Expedeon AG has completed the sale of its proteomics and immunology business to Abcam Plc of the UK for €120 million, leading to a repositioning of the company as a provider of genomics services. Based in Heidelberg, Germany, Expedeon will in future focus on manufacturing DNA for use in gene therapies and gene-based vaccines. It will henceforth go by the name 4basebio AG and will continue to be listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.
Lynparza (olaparib) has been approved in the US as a first-line maintenance treatment for metastatic pancreatic cancer, the first therapy of its type to show a statistically significant improvement in progression-free survival in patients with the disease. The Food and Drug Administration announced the approval on 30 December on the basis of data from a Phase 3 trial of 154 patients who had germline BRCA-mutated pancreatic cancer.
Patients will be eligible for the drug based on an FDA-approved companion diagnostic.
Business hubs where life science companies co-locate in order to share infrastructure exist almost everywhere. But not all business hubs support basic science, let alone national healthcare systems. EIT Health is different. The group is part of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology which was set up in 2015 to promote the interface between industry, science and public healthcare systems. At conference in Paris on 2 to 3 December, members of the consortium met to discuss issues facing healthcare – and to congratulate a new crop of entrepreneurs.
Syncona Ltd has committed $80 million in new capital to Freeline Therapeutics Ltd which has a candidate gene therapy for haemophilia B in early clinical development. The Series C financing consists of two tranches, of which the first $40 million is being dispensed to support an expansion of manufacturing and clinical development activities, Freeline announced on 19 December.
France-based Truffle Capital has raised €250 million for a new life science fund that will invest in medical technologies using minimal intervention to treat major diseases such as heart disease. The closing of the BioMedTech fund was announced on 18 December. It is one of two new Truffle ventures, the second being a €140 million fund for banking and insurance innovation.
Three European biotech companies have received loans totalling €100 million from the European Investment Bank (EIB) enabling them to advance imaging and cell and gene therapy technologies, as well as individualised medicines for cancer. The EIB is the long-term lending institution of the European Union and owned by the EU member states. The three biotech companies are France-based Median Technologies SA, Italy-based MolMed SpA and Germany-based BioNTech SE.
The Roche group has acquired commercialisation rights, outside the US, for an experimental gene therapy for Duchenne muscular dystrophy, a rare degenerative neuromuscular disorder. The deal was announced on 23 December and is with Sarepta Therapeutics Inc. It comes only days after Roche received regulatory clearance to acquire the gene therapy company Spark Therapeutics Inc.
Genmab A/S has expanded its antibody repertoire under a new research and collaboration agreement with CureVac AG to produce antibody therapeutics for cancer that have been developed using messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. The agreement includes an upfront payment of $10 million for the first product and a €20 million equity investment in CureVac, as well as options on three other programmes. The deal was announced on 19 December 2019.
Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH has encountered a setback in its plans to develop multiple products for non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). A small molecule drug in-licensed from Pharmaxis Ltd in Australia is being dropped from development because of the risk of drug interactions, the German company said on 18 December.
A large observational study of patients with atrial fibrillation treated with the cardiovascular drug Lixiana (edoxaban), has confirmed that the drug is noninferior to warfarin but generates fewer bleeding episodes, according to the developer, Daiichi Sankyo Co Ltd.