Faced with a tradeoff between low Medicare premiums that benefit all beneficiaries and lower out-of-pocket costs that benefit the sickest beneficiaries, the Trump administration chose lower premiums, sinking a proposed rule that would have pulled drug rebates from the safe antikickback harbor. Read More
Macrogenics Inc. is taking a further step into Asia as it joins with I-Mab Biopharma (Shanghai) Co. Ltd. in a collaboration and license agreement to develop and commercialize enoblituzumab, an immune-optimized, anti-B7-H3 monoclonal antibody. Read More
Although the public biopharmaceutical sector set a fast pace at the beginning of the year, it has been all downhill since February, with the BioWorld Biopharmaceutical index losing 16% of its value. However, a strong performance in June, with the group gaining 7.6%, helped the sector marginally push into positive territory year-to-date (YTD). At the halfway point of the year, the index is trailing the general market by a wide margin, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average trading up 14% and the Nasdaq Composite index up 20%. Read More
LONDON - More than half of the 216 newly approved drugs reviewed by Germany's health technology assessment (HTA) agency between 2011 and 2017 did not have evidence to show they provided benefit over the existing standard of care. Read More
Word from the FDA to Axsome Therapeutics Inc. about the effort with oral N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonist AXS-05 in depression – and the company's accelerated push with the compound – had Wall Street watching the NMDA space with even more interest than usual. Read More
By priming CAR T cells through antigen delivery to the lymph node, researchers have boosted the responses of CAR T cells to solid tumor antigens. Read More
Phagomed Biopharma GmbH, a Viennese company born of frustrations with the rise of multidrug-resistant infections and confidence in the potential for bacteriophage therapies to address them, has landed a €1.5 million (US$1.7 million) equity investment from new and existing investors. It's the second part of a €2.3 million seed financing, raised ahead of a series A round the company hopes to secure in 2020 to help it move toward the clinic in 2021. Read More
Hemostemix Inc., of Calgary, Alberta, said it will not proceed with its nonbrokered private placement of up to $6 million in secured convertible debentures and will not have a second close of its nonbrokered private placement of up to $1 million in secured convertible debentures, which previously raised gross proceeds of $525,000. The company said it continues to pursue efforts to raise capital to fund operations and an ongoing phase II trial. Read More
A False Claims Act suit was unsealed alleging that Johnson & Johnson fraudulently obtained a patent to block generic competition for prostate cancer drug Zytiga (abiraterone acetate), a drug that costs roughly $9,000 per month and generates about $2.4 billion in annual revenue for New Brunswick, N.J.-based J&J, according to law firm Herrera Purdy LLP. Read More
Schrodinger Inc., of New York, said it received a preclinical milestone payment from Sanofi SA, of Paris, in a drug discovery program advancing as part of a multiyear, multitarget collaboration. Read More
