Biogen Inc is to acquire Nightstar Therapeutics Plc, a gene therapy company spun out from the University of Oxford and financed by Syncona, which has a product in Phase 3 for the treatment of choroideremia, a rare retinal disorder. The US biotech company will pay $25.50 in cash for each share of Nightstar, valuing the company at approximately $800 million.
Sangamo Therapeutics Inc is readying a second generation of its zinc finger nuclease technology to use in an in vivo genome editing trial later this year. This is expected to provide further support for the company’s strategy of using engineered nucleases to correct DNA in patients with Hunter syndrome and other genetic diseases. Hunter syndrome is a rare genetic disorder that can lead to tissue and organ damage.
Calypso Biotech BV has completed a €20 million Series A round to advance a preclinical antibody for autoimmune indications into human studies. The financing round was announced on 20 February by INKEF Capital, which co-led the round together with Gilde Healthcare.
Belgium-based UCB SA has upgraded its medium-term sales forecast for core neurology and immunology products after a year of improved profitability and sales growth. During 2018 the company’s epilepsy product Vimpat (lacosamide) achieved sales of €1.1 billion with double-digit growth in the US, Europe and elsewhere.
An approach to drug payments, where the price of a new medicine is linked to its effectiveness, may enable patients suffering from cancer to get new treatments faster, according to Cancer Research UK.
The German Cancer Award 2019 has been given to Ugur Sahin, the co-founder and chief executive of BioNTech AG for his work on individualised cancer immunotherapies and in particular, the development and clinical testing of messenger RNA (mRNA)-based cancer vaccines tailored to an individual patient’s cancer mutation profile.
Syncona Ltd, an active investor in cell and gene therapy, has joined the Novartis Venture Fund to provide CHF 35 million (€31 million) in Series A funding to Anaveon AG, a Swiss start-up which is developing biologics for cancer.
Founded in December 2017, Anaveon has a preclinical product targeting the interleukin 2 (IL-2) receptor. The biologic is an agonist which is expected to enhance a patient’s immune system to respond to tumours and work better than other IL-2 products.
A Dutch venture capital fund with investments in healthcare and technology has led a €10 million Series A financing round for Aidence BV, a company that uses artificial intelligence to improve medical imaging. INKEF Capital headed the round with co-investor Rabo Ventures, alongside existing investors Northzone, HenQ and Health Innovations.
Patients with pancreatic cancer, who were treated with Lynparza during a Phase 3 clinical trial, have shown a statistically-significant and clinically-meaningful improvement in progression-free survival, according to AstraZeneca Plc. The drug’s benefit, reported on 26 February, is the first for a PARP inhibitor in pancreatic cancer, one of the most difficult-to-treat cancers.
The Roche group has moved into gene therapy and simultaneously strengthened its franchise in haemophilia with the acquisition of Spark Therapeutics Inc, one of a small number of gene therapy companies in the world with a product on the market. The all-cash transaction is valued at approximately $4.3 billion, representing a substantial premium to Spark’s current stock price. Nonetheless, it is below the $8.7 billion that Novartis paid for AveXis Inc and the $9 billion Celgene Corp paid for Juno Therapeutics in 2018 – both gene therapy companies.