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The Denton site is part of a network of manufacturing plants Novartis is building across the U.S. to make cancer drugs that must be shipped to patients quickly.
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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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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.
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Analysts believe that Gilead’s new PrEP drug Yeztugo could reach peak sales of $4.5 billion. Not if GSK has anything to say about it.
In this episode presented by IQVIA, BioSpace’s head of insights Lori Ellis discusses the FDA’s first draft guidance for AI in drug development, published in January 2025, with Archana Hegde, senior director, pv systems and innovations at IQVIA.
Cell and gene therapy leaders say the agency’s decision to remove the Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategies that had been attached to approved CAR T cancer therapies reflects “thoughtful consideration of real-world evidence” and “regulatory trust.”
BPL-003 showed “robust” efficacy data in treatment-resistant depression, according to analysts from Jefferies, who noted that the asset could hit peak market sales of $1 billion. The results clear the way for the asset’s late-stage development and for the completion of a proposed merger with atai Life Sciences.
Macrocyclic peptides are designed to engage complex targets like biologics but pass through cell membranes like small molecule drugs.
The pivotal trial for Neurogene’s Rett syndrome gene therapy makes use of baseline controls and a rigorous endpoint that could help ensure a broader label for the drug product, if approved, according to analysts.
With PN-477, Protagonist is directly going up against Eli Lilly, which is advancing retatrutide, also a triple-G agonist, in a Phase II trial.
Pfizer insists that the discontinuation of the Phase II study was due to recruitment difficulties and was not linked to maplirpacept’s safety or efficacy.
Big Pharmas like Eli Lilly, Sanofi and Novartis headed back to the dealmakers table multiple times, with 32 total deals counted across the industry for the first half.
In a detail-thin announcement, Amgen said that adding bemarituzumab to chemotherapy improved overall survival, though analysts pledged to wait for more data on safety and tolerability before assessing the drug.