Drug Discovery

LUNAC Therapeutics-led project awarded £3.14m under Innovate UK Biomedical Catalyst Programme, to develop next-generation anticoagulant

LUNAC Therapeutics (LUNAC), a UK based drug discovery company focused on the identification and development of advanced anticoagulants with minimal bleeding risk, announced that, along with the Medicines Discovery Catapult and the University of Leeds, it has been awarded £3.14M funding under Innovate UK’s Biomedical Catalyst programme.

WuXi ATU and GeneMedicine sign development and manufacturing agreement for oncolytic virus products

WuXi ATU Co, a subsidiary of WuXi AppTec, and GeneMedicine - a South Korea-based gene therapy biotechnology company, have formed a strategic partnership for the development and manufacturing of oncolytic virus products. Under the terms of the collaboration, WuXi ATU will provide overall process development, manufacturing and Investigational New Drug (IND) filing services for GeneMedicine's oncolytic virus products.

Lonza and DiNAQOR announce strategic collaboration to advance gene therapy programs for patients with monogenic cardiomyopathies

Lonza and DiNAQOR AG, a global gene therapy platform company, announced a strategic collaboration to advance DiNAQOR's preclinical programs for the treatment of cardiac myosin-binding protein-C (MYBPC3) cardiomyopathies, a genetic condition that can result in heart failure.

Ferring, Blackstone to invest $570m in gene therapy for bladder cancer

Ferring Pharmaceuticals and Blackstone Life Sciences will make a joint investment of more than $570m in an investigational gene therapy called nadofaragene firadenovec (rAd-IFN/Syn3) for bladder cancer patients.

CARB-X funds VenatoRx to support development of new class of oral antibiotics to treat multi-drug-resistant gonorrhoea

CARB-X is awarding VenatoRx Pharmaceuticals, (Malvern, Pennsylvania, USA) up to US$4.1 million in non-dilutive funding, with the possibility of up to an additional US$8.9 million if certain project milestones are met, to develop a new class of oral antibiotics to treat infections caused by multi-drug-resistant (MDR) Neisseria gonorrhoeae.

Novartis to buy The Medicines Company for $9.7bn

Novartis has agreed to acquire The Medicines Company for about $9.7bn to add inclisiran, an investigational cholesterol-lowering drug, to its cardiovascular portfolio.

Vor Biopharma and MaxCyte announce clinical and commercial licence agreement for engineered hematopoietic stem cells to treat cancer

Vor Biopharma, an oncology company pioneering engineered hematopoietic stem cells (eHSCs) for the treatment of cancer, and MaxCyte, a global cell-based therapies and life sciences company, today announced a clinical and commercial license agreement under which Vor will use MaxCyte’s Flow Electroporation technology to produce eHSCs and initiate Investigational New Drug (IND)-enabling studies to accelerate its progress towards the clinic.

ViiV Healthcare, NIH collaborate on investigational bNAb for HIV treatment

ViiV Healthcare, the global specialist HIV company majority owned by GSK, with Pfizerand Shionogi Limited as shareholders, today announced that the company will be developing the investigational broadly neutralising antibody (bNAb) N6LS for the treatment and prevention of HIV-1, as part of an exclusive licensing agreement between GSK and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Bristol-Myers Squibb completes $74bn acquisition of biotechnology firm Celgene

Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) has completed the acquisition of US-based biotechnology company Celgene in a cash-cum-stock deal worth around $74bn.