Immunogen Inc. and Eli Lilly and Co., having already seen a collaboration collapse in 2018, will try it again. Immunogen granted the exclusive rights to research, develop and commercialize antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) that are directed toward targets Lilly will select. Waltham, Mass.-based Immunogen will receive $13 million up front from Lilly and is eligible to receive another $32.5 million in exercise fees if Lilly licenses all the targets. Down the road, Immunogen could receive as much as $1.7 billion in exercise fees and milestones payments. Read More
Kallyope Inc., a company leveraging connections between the gut and brain to develop new medicines for diabetes, obesity and other diseases, has raised $236 million in series D financing to support its work. Readouts of early clinical data for its most advanced programs, phase I small molecules for metabolic disease and gut barrier conditions, will start to arrive later this year, company CEO and President Jay Galeota told BioWorld. Read More
The U.S. Senate narrowly voted 50-46 to confirm Robert Califf as the next commissioner of the FDA, a critical outcome for an agency that has lacked a fully anointed commissioner for a year. Califf, who was previously FDA commissioner under President Barack Obama from February 2016 to January 2017, faces several challenges in the coming year, however, including the agency’s accelerated approval program for prescription drugs, which has added drag to the process of registering him as the new commissioner. Read More
LONDON – Neuromuscular disease specialist NMD Pharma A/S has raised €35 million (US$39.7 million) in a new financing, as it awaits initial data from its first clinical trial, in the treatment of myasthenia gravis. The new money enables NMD to complete that phase IIa study and to launch another trial of the same compound, NMD-670, in spinal muscular atrophy. The Aarhus, Denmark-based company is preparing the IND and aims to treat the first patient before the end of 2022. Read More
At the 2022 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI), investigators reported on a fourth patient who has achieved HIV remission after a stem cell transplant. The patient is the first woman and the first mixed-race person to achieve HIV remission through a transplant procedure. In 2017, she was transplanted with cord blood stem cells lacking a functional CCR5 receptor, which prevents HIV from entering cells. Read More
The U.S. Federal Circuit’s denial Feb. 11 of an en banc rehearing in a case that could undermine label carveouts and slow the launch of generics is the topic of hallway chatter at this week’s annual conference of the Association for Accessible Medicines. Read More
PERTH, Australia – New Zealand’s single payer, Pharmac, funded 13 new medicines and widened access to 19 medicines in 2021 that are expected to benefit about 45,426 New Zealanders, according to the agency’s year in review report. Read More
The number of biopharma deals with nonprofits or government entities has dropped over last year, partly due to fewer COVID-19-related alliances, but the activity in 2022 is still strong in comparison to pre-pandemic years. Read More
With the study of long COVID-19 continuing to evolve, the BioWorld team is taking a closer look at the condition – a complex syndrome affecting more than 100 million people globally –
and what's being done about it. In this episode, BioWorld Senior Science Editor Anette Breindl and Staff Writer Lee Landenberger, fresh off writing a pair of detailed stories about these issues, join us to talk about how consensus around what long COVID is has emerged.
New hires and promotions in the biopharma industry, including: Arrivent, Grey Wolf, Hepion, Inmed, Nucleome, Opus Genetics, Palisade, Pharnext, Portage, Shoreline, Topas, Travecta, Zynerba. Read More
Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Ascletis, Axcella, Avion, Bavarian Nordic, Cidara. Read More
