LONDON – Renovo plc is weighing its options, including that of winding up the company, after its lead scar-improving product Juvista failed in the pivotal Phase III European trial. Shares (LSE:RNVO) in the Manchester, UK-based company fell 75 percent to 17 pence when the news was announced on Friday afternoon. Read More
After floating an initial range of $12 to $14 per share, AcelRx Pharmaceuticals Inc. priced its initial public offering (IPO) at $5. The move is consistent with IPOs by other companies in the industry, which are finding that more shares at a lower price is the way to attract buyers in a post-2008 economy. Read More
Optimer Pharmaceuticals Inc. continued to take care of its near-term cash needs in anticipation of a commercial launch of Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) drug fidaxomicin by raising gross proceeds of $67.5 million in an underwritten public offering of 6 million shares of common stock priced at $11.25 per share, about 10.5 percent below the previous day's closing price. Read More
NEW YORK – Scores of industry senior executives and the professionals who finance and invest in their drug development pursuits have descended upon New York – which is still in the throes of a most frigid winter – to attend the 13th annual Biotechnology International Organization (BIO) CEO & Investor Conference taking place Monday and Tuesday at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. They have come to address the cold-reality financial and investment landscape issues affecting continued post-recession growth in the biotechnology market. Read More
Genentech Inc., of South San Francisco, a unit of the Roche Group, said one of two Phase III studies testing monthly Lucentis (ranibizumab) in patients with diabetic macular edema met its primary endpoint. The study, designated RISE, showed that a significantly higher percentage of patients receiving Lucentis achieved an improvement in vision of at least 15 letters on the eye chart at 24 months compared to those in the placebo group. The study enrolled 377 patients. Read More
Gilead Sciences Inc., of Foster City, Calif., refiled its new drug application (NDA) for the single-tablet regimen of Truvada (emtricitabine and tenofovir disoproxil fumarate) and TMC278 (rilpivirine hydrochloride), a non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor from Tibotec Pharmaceuticals Ld., a unit of New Brunswick, N.J.-based Johnson & Johnson. Read More
It sounds like a bacterial version of Freud: Researchers from the Swedish Karolinska Institutet have reported that the id, or the gut – and specifically, its bacteria – plays a critical role in the development of the ego and superego, otherwise known as the brain. Read More
