Merck & Co. Inc. is shelling out $1.3 billion in cash up front to acquire privately held Eyebiotech Ltd., gaining rights to the latter’s pivotal trial-ready diabetic macular edema drug and a pipeline of earlier-stage candidates targeting vision loss. An additional $1.7 billion could follow in development, regulatory and commercial milestones, raising the deal total to $3 billion.
Shares of Redwood City, Calif.-based Rezolute Inc., and Korean parent company Handok Inc., rose May 22 on positive results of a phase II proof-of-concept study for its investigative oral diabetic macular edema (DME) drug, RZ-402. RZ-402 is an oral small-molecule plasma kallikrein inhibitor designed to block vascular leakage and inflammation for treating chronic DME.
In lieu of pending guidance, the U.S. FDA’s approval May 20 of Biocon Biologics Ltd.’s Yesafili and Samsung Bioepis Co. Ltd.’s Opuviz as interchangeable biosimilars to Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s Eylea (aflibercept) provides further insight into how the agency is approaching the market exclusivity the Biologics Price Competition and Innovation Act awards to the first approved interchangeable for any given biologic.
Théa Open Innovation, a subsidiary of France’s Laboratoires Théa SAS, returned rights to South Korea’s Curacle Co. Ltd.’s CU-06, an oral diabetic macular edema drug candidate. Curacle posted positive top-line phase IIa data of CU-06 just three months prior.
The U.S. FDA approved the country’s first two interchangeable biosimilars, or copy products, of Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc./Bayer AG’s Eylea (aflibercept) on May 20, to treat four eye-related conditions. The FDA granted the approvals to U.S.- and India-based Johnson & Johnson Services Inc./Biocon Biologics Ltd.’s Yesafili (aflibercept-jbvf; M-710) and South Korea’s Samsung Bioepis Co. Ltd.’s Opuviz (aflibercept-yszy; SB-15).
From glaucoma to Stargardt disease, age-related macular degeneration (AMD) to retinitis pigmentosa, or a corneal transplant to Bietti’s crystalline dystrophy, the 27th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Gene & Cell Therapy (ASGCT) is working to bring some light to patients with age and congenital diseases that affect vision. From May 7-11, 2024, thousands of scientists are gathering in Baltimore to show their advances against the challenges of delivering genes and cells to the correct place, avoiding immunogenicity and improving diseases.
Not long after Ocular Therapeutix Inc. unveiled positive phase I data in non-proliferative diabetic retinopathy with Axpaxli (axitinib intravitreal implant), Eyepoint Pharmaceuticals Inc. offered less-sunny phase II data from the Pavia trial testing Duravyu (vorolanib intravitreal insert), previously known as EYP-1901, in the same indication.
With credit card fees taking a sizable bite of their billings, many U.S. health care providers are fighting back by offering patients cash discounts. But when a drug company covers card processing fees for its distributors to pass on to their provider clients so they can pay for so-called “buy-and-bill” Medicare Part B drugs with a credit card at cash prices, it’s fraud if those concessions aren’t figured into the drug’s average sales price – at least that’s what the U.S. Department of Justice is claiming in a complaint it released April 10 against Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc.
On the heels of a $4.6 million series A round in December 2023, cell therapy company Rxcell Inc. is planning to raise another $15 million in 2024 to take its iPSC-derived photoreceptors to the clinic for retinitis pigmentosa and other degenerative diseases of the retina.
Less than two weeks after going public by way of the merger with Graphite Bio Inc., Lenz Therapeutics Inc. unveiled positive top-line data from its pair of phase III Clarity studies testing two formulations of the muscarinic acetylcholine receptor agonist aceclidine, LNZ-100 and LNZ-101, for presbyopia.
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