Annalee Armstrong headshot

Annalee Armstrong

Senior Editor

Annalee Armstrong is an award-winning biopharma journalist covering the business of drug development. She began her career at small newspapers across Western Canada. During the assignment of a lifetime, the Yukon Quest Sled Dog Race, she met her husband in Alaska and eventually moved to the U.S. Since then, Annalee has covered energy, environmental regulations, healthcare and biopharma. Prior to BioSpace, Annalee was senior editor for Fierce Biotech, where she received several awards for her writing and editing. She lives in Ottawa, Ontario, with her husband, two wild boys, an anxious Rhodesian Ridgeback and an indifferent tabby cat.

AstraZeneca’s $15 billion pledge to its China operations highlights the country’s advantages. But other regions are also hoping to host more clinical studies.
The Senate failed to pass a massive spending bill on Thursday—which includes the rare pediatric PRV program but also funding for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s large-scale crackdown in Minnesota and other states.
Moderna will continue to lead clinical development and manufacturing of the asset, while Recordati will handle commercialization of mRNA-3927, which is under development for the rare metabolic disorder propionic acidemia.
Roche’s obesity candidate achieves 22.5% weight loss in Phase II; Moderna pulls the plug on late-stage vaccine trials as Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy’s anti-vaccine policies and rhetoric continues; and embattled gene therapy maker Sarepta announces new data in Duchenne muscular dystrophy.
Roche said the Phase II results help build the case for advancing CT-388 into late-stage testing, which is set to get underway this quarter.
JPM
With the biopharma industry performing better of late, analysts, executives and other industry watchers are “cautiously optimistic”—a term heard all over the streets of San Francisco at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference earlier this month.
Investors are apparently taking bets on when Revolution will be acquired. A handful of pharmas could be interested as Merck backs off.
Attendance at the Biotech CEO Sisterhood’s annual photo of women leaders and allies in Union Square doubled this year. There’s still more work to do.
The obesity market and Most Favored Nation drug pricing were among the topics de jour at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference last week, while smaller biotechs sought to assure investors that their regulatory ducks are in a row; Novo Nordisk’s oral obesity pill got off to a hot start while the FDA delayed a decision on Eli Lilly’s investigational offering; and SpyGlass Pharma and AgomAb Therapeutics join the 2026 IPO club.
As drug candidates discovered via AI move into later-stage clinical trials, the technology seems to be doing as promised: speeding drug development.
The companies have an expansive clinical program for the mRNA neoantigen therapy intismeran autogene in combination with immuno-oncology heavyweight Keytruda.
Henry Gosebruch, who has $3.5 billion in capital to deploy, is thinking broad as he steers the decades-old biotech out of years of turmoil. 
Following rusfertide’s triumphant Phase III trial last year, Protagonist must decide how involved to be in future development. Hundreds of millions of dollars are on the line.
Speaking on the sidelines of the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, Novo business development executive Tamara Darsow said the company is gunning for obesity and diabetes assets.
Incoming PhRMA Chair Paul Hudson, a day before the White House announcement, pledged to work with the administration as the president turns to insurers as a source of cost savings for prescription medicines.