South Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety approved 18 biosimilar products in 2024, making it a record year for domestic biosimilar approvals since the agency’s first nod of Celltrion Inc.’s Remsima, a reference product of Remicade (infliximab), in 2012.

Watchers of the percolating myasthenia gravis space are waiting eagerly for data from Dianthus Therapeutics Inc.’s phase II Magic study testing DNTH-103, an active C1s inhibitor, compared to placebo in patients with anti-AChR-positive generalized disease.

Remegen Co. Ltd. emerged as a surprise challenger in the generalized myasthenia gravis space, unveiling positive phase III data of its China-approved lupus drug, telitacicept (RCT-18; Tai’ai), in the rare autoimmune neuromuscular disorder at the 2025 American Academy of Neurology conference.

Cartesian Therapeutics Inc. followed up December’s phase IIb data with more good news regarding Descartes-08, offering 12-month efficacy and safety results that whetted Wall Street’s appetite for the phase III Aurora effort ahead. Milos Miljkovic, chief medical officer, told BioWorld that minimum symptom expression – among the areas where Descartes-08 shone, providing relief for “months and months after the last dose of treatment” – is especially important to patients.

Wave Life Sciences Ltd. plans to file with the U.S. FDA for accelerated approval of WVE-N531, an exon skipping oligonucleotide for boys with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) who are amenable to exon 53 skipping, a decision based on favorable data from the phase II Forward-53 study. The analysis was conducted after 48 weeks of treatment with 10 mg/kg of the drug dosed every two weeks. Forward-53 achieved all trial goals, turning up sustained exon skipping, muscle concentrations, and dystrophin restoration through 48 weeks and a 61-day tissue half-life that supports giving the DMD therapy once a month.

Nature Cell Co. Ltd. won U.S. FDA breakthrough therapy designation of its autologous adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cell therapy, Jointstem, March 20, becoming the first Korean company to earn the label in the field of cell therapy.

Eight months after announcing the $18.5 million first tranche of its series A, Augustine Therapeutics has closed the oversubscribed round at $85 million and is now ready to begin clinical development of its novel histone deacetylase-6 (HDAC6) inhibitors.

Wall Street was weighing the gravity of the death from acute liver failure of a patient who was treated for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) with Sarepta Therapeutics Inc.’s gene therapy, Elevidys (delandistrogene moxeparvovec). Liver injury is a known possible side effect of the product, first approved by the U.S. FDA in June 2023 for DMD, as well as other AAV-mediated gene therapies, and the potential problem is highlighted in Elevidys’ prescribing information.

While data on functional endpoints are still to come, Avidity Biosciences Inc. executives said the firm is moving ahead with plans for a BLA filing by the end of 2025 for del-zota, an antibody-oligonucleotide conjugate, in Duchenne muscular dystrophy with mutations amenable to exon 44 skipping (DMD44), based on positive top-line data that analysts say bode well for Avidity’s other late-stage programs targeting rare neuromuscular diseases.