Recent changes in the industry include changes at the top at Caribou Biosciences, Prothena and 180 Life Sciences, plus Cantargia acquires chief business officer from Ultimovacs.

Plus deals involving Jiangsu Alphamab/CSPC, Zydus/CDRI, Junshi/JSIAMA, Repair/Genevant, Sanofi/I-Mab, Novartis/Mitem and BioAtla/Context.

Private Company Edition: ARCH raised more than $3bn for its eighth fund, Frazier added $630m to its public fund that also can back crossover rounds, DCVC’s third biotech fund totaled $400m and Asabys raised €180m ($200m) for its second fund. Also, Aktis closed a $175m series B round. 

R&D managers can sometimes drive a drug’s development despite evidence of its unviability. This has recently resulted in a scramble to adjust in-progress trial protocol and post-approval cost-effectiveness concerns.

The German group is spinning off from Eckert & Ziegler and listing in Frankfurt, though a leap to the NASDAQ will likely follow once it has more data on a lymphoma theranostic.

Sharon Barr, AstraZeneca’s executive vice president, biopharmaceuticals R&D, in an interview with Scrip, outlines how the company is using a holistic approach to define a new competitive landscape in the weight loss sector. She also sees new frontiers for the firm and its potential partners both in China and beyond to jointly explore aimed at maintaining healthy muscle mass while decreasing body fat.

In a video interview with Scrip, Syed Husain, CEO of the US-based cell therapy CDMO BioCentriq, talks about the company’s role in parent GC’s growth strategy and business priorities, the cell and gene therapy manufacturing market and his views on the US BIOSECURE Act.

Emerging Company Profile: Danish group Vesper Bio is advancing an oral sortilin inhibitor in frontotemporal dementia, and is aiming to get to market in a similar timeframe to its much larger rivals.

Lilly’s Mounjaro to Pfizer’s Paxlovid, the WuXi group has been part of pharma majors’ sourcing chain. How big is the hole clients are to fill when the proposed BIOSECURE Act comes into effect? Here’s a Scrip infographic using Evaluate Pharma data.

After 10 years of promised investment following its Nobel Prize for iPS cell research, Japan is cautiously narrowing regulations around the conditional approval of cell therapies and cutting some reimbursement prices. Commercial success remains mixed and some products have been withdrawn from the market.

Lilly and Novo Nordisk were top performers among large-cap pharma stocks, while the stock prices of Bristol Myers and Gilead declined the most.

Six biopharma companies have filed to list their shares on US exchanges so far this year, but the sums they are seeking are small.

Gilead strikes voluntary licensing agreements with six generic manufacturers for lenacapavir but health groups seek clarity on pricing and seeming API supply restrictions. All eyes are also on the patent opposition case in India.

Big pharmas, biotechs and the US government look to partner with artificial intelligence and machine learning firms for discovery efforts across therapeutic areas and modalities.

Avidity hopes to complete enrollment in mid-2025 for an ongoing Phase III trial of its antibody-oligonucleotide conjugate in myotonic dystrophy type 1, which has no approved drug therapy.

Recent changes in the industry include changes at the top at Caribou Biosciences, Prothena and 180 Life Sciences, plus Cantargia acquires chief business officer from Ultimovacs.

Plus deals involving Jiangsu Alphamab/CSPC, Zydus/CDRI, Junshi/JSIAMA, Repair/Genevant, Sanofi/I-Mab, Novartis/Mitem and BioAtla/Context.

The drug maker will spend $4.5bn on a “Lilly Medicine Foundry” that it said would provide extra manufacturing capacity as well as research ways to improve manufacturing processes.

Private Company Edition: ARCH raised more than $3bn for its eighth fund, Frazier added $630m to its public fund that also can back crossover rounds, DCVC’s third biotech fund totaled $400m and Asabys raised €180m ($200m) for its second fund. Also, Aktis closed a $175m series B round. 

The vaccine maker might be facing the end of the road following another feeble readout from its mid-stage colorectal cancer study.

Would-be partners for the Spanish firm’s vafidemstat will be closely following the news that regulators in the US are looking favorably on the LSD1 inhibitor’s potential as a therapy for the debilitating psychiatric illness.

The dual agonist of the FP and EP3 receptors has shown efficacy in a Japanese Phase III trial and completed its US Phase II study, which aligns with the Japanese firm’s global expansion strategy for glaucoma products.

A new contender emerges in obesity with pipeline assets from Jiangsu Hengrui, including a Phase III dual agonist, and an experienced team already focused on commercial hurdles.

The biotech is cutting jobs and discontinuing development of its anti-CD47 bispecific for blood cancers and moving its focus to SL-325, which targets the TL1A-DR3 axis in autoimmune diseases.