Facing patent expiration for its top-selling drug next year, the Japanese firm Astellas Pharma Inc. is buying out Agensys Inc. for $387 million up front (assuming about $30 million net cash at closing), with potentially $150 million more in milestone payments. (BioWorld Today)

With its hepatitis C virus protease inhibitor in Phase Ib trials, InterMune Inc.'s buyout of rights to pirfenidone for $13.5 million up front and as much as $53.5 million later puts the firm in position for another run against idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) - the lung-scarring condition against which Actimmune failed earlier this year. (BioWorld Today)

Remember FDA-stalled oritavancin? The hospital-based glycopeptide antibiotic acquired in 2001 by InterMune Inc. from Eli Lilly and Co. (which developed the compound as a replacement for vancomycin, which still takes an estimated 80 percent share of the market) was bought by Targanta Therapeutics Inc around Christmas four years later. (BioWorld Financial Watch)

Amid reports of pre-holiday bidding for Biogen Idec Inc., the firm's potential $380 million deal with the Swiss firm Neurimmune Therapeutics AG for antibodies against Alzheimer's disease signals a business-as-usual approach that could make Biogen that much more tempting to would-be acquirers. (BioWorld Today)

Among drugs for the consequences of chemo, those with the highest profile are Amgen Inc.'s erythropoietin stimulating agents, Epogen (epoetin alfa) and Aranesp (darbepoetin alfa), and Ortho Biotech Products LP's Procrit (epoetin alfa) - all lately dogged by safety concerns that have led to label changes and lessened reimbursements due to concerns about safety. (BioWorld Financial Watch)