Humacyte Inc. provided its Human Acellular Vessel (HAV) implants to Ukrainian hospitals on the front-line of the Russian invasion as part of the company’s humanitarian relief initiative. Two patients have received the implants for treatment of vascular trauma injuries. One patient had sustained a severe gunshot wound to the leg and the other was injured by shrapnel.

Pfizer Australia Holdings Pty Ltd. has revised its offer to acquire digital health company Resapp Health Ltd. after results from an independent data confirmation study of its COVID-19 algorithm failed to meet Pfizer’s required sensitivity and specificity results.

Medtronic plc has received U.S. FDA 510(k) clearance and breakthrough device designation for its Ligapass 2.0 ligament augmentation system in spine surgery. The surgical treatment is designed to reduce the reoperation rate for proximal junctional kyphosis (PJK), a complication of adult spinal deformity surgery which disrupts spinal ligaments. Ligament augmentation provides strength to the upper instrumented vertebra and adjacent segments while also reducing junctional stress at those levels.

It’s been a decade since the America Invents Act (AIA) transformed the U.S. patent landscape from a first-to-invent to a first-inventor-to-file system and added new contours with the creation of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) to hear post-grant patent challenges outside of court. While the AIA’s inter partes review process and other post-grant procedures have helped weed out weak patents, they’ve also increased the uncertainty and unpredictability of many patents. Now, 10 years on, Congress is assessing how the PTAB has developed in real life and considering what course corrections may be needed.

A tightening of rules for biotech listings on the Shanghai STAR Market may have contributed to a visible cool-down in biotech IPOs, with fewer listings in Chinese stock markets in the first half of 2022.