News

Supporting Lexicon Pharmaceuticals’ decision to advance the non-opioid analgesic pilavapadin into late-stage development—despite a topline miss in March—is an “improving” regulatory environment for non-addictive options for chronic pain, according to analysts at Jefferies.
FEATURED STORIES
IPO
Some of the biggest SPACs from the industry’s pandemic-fueled heyday are no longer on the market.
IPO
After spinning out of BridgeBio in May 2024, BBOT had an eye on another round of fundraising in 2025. A SPAC quickly emerged as the best option.
Aside from the rare disease market, Novo Nordisk also scored a key regulatory win last month for its blockbuster GLP-1 drug Wegovy, which can now be used to treat patients with metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis.
Job Trends
Carisma’s second workforce reduction this year likely leaves the company with 44 full-time employees as turns its focus to developing therapies for fibrosis, oncology and autoimmune diseases.
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Roche’s fenebrutinib this week scored a mid-stage win in relapsing multiple sclerosis, while Sanofi’s tolebrutinib met the primary endpoint in a Phase III trial for progressive MS but flopped in two late-stage relapsing MS studies.
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These 27 markets, comprising countries across Asia, Europe and South America, together contributed some 12% of Lundbeck’s earnings in 2024.
Jefferies analysts expect a regulatory filing for rocatinlimab later this year, with a product launch in 2026.
Cullinan Therapeutics and Taiho Oncology’s zipalertinib elicited promising response rates in two mid-stage studies of non-small cell lung cancer patients with typical and uncommon EGFR mutations.
CDC
Former CDC director Susan Monarez and former chief medical officer Debra Houry will appear in front of the Senate HELP Committee on Sept. 17.
Novo Nordisk also lowered its full-year profit growth guidance in connection with the restructuring effort. The pharma now anticipates operating profit to grow from 4% to 10%, down from its prior projection of 10% to 16%.
This week’s release of the Make America Health Again report revealed continued emphasis on vaccine safety; Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s faceoff with senators last week amounted to political theater; the FDA promises complete response letters in real time and shares details on a new rare disease framework; and Summit disappoints at the World Conference on Lung Cancer in Barcelona.
Four Los Angeles County life sciences projects are receiving funding to support goals that include adding jobs, creating multitenant facilities for graduation-stage companies, financially supporting emerging businesses and attracting large employers to the area.
Suddenly one obesity asset has come to define Amgen but executives see a fuller portfolio that will bring the big biotech into the future.
Contingent value rights are rising in a down market, helping to close the gap between buyer and seller expectations in biotech transactions.
In a livestreamed meeting Tuesday afternoon, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. drew a dark portrait of the state of America’s health while addressing the MAHA Commission’s most recent report, which includes plans to research potential links between vaccines and rising rates of chronic disease.