Featured Story | By Ben Adams Pfizer’s $2.3 billion buyout of immuno-oncology biotech Trillium, which spent most of 2019 in penny-stock territory, has tongues wagging about whether this will prove the M&A push many want from a sluggish 2021. read more |
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Top Stories By Annalee Armstrong Merck KGaA’s biliary cancer hopeful bintrafusp alfa—the immunotherapy at the heart of a $4.2 billion deal with GlaxoSmithKline—has nabbed its third strike. The German pharmaceutical company announced Monday that a phase 2 clinical trial of bintrafusp alfa has been discontinued as the therapy is unlikely to improve overall survival. read more By Amirah Al Idrus Roche may market the first FDA-approved in vivo gene therapy, but the company isn’t resting on its laurels. The Swiss pharma is teaming up with Shape Therapeutics on next-generation gene therapies for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and rare diseases in a deal that could exceed $3 billion. read more By Kyle LaHucik Theravance Biopharma has one more chance for the Johnson & Johnson-partnered JAK inhibitor izencitinib after the therapy failed to alter symptoms of ulcerative colitis in a midstage test. The trial flop is a blow to Theravance, which wanted to go up against some of the biggest medicines in the crowded immunology business—including partner Janssen's Stelara and AbbVie's Humira. read more By Kyle LaHucik Months after first-in-human gene-editing results made a splash around the world, Vertex is making a $1.2 billion edit to its CRISPR work through a new research pact with existing partner Arbor Biotechnologies. After dishing out $900 million upfront to CRISPR Therapeutics for sickle cell disease and beta thalassemia in April, Vertex is doubling down in its attempt to beat bluebird bio to market with a gene-editing therapy for those blood diseases. read more By Nick Paul Taylor In April, the FDA advised Stealth BioTherapeutics to run another phase 3 clinical trial of elamipretide in a rare genetic condition before seeking approval. Stealth, having been unable to come up with a feasible design for the study, has now gone ahead and filed for approval despite the FDA’s advice. read more By Nick Paul Taylor The U.S. government has continued to seek out new, better anthrax vaccines despite the availability of Emergent BioSolutions’ Biothrax. Now, BlueWillow Biologics, working with Porton Biopharma, has delivered phase 1 data on a nasal vaccine it argues has advantages over other options. read more By Conor Hale With the goal of launching 100 new digital research programs across different rare diseases, AllStripes has secured $50 million to intensify its efforts at collating medical records and searching them for insights that could aid in drug development. read more By Kyle LaHucik Following its success in myeloma, the HealthTree Foundation unveiled a new tool that lets patients find acute myeloid leukemia clinical trials based on type of studies, stage of trial, drug class, genetic mutations, location and other filters to ease the burdensome "mind cramp" associated with the federal clinical trials database. read more By Kevin Dunleavy Cara Therapeutics has failed in its attempts to advance Korsuva as a treatment for atopic dermatitis or in an oral form. But the company has found success with an FDA approval for the drug in chronic kidney disease patients on hemodialysis with the relentless itch disease pruritis. read more By Fraiser Kansteiner With a self-proclaimed “Super Plant” already on the way in South Korea, Samsung Biologics CEO John Rim said in January that the CDMO’s expansion was just getting started. He wasn’t kidding. The manufacturer’s parent company Samsung Group is investing an eye-popping 240 trillion won ($205 billion) across its biopharmaceutical, semiconductor and telecommunications businesses, among others. read more By Dave Muoio A new report from the Kaiser Family Foundation estimated 113,000 preventable COVID-19 hospitalizations in June and July alone. read more Resources Sponsored by: Patheon by Thermo Fisher Scientific Learn how a decentralized clinical trial strategy improves patient recruitment, reduces drop-out rates, and ultimately streamlines the path to the next trial phase. 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