Stock market exuberance, particularly in favor of an innovative industry working to pull the world out of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, led to drug developers shares surging 30% in 2020. But if one thing is certain, it is this: Markets usually pull back and that is partially why BioWorld’s Drug Developers Index is showing only a 2.06% gain so far this year, in contrast to both the Nasdaq Biotechnology Index and the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which are up 6.28% and 10.96%, respectively. Read More
Proceeds from Vedanta Biosciences Inc.’s just closed $68 million series D financing will be used for a phase III study of the company’s lead candidate, VE-303, composed of eight clonal human commensal bacterial strains to give colonization resistance for treating Clostridioides difficile (C. diff) infection, and also for a phase II study of VE-202, made up of 16 clonal human commensal bacterial strains for treating inflammatory bowel disease. Read More
Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare approved the Regen-Cov (casirivimab/imdevimab, also known as Ronapreve) antibody cocktail for the treatment of patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 via intravenous infusion. Read More
Sweden’s Calliditas Therapeutics AB has licensed its rare kidney disease therapy to Stada Arzneimittel AG in Europe to help it navigate the complexity of the region’s market, ahead of a potential European and U.S. approval in the coming months. Read More
DUBLIN – Coave Therapeutics unveiled a new identity and a new gene therapy platform, as it closed a €21.2 million (US$25 million) extension to its long-running series B round, which takes the total raise to €33 million. Read More
The complete relegation of conferences to cyberspace that began with one HIV conference, CROI 2020, ended with another, the 2021 IAS meeting. Though the conference was still largely virtual, there was also an in-person component held in Berlin. Read More
While regulators and policymakers across the world are stressing the need for equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines, therapies and devices, their own policies and regulations may be getting in the way of that goal. The World Trade Organization (WTO) released a list of trade-related bottlenecks July 20 that are hindering access to pandemic-related medical products. Read More
Financing is the fuel that drives growth in the biopharma sector, and participants at the BIO Asia-Taiwan Conference 2021 this week discussed different financing strategies for companies in the currently booming market. Read More
A proposed $26 billion global settlement could end the state-by-state opioid litigation in the U.S. for Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and three drug distributors. The attorneys general from several states announced the proposed agreement July 21 with J&J, Amerisource Bergen Drug Corp., Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp. Read More
Biopharmas raising money in public or private financings, including: Clexbio, Cytokinetics, Erasca, Imago, Immutep, Reform, Regencell, Surface, Turnstone. Read More
Clinical updates, including trial initiations, enrollment status and data readouts and publications: Annovis, Anthos, Biomarin, Bonus, Ionctura, Lineage Cell, Mediwound, Merck, Ose, Rain, Sesen, SK Life, Wave. Read More
Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Aldeyra, Ardelyx, Ionctura, Keiferx, Myovant, Octapharma, Sanofi, Swedish Orphan. Read More
