Johnson & Johnson, after several prior failed R&D attempts in AD, will pay Numab $1.25bn to acquire a subsidiary and its Phase II-ready bispecific antibody for key unmet needs in the disease.

Plus transactions involving Nissan Chemical/Sanwa Kagaku, Memel/Therabest, Chugai/Alnylam, Takeda/Kumquat, Nxera/Handok, 3SBio/CStone and deals in brief.

Confidence in growing in-house commercial capabilities has recently prompted several Chinese pharmas, including Simcere and 3SBio, to focus on obtaining domestic rights to novel drug assets developed by other China-based biotechs, rather than pursuing international deals.

The Swiss drug maker is licensing multiple DLL3-targeting CAR-Ts from the Chinese biotech, including one already in early clinical development, and will use its T-Charge manufacturing platform.