BioNTech AG is to expand its drug discovery capabilities following an agreement with MAB Discovery GmbH to acquire that company’s antibody generation unit. The two companies, both based in Germany, have been collaborating since 2013. Financial terms of the agreement weren’t disclosed.
UK-based Autifony Therapeutics Ltd has achieved a first milestone under an option agreement with Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH, triggering an undisclosed payment for work on small molecule potassium channel modulators for the treatment of central nervous system disorders.
Philip Hampton, non-executive chairman of GlaxoSmithKline Plc since May 2015, has decided to step down from the position, triggering the start of recruitment for a successor, GSK announced on 21 January 2019.
Mr Hampton’s departure comes nearly two years after the appointment of Emma Walmsley as chief executive, and the recently announced restructuring that will see GSK spin out an enlarged consumer healthcare business into a separately listed company. This restructuring is expected to take place over the next three years.
Nanobiotix SA has announced plans to make a public offering of its shares in the US with the submission of a registration statement Form F-1 to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The timing and size of the issue haven’t been decided.
A team of scientists at the VIB research institute and KU Leuven in Belgium has discovered that an amyloid-beta precursor protein, APP, modulates neuronal signal transmission by binding to a specific receptor called GABABR1a. This has implications for treating Alzheimer’s disease and probably other disorders.
Alzheimer’s-affected brains are clogged with amyloid-beta plaques. These fragments are produced from a precursor protein whose normal function has remained unclear for decades.
A wave of clinical trial applications for new cell and gene therapies has reached the US Food and Drug Administration triggering a review of clinical guidance documents for developers. In an announcement on 15 January, Scott Gottlieb, the FDA commissioner, said new guidances are being drafted for gene replacement therapies as well as for cell-based gene therapies such as the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell drugs.
Scientists at the University of Cambridge have identified mechanisms by which mutations in the ATM gene can lead to cancer drug resistance and how this can be counteracted by changes in other genes. The findings, reported on 8 January 2019 in Nature Communications, show how cells respond to DNA damage as well as highlight potential therapeutic targets for the genetic disease, ataxia-telangiectasia (A-T).
A partnership between German and US companies aims to develop gene therapies for neurodegenerative diseases that would cross the blood-brain barrier and deliver therapeutic agents to the brain.
The collaboration is between Sirion Biotech GmbH, which specialises in viral vector technologies for gene and cell therapies, and Denali Therapeutics Inc, a developer of treatments for diseases of the central nervous system.
Neem Biotech Ltd, which is researching treatments for bacterial infections, has received £50,000 in public funding to advance its studies into treatments for bacterial infections in wounds. The company is investigating potential therapies targeting biofilms which are formed by bacteria as a protection against the human immune system and antibiotics.
The German biotech company Immunic AG is to execute a reverse merger with Vital Therapies Inc of the US in the first step towards an anticipated share listing on Nasdaq. The two companies have agreed to an all-share transaction that will create a new company, Immunic Inc, the majority of whose shares will be held by Immunic AG.