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IPO
LB Pharma needed $350 million to advance a promising schizophrenia candidate at a time when the biotech markets were locked up tight. Fortunately, it wasn’t CEO Heather Turner’s first rodeo.
Rare disease drug developers struggle to survive in a biopharma investment market that prioritizes large patient populations. Initiatives like the Orphan Therapeutics Accelerator are attempting to solve what CEO Craig Martin says is not a science problem, but a math problem.
Eli Lilly’s win in a head-to-head trial drove Novo Nordisk’s market cap to pre-Wegovy levels not long after the victor became the first pharma company to top a $1 trillion valuation. It seems one company can do no right, while the other can do no wrong.
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FROM OUR EDITORS
Read our takes on the biggest stories happening in the industry.
FDA
Following the FDA’s refusal to review Moderna’s investigational mRNA flu vaccine last week, Commissioner Marty Makary faced questions from the U.S. president about the agency’s handling of vaccines. It’s a clear signal that the tension long brewing at the drug regulator has now gone all the way to the top.
THE LATEST
Bristol Myers Squibb is continuing its cost-savings measures with layoffs in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. The company announced earlier this year that it will eliminate 2,200 jobs by the end of 2024 in a bid to save $1.5 billion through 2025.
Monday’s failure to improve overall survival in breast cancer “further dents belief” in the companies’ Dato-DXd and “likely complicates regulatory discussions for approval of this indication,” Jefferies analyst Peter Welford wrote in a note to investors.
A lawsuit filed by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, which claims the Inflation Reduction Act’s Medicare Drug Price Negotiation Program is unconstitutional, now goes back to a lower Texas court.
With Friday’s approval, Sanofi’s anti-CD38 antibody Sarclisa will go head-to-head with the first such therapy for multiple myeloma, Johnson & Johnson’s Darzalex, which raked in nearly $10 billion last year.
As the FDA prepares to render a verdict on BMS’ closely watched schizophrenia drug, BioSpace takes a closer look at the late-stage pipeline for this neuropsychiatric disorder.
The European Society for Medical Oncology’s annual meeting this week featured the hottest emergent areas of cancer treatment—antibody-drug conjugates, bispecifics and radiopharmaceuticals—while anti-TIGIT therapies made a bit of a comeback.
Novo Nodrisk’s cannabinoid receptor–targeting obesity pill was picked up in the $1.1 billion acquisition of Inversago Pharmaceuticals last year.
The positive readout in patients with non-relapsing secondary progressive multiple sclerosis comes on the heels of back-to-back failures in which tolebrutinib was unable to improve relapse rates in patients with relapsing MS.
With Thursday’s positive opinion from the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use, the matter now heads to the European Commission which will have the final say on whether Wegovy’s label will be updated.
IRA
While unlikely to pass this year, given the Democrats’ control over the White House and Senate, the proposed legislation might be a harbinger of the Republicans’ agenda next year for the Inflation Reduction Act should they win the November elections.