Chiesi Farmaceutici SpA has agreed to pay Affibody AB up to $214 million in a collaboration and licensing agreement to develop an inhaled treatment for respiratory diseases, with a further $423 million also in the cards if the deal is extended to two more programs. The fees consist of up front and milestone payments, based on certain development, regulatory and commercial achievements, with additional mid-single to low double-digit royalties on sales. Read More
Protagonist Therapeutics Inc. got a win in its phase IIb study and is making plans for a phase III. JNJ-2113 (formerly PN-235), an oral, interleukin-23 receptor antagonist peptide, hit its primary efficacy endpoint in treating moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. A statistically significant greater proportion of the participants receiving JNJ-2113 saw a 75% improvement in their skin lesions compared to placebo at week 16. Read More
Rapport Therapeutics Inc. launched with $100 million in series A funding and ambitious plans to bring a hitherto unprecedented level of precision to therapies for neurological disease. Although the Boston-based company is new to the world, its underlying platform has been a decade in the making, and it already has one clinical-stage asset, which is in development for seizure disorders. It is currently undergoing a phase I trial. Read More
Noema Pharma AG raised CHF103 million (US$110.3 million) in a series B round to continue moving forward its bulging pipeline of clinical stage assets in development for multiple central nervous system disorders. The Basel, Switzerland-based company is now funded through early 2025, by which time it will have at least some clinical data that will help it to determine its next steps. Read More
Whether as primary tumors or metastases, brain tumors remain stubbornly intractable to the progress that has occurred in many other tumor types. As Igor Vivanco, who is a senior lecturer in the Institute of Pharmaceutical Science at King’s College London, noted in his talk at the European Society for Medical Oncology Targeted Anticancer Therapies (ESMO TAT) meeting in Paris this week, the last win in glioblastoma was the addition of temozolomide to the radiotherapy standard of care in 2005. And temozolomide’s benefit is measured in months, not years. Read More
The Biden administration offered a sneak peek March 7 at its fiscal 2024 budget by outlining ways it proposes extending the life of the U.S. Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund by at least 25 years. Read More
Hanall Biopharma Co Ltd.’s batoclimab met the primary and key secondary endpoints in a pivotal phase III trial in generalized myasthenia gravis (gMG) in China, marking the first positive phase III data for the candidate globally. Read More
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit once again delved into genus claims as it affirmed Gilead Sciences Inc.’s win in its inter partes review (IPR) challenge of several claims in a patent held by the University of Minnesota. Read More
Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Bioarctic, Cantex, Coherus, Eli Lilly, Ikena, Merck, Milestone. Read More
