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The FDA greenlit 26 novel therapies in the first half of 2026, including four for cancer and six for orphan indications. Meanwhile, AstraZeneca and Johnson and Johnson took home a combined 11 of the agency’s 79 total approvals, including supplemental nods.
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Even as FDA approvals for biologic therapies fell in the first half of 2026, regulatory experts are optimistic about a turnaround in the rare disease space after the departure of key leaders at the agency. Still, there will continue to be tension between science and politics.
Early-stage financing rounds are on track to hit their lowest dollar value in years as funders continue to eschew risky investments, experts told BioSpace.
A mostly black box since emerging with more than a billion dollars in hand, Xaira Therapeutics is slowly pulling back the curtain, revealing plans to find partners and validate its pipeline.
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Congressional letters sent to the CEOs of Eli Lilly, Pfizer, Merck, BMS and AbbVie this week voicing concerns about the pharmas’ clinical trials in China highlight an ongoing discrepancy in how government and industry think about the rise of the Asian country’s biotech industry.
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Analysts said the deal with Novo was likely giving Hims “‘credibility’ or increased consumer traffic,” adding that the “litigation risk is back on the table” now that the Danish pharma has stepped away.
BrainStorm Cell Therapeutics issued a statement Tuesday supporting a Citizens’ Petition submitted to the FDA requesting the approval of its cell therapy NurOwn, whose BLA was withdrawn in 2023. A Phase IIIb trial was scheduled to begin last month.
The deal marks an end for CAR T company Cargo Therapeutics, which has been slashing its workforce and cutting programs since the January decision to halt its lead candidate for a certain type of aggressive large B cell lymphoma.
President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill, signed into law last week, reintroduces broader exemptions for orphan drugs from the IRA’s drug price negotiation program—a move welcomed by the biopharma industry. The new tax law also cuts Medicaid funding, posing a minimal risk to pharma’s bottomlines and potentially jeopardizing hospitals’ 340B status. It does not, however, include new rules for pharmacy benefit managers that had been in an earlier draft.
After issues with a batch of Jasper Therapeutics’ investigational antibody led to “lower” therapeutic effects in several patients, analysts at BMO Capital Markets said they “believe investors won’t feel comfortable coming back to the story.”
Societies, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, allege that Kennedy’s directive to remove COVID-19 from vaccination guidelines for healthy pregnant women and healthy children puts these vulnerable groups at risk of serious illness.
A readout from the company’s SUMMIT trial put its small molecule bezuclastinib on a collision course with rival Blueprint’s Ayvakit, which Leerink analysts said does not sufficiently treat all patients.
The partnership will give Chugai access to Gero’s artificial intelligence technology to discover novel targets in aging-related diseases. Chugai will then develop antibody-based drugs based on the findings.
After a season of regulatory upheaval, obesity and rare genetic diseases will likely remain major themes for biopharma in 2025, according to Jefferies.
Ekterly’s road to approval was not a smooth one. Last month, the FDA informed KalVista it would not meet its PDUFA date due to resource constraints and reports surfaced that Commissioner Marty Makary tried to have the application rejected.