The immediate implementation of the U.S. NIH’s guidance to cut indirect costs included in its grants to 15% was quickly halted late Feb. 10 when a federal district judge granted a nationwide temporary restraining order in two separate challenges to the cuts that were to go into effect that day on all existing and new NIH grants. Read More
In fiscal 2023, the NIH spent more than $35 billion on nearly 50,000 competitive grants to more than 300,000 researchers at more than 2,500 universities, medical schools and other research institutions across the nation. Of this funding, the NIH said about $26 billion was spent on direct research costs, while $9 billion was allocated to help cover “facilities and administration” through the agency’s indirect cost rate. Read More
The fast pace in which the Trump administration has rolled out changes to how government and businesses operate – a disruptive effort that appears to be creating a new world order – has caught the attention of biopharma industry leaders who spoke Tuesday at the Biotechnology Innovation Organization’s CEO and Investor Conference in New York. Read More
Cognition Therapeutics Inc. evolved from the work of a neuroscientist and a chemist working in the San Francisco Bay area, seeking out targets to block the effects of Alzheimer’s disease. Since the company’s 2007 inception, it has received close to $200 million in U.S. NIH grant funding. Investors often tell CEO Lisa Ricciardi, who joined the company in 2020: “’That’s because you have a relationship with the FDA.’ Well, no. It’s because it’s competitive” and the company’s research has met the muster. “You have to apply two or three times. … It’s with rigor that these results are generated and that we’re able to get more funding.” Read More
Novartis AG is paying nearly $1 billion up front to buy privately held Anthos Therapeutics Inc. in a deal that eventually could top out around $3.1 billion. Novartis, coming back to where it started as it and Blackstone Life Sciences founded Anthos in 2019, is entering a crowded space. Read More
The closely watched chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU, or hives) space chalked more early stage KIT inhibitor data as Third Harmonic Bio Inc. rolled out results from the phase I single and multiple ascending-dose trial with THB-335 in healthy volunteers, along with plans to move the oral candidate into phase II development by the middle of 2025. Read More
Researchers from the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Queensland, Australia and Emory University have shown that a potential new targeted therapy for childhood brain cancer was effective in infiltrating and killing tumor cells in mouse models. Read More
With the first company in the world announcing more than $1 billion in annual revenue from pulsed field ablation on Feb. 5, Clarivate plc and BioWorld MedTech’s latest report provides well-timed insight into the stunning growth and bright future of this new medical technology for the treatment of atrial fibrillation. Read More
Biopharma happenings, including deals and partnerships, grants, preclinical data and other news in brief: Advancell, Arrowhead, Axsome, Eli Lilly, Medincell, Sarepta, Teva. Read More
Regulatory snapshots, including global drug submissions and approvals, clinical trial approvals and other regulatory decisions and designations: Abbvie, Biodexa, Cosmo, Glenmark, Immix. Inmune, Keymed, Nektar, Tempest. Read More