Amarin Corporation Plc of Dublin has raised $70 million in a private placement with institutional investors that will finance Phase 3 trials of the omega-3 drug, AMR 101, for cardiac diseases.
Prosensa BV of Leiden has granted GlaxoSmithKline an exclusive licence for its gene-correcting treatment for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, PRO051, and has entered into an alliance that could make three other of Prosensa’s DMD products available to GSK.
Heptares Therapeutics Ltd has entered into an option agreement with the Novartis Option Fund under which the UK company will make its technology available to Novartis to generate drug leads against an unspecified GPCR target.
The private equity firm, Celtic Therapeutics Holdings LP, has announced plans to invest up to $15 million in the clinical investigation of a cancer drug developed by the privately-owned UK company, Spirogen Ltd.
A two-year old Swedish company with a novel strategy for treating cancer, Axcentua Pharmaceuticals AB, has raised an undisclosed amount of money in a Series A financing round. It will use the funds to bring its lead molecule into the clinic.
UCB SA, which develops and sells treatments for diseases of the central nervous system and the immune system, has successfully floated a €500 million convertible eurobond issue.
Santhera Pharmaceuticals Holding AG of Switzerland has completed an all-share acquisition of Oy Juvantia Pharma Ltd of Finland thereby giving it control of a compound for the treatment of dyskinesia in Parkinson’s disease.
Sanofi-aventis said it has reached an agreement to buy the privately-owned French opthalmology company, Fovea Pharmaceuticals SA, for up to €370 million. This includes €90 million upfront as well as future milestone payments.
Silence Therapeutics Plc, which is working in the field of ribonucleic acid interference (RNAi), said that it is in talks that could lead to a reverse takeover of the company. Trading in the company’s London-listed shares has been suspended.
The Pharming Group NV has metaphorically pulled a transgenic rabbit out of a hat by submitting an expanded marketing authorisation application to the European Medicines Agency for Rhucin, a treatment for hereditary angioedema, and by persuading 70% of its convertible bondholders to forego receiving €50,000 per bond in three years and instead accept €7,500 plus shares now.