The Roche group is set to broaden its antibody technology holdings with the acquisition of the privately-owned Austrian company Dutalys GmbH which has a new bispecific antibody platform. The deal is valued at up to $489 million including milestones.
Merck & Co Inc has bolstered its oncology portfolio with the acquisition of the privately-held Swiss biotechnology company OncoEthix SA which has a BET bromodomain inhibitor in Phase 1b for the treatment of haematological malignancies and advanced solid tumours.
Geneva-headquartered Index Ventures has invested £2 million in Stealthyx Therapeutics Ltd, a small British company that has developed an encapsulation technology for delivering biologics to the site of a disease. Stealthyx is a spin-out of Queen Mary, University of London.
BerGenBio AS, a privately held platform company which is developing products that interfere with cancer metastasis, has raised NOK 90 million (€9.75 million) in equity financing to further develop its pipeline of early-stage therapies.
Two European companies with complementary technology platforms have joined forces to supply drug targeting services to Forma Therapeutics Inc, a US company working to discover new compounds to treat cancer and other genetically-driven diseases.
Responding to the growing need for new antibiotics, Merck & Co Inc has reached an agreement to acquire Cubist Pharmaceuticals Inc for $9.5 billion. Cubist’s pipeline has new treatments for both Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Clostridium difficile infections.
A medical device which is intended to treat congenital malformations of the heart using a regenerative medicine approach has been backed by a syndicate of leading European investors in a €27 million Series B financing round.
Switzerland-based Anergis SA has raised CHF 14.5 million (€12.1 million) from European and US-based investors in order to progress its lead vaccine against birch pollen allergy into a Phase 3 study. The vaccine consists of synthetic long peptides.
Evgen Pharma Plc, which is developing cancer and neurology products based on a naturally occurring chemical, has announced its intention to make an initial public offering of up to £20 million worth of its shares on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange in mid-December.
BTG Plc is to pay up to $475 million to acquire privately-held PneumRx Inc of California which has a medical device approved in Europe to treat emphysema. The purchase price consists of an upfront payment of $230 million and up to $245 million in milestones.