The radiopharma field has garnered increasing attention in recent years due to big-ticket deals like Bayer AG's $2.9 billion acquisition of Algeta ASA and Novartis AG's nearly $6 billion spent on buying Advanced Accelerator Applications SA and Endocyte Inc. As a result, competition is ratcheting up and pipelines are exploding with new combinations of different drugs. The global radiopharmaceuticals market was estimated to be valued at $6.7 billion in 2020, a number expected to reach $11.5 billion by 2027, according to a 2022 William Blair report.
If its challenges can be overcome, radioligand therapy is poised to change the way many cancers are treated. It is also likely to become an example of how scientific advances, once they are translated successfully, can enable further insights in a bench-to-bedside-to-bench loop. David Piwnica-Worms, professor and chair of cancer systems imaging at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, predicted that as radioligand therapy expands, many questions will be answered about both radiation biology and the interaction of radiation with the immune system more specifically.
After spending decades developing targeted chemotherapy and bringing a dozen or so compounds into the clinic, Fusion Pharmaceuticals Inc. Chief Scientific Officer Christopher Leamon switched careers to focus on radio-oncology because he saw the need for “a really strong bomb to target cancer to get it to respond.” That was radiotherapy, said Leamon, who was one of the scientific founders of Endocyte Inc., which Novartis AG acquired.
Global interest in radiopharmaceuticals is growing, and some big deals in the space have sparked interest in the last few years. Novartis AG has spent about $6 billion in acquisitions and is seen as the global leader.
Genialis Inc. reeled in $13 million in a series A financing co-led by Taiwania Capital and Debiopharm Innovation Fund. The funds will be used to build out the company’s store of clinically validated biomarker models for individualized cancer diagnosis.
The Gustave Roussy cancer center, specializing in cancer treatment, and its technology transfer subsidiary Gustave Roussy Transfert, reported the creation of startup Orakl SA, which develops a technology for modeling cancer tumors called the patient tumor avatar. Orakl leverages a unique collection of patient tumor avatars, combining biological and clinical data to fuel the therapeutic arsenal to fight cancer.
The U.S. FDA gave Bot Image Inc. a coveted threefer with 510(k) clearance for its Prostatid artificial intelligence (AI) software for detection, diagnosis and monitoring of prostate cancer using both standard MRI and a non-invasive bi-parametric MRI, which does not require a contrast agent.
Precision oncology startup Prana Thoracic Inc. closed a $3 million series A financing round aimed at advancing its minimally invasive lung tissue excision device for early treatment of lung cancer. The series A funds and a prior $3 million award from the Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas are earmarked for product development and to support first-in-human clinical studies.
A cancer therapy test unveiled by Exact Sciences Corp. will be able to provide a complete molecular picture of a patient’s tumor allowing for them to receive the most effective treatment as quickly as possible. Exact’s Oncoextra therapy selection test, recently launched in the U.S., enhances the ability of doctors to characterize and understand solid tumors.
Esophageal cancer is often referred to as the “silent killer” because few people show any symptoms until after the cancer has spread. If localized, five-year survival rate is 46%, but that drops to just 5% when malignancy has reached distant parts of the body.
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