Finance, Grants, Deals

Gilead Sciences Inc has struck a $5 billion deal with Galapagos NV giving it rights to the Belgian company’s suite of small molecule drugs for inflammatory diseases as well as an equity stake in the company of up to 29.9%. The agreement also includes a pledge by Gilead to not increase its stake in Galapagos for 10 years.

BioNTech SE has generated substantial financial support for its portfolio of personalised cancer medicines with a Series B financing of $325 million – one of the largest single private financing rounds for a European biotechnology company. The fundraising was led by Fidelity Management & Research Co with participation from both new and existing investors.

Evotec SE has announced the launch of a new company, Breakpoint Therapeutics GmbH, to discover compounds modulating the DNA repair pathway as a source of potential treatments for cancer. In so doing, it joins a number of enterprises that see DNA damage response as a way of developing drugs for patients who don’t respond to existing treatments.

A science team from the University of Birmingham in the UK has reformulated the diabetes drug exenatide in order to treat patients with the neurological condition idiopathic intracranial hypertension. With a view to commercialising the discovery, it has assigned intellectual property rights for the reformulated drug to a new Australian-based company – Invex Therapeutics Ltd.

MorphoSys AG has upgraded its financial guidance for 2019 following a decision by GlaxoSmithKline Plc to start Phase 3 trials of one of its antibodies. This triggers a €22 million milestone payment to MorphoSys. The German company now expects revenue this year will be between €65-72 million, up from €43-50 million previously, and its loss before interest and tax to narrow to €105-115 million from €127-137 million previously.

The Belgian drug discovery company Confo Therapeutics NV has linked up with a technology provider in Germany to identify a small molecule compound that could modulate an undisclosed G-protein coupled receptor (GPCR) for the purpose of treating disease. Companies have been working for years to effectively target GPCRs, a family of membrane proteins that are involved in a wide range of biological processes and disorders.  

The charity Cancer Research UK is to invest $25 million in a biotechnology fund managed by SV Health Investors as part of a partnership aimed at accelerating the development of new oncology drugs.

Under the arrangement, Cancer Research UK will provide at least $25 million to SV Health Investors’ seventh venture capital fund which is expected to raise $250 million. About 60% of the fund’s new capital will be invested in oncology or oncology-related projects.

MODAG GmbH, a new German company focused on neurological diseases, has raised €12 million in a Series A financing round to bring its lead product for multiple system atrophy (MSA) into clinical development. MSA is a rare neurodegenerative disorder characterised by the progressive loss of function and death of different types of nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. According to the US National Institutes of Health, there are currently no drugs that are capable of slowing the progression of the disease.

Sanifit Therapeutics SA has raised €72.2 million from venture finance and convertible bonds to take its orphan drug candidate SNF472 into Phase 3 development for the treatment of calciphylaxis, a disease where calcium accumulates in small blood vessels in fat and skin tissues. This causes blood clots and serious infections which frequently leads to death.

The fundraising consisted of €55.2 million in Series D finance and €17 million in convertible bonds.

Erytech Pharma SA has teamed up with SQZ Biotechnologies Co, a spin-out of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to develop antigen-specific immune modulating therapies for cancer. The collaboration uses Erytech’s technique for encapsulating drug substances inside red blood cells to inform drug development by SQZ. The MIT spin-out is a cell therapy company.