Neuropsychiatric disorders

Tavapadon improved motor and daily living complications at week 26. The news comes nearly one month to the day after AbbVie announced the Phase II failure of another key Cerevel asset, emraclidine.

Novartis, Gilead, Roche and Takeda commit to new partners in a spate of mid-sized collaborations this week. Meanwhile, Applied Therapeutics’ stock tanks 80% after govorestat is denied approval, Intra-Cellular Therapies seeks to expand Caplyta into major depressive disorder and the FDA investigates the safety of bluebird bio’s Skysona.

The shocking failure of AbbVie’s emraclidine has investors questioning the Big Pharma’s long-term neuroscience strategy, which put the drug at the center of expectations.

Bristol Myers Squibb’s third-quarter results benefited from sales of its legacy brands Eliquis and Revlimid, as well as growth portfolio products such as Abecma, Breyanzi and Reblozyl.

Alto Neuroscience’s depression treatment failed to beat placebo just nine months after the biotech went public. The stunning failure called to mind Acelyrin, which faced a similar fate last year.

Seaport Therapeutics, kick started by the former leaders of Karuna Therapeutics, has raised $225 million in an oversubscribed Series B to fund a pipeline of neuropsychiatric medicines.

Johnson & Johnson is cutting several programs—most of which are in neurology and psychiatry—as the company also pulls back from the infectious diseases market.

After the FDA declined to approve Lykos Therapeutics’ MDMA-assisted therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder, companies are pivoting away from or delaying similar therapeutics targeting the psychiatric disease.

The FDA has six target action dates ahead to round out September as drugs for gastroparesis, Niemann-Pick disease type C and more await decisions.

BMO Capital Markets analyst Evan Seigerman said luvadaxistat’s inconsistencies between mid-stage trials raise questions about Neurocrine Biosciences’ developmental efforts moving forward.