Inc. and Pandion Therapeutics Inc. launched July 17 as investors continued to pour money into biopharma’s public sector. Through June, $8.53 billion in biopharma IPOs had been filed so far this year by 35 companies.
Robust financial markets continue to fuel the industry despite gloom over the COVID-19 pandemic, with Relay Therapeutics Inc. pricing its upsized, 20 million-share IPO at $20 per unit to reap $400 million.
HONG KONG – Shanghai-based I-Mab Biopharma Co. Ltd. expects to begin clinical trials for the world’s first and only claudin18.2 and 4-1BB bispecific program in a year. "We expect the trial to start in U.S. in the [middle of] next year. We will then expand the trial to China afterwards as planned," Joan Shen, CEO of I-Mab, told BioWorld.
Novocure Ltd. and Merck & Co. Inc. will work together to test the use of electric fields at specific frequencies in combination with anti-PD-1 immunotherapy Keytruda (pembrolizumab) to treat non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The pair plan to start a phase II pilot study during the second half of Novocure’s Tumor Treating Fields in combination with Keytruda as a first-line treatment for intrathoracic advanced or metastatic, PD-L1 positive NSCLC.
BEIJING – U.S.-Taiwan biotech Acepodia Inc., of Burlingame, Calif., and Taipei, has licensed out two of its cell therapy candidates, ACE-1702 and ACE-1655, to Chinese CAR T therapy developer JW Therapeutics (Shanghai) Co. Ltd. to develop and commercialize them in China, Hong Kong and Macau. Acepodia will receive up-front and milestone payments from JW Therapeutics, plus royalties on sales.
Patients with triple-refractory multiple myeloma who are running out of options may soon have a new lifeline. That’s if the FDA follows the unanimous vote of its Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee (ODAC) and grants accelerated approval to Glaxosmithkline plc’s (GSK) belantamab mafodotin as a fifth-line therapy for adults with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma.
DUBLIN – Blueprint Medicines Corp. is banking $775 million, including $675 million up front and another $100 million as an equity investment, from a co-commercialization deal with Roche Holding AG and its Genentech subsidiary involving RET inhibitor pralsetinib. The deal also includes up to $927 million in development, regulatory and commercial milestones, $90 million of which are described as “near-term,” plus tiered royalties on ex-U.S. sales, ranging from the high-teens to mid-twenties.
Nextcure Inc. won’t advance the non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and ovarian cancer cohorts in the stage two portion of its phase I/II study of NC-318, a monoclonal antibody targeting Siglec-15 (S15), as a monotherapy. The data and decision prompted the company stock to shed more than half its value July 13 and several analysts to adjust their price targets downward.
Two California companies – Nkarta Inc. and Poseida Therapeutics Inc. – scored impressive IPOs but with decidedly different post-pricing performance, as Wall Street showed its enthusiasm for the former’s natural killer (NK) cell research by pushing shares (NASDAQ:NKTX) up 166%, to close July 10 at $47.90, an increase of $29.90.
BEIJING – Known for its transgenic mouse platforms to develop antibodies, U.S., China and the Netherlands-based Harbour Biomed Therapeutics Ltd. closed a series C funding round July 9 to raise $102.8 million to advance its late-stage clinical programs and COVID-19 pipeline.
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