Doing his version of the Texas Two-Step, Texas Attorney General (AG) Ken Paxton is again shuffling Eli Lilly and Co. into a state courtroom – this time for allegedly overstepping the anti-kickback line.
A federal appeals court opened the door Aug. 6 for an amended class-action lawsuit alleging that Astrazeneca plc, Eli Lilly and Co., Novo Nordisk A/S and Sanofi SA engaged in a horizontal price-fixing conspiracy involving insulin products and GLP-1 drugs indicated in diabetes when they each adopted similar policies in 2020 to impose restrictions on 340B discounts to an unlimited number of contract pharmacies.
With reduced sales and operating expectations for the rest of the year, Novo Nordisk A/S is on the receiving end of a huge stock drop. For a big pharma, where the stock drops are usually more modest, the shares (NASDAQ:NVO) fell off a cliff on July 29, closing 21.8% downward to $53.93 each, the lowest price per share in the past 12 months. Lower U.S. sales of semaglutide blockbusters Wegovy and Ozempic for treating obesity and diabetes are at the heart of the plunge. In May, the Danish company had expected 13% to 21% sales growth but now is looking at only 8% to 14%.
The U.S. FDA on July 15 cleared Biocon Biologics Ltd.’s Kirsty (insulin aspart-xjhz) as the first and only interchangeable biosimilar product referencing Novo Nordisk A/S’ Novolog (insulin aspart), a rapid-acting diabetes medication.
A mixed bag of top-line phase II data prompted stellar stock results for Prokidney Corp. and its chronic kidney disease (CKD) and diabetes therapy, rilparencel. The results came from two arms of the study, each with its own treatment regime. The market heartily took to the results as the company’s stock (NASDAQ:PROK) closed 515% upward at $3.73 per share after starting the day under $1 each.
The increased use of GLP-1 receptor agonists has led on to an increase in reports of acute pancreatitis in people taking these weight loss drugs in the U.K. That has prompted the launch of a pharmacogenomics project to investigate if there are any genetic links underlying the occurrence of this adverse event.
Abvance Therapeutics Inc. secured an undisclosed amount of capital in a seed round led by Zubi Capital to support development of an insulin and glucagon combination product that the company has been in the process of developing for approximately 18 months.
Innovent Biologics Inc. announced a HKD$4.3 billion (US$547 million) placement on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange to advance its R&D projects and to fund its global expansion.
Far from eliminating the need for weight-loss procedures, glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists could drive more people to seek them out. At least that’s what Fractyl Health Inc. and Bariendo Inc. hope, and they have strong evidence to support their case with a recent meta-analysis showing that individuals discontinuing the popular weight loss medications regain all their weight and more within two years.
China’s Pegbio Co. Ltd. launched its IPO on the Hong Kong stock exchange May 19, to raise up to HK$300.82 million (US$38.4 million) to advance visepegenatide (PB-119), its glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist.
RSS
