The erosion of pharmaceutical prices in Europe has accelerated with the debt crisis and prices now look set to decline by 5% or more, according to Andrew Witty, president of the European pharmaceutical industry federation, EFPIA, and chief executive of GlaxoSmithKline Plc.
The Roche group has announced plans to close its Nutley, New Jersey, US research site with the anticipated loss of 1,000 jobs and the relocation of the activities to Switzerland and Germany. The reorganisation is expected to keep group R&D costs stable.
Ablynx NV said that fresh data from a trial of its anti-tumour necrosis factor-alpha antibody for rheumatoid arthritis, ozoralizumab (ATN-103), has shown some promising results, at least one of which was unexpected.
An antibiotic from AstraZeneca Plc is one of four new medicines to be recommended for marketing in Europe by the EMA’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use. The drug, Zinforo, is a cephalosporin antibiotic.
In an unusual public rebuke, the European Medicines Agency has cited Roche for deficiencies in its medicine-safety reporting system. It has given the company until 27 June to submit a comprehensive plan for dealing with outstanding cases.
NicOx SA, which has shifted its strategy to focus on ophthalmology, is to in-license point-of-care diagnostics from Rapid Pathogen Screening Inc. The agreement, financial terms of which were not disclosed, was announced on 21 June 2012.
Venture capital-backed Heptares Therapeutics Ltd has extended a research collaboration with the UK Medical Research Council that is looking at the structure of G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs) and other transmembrane proteins.
InDex Pharmaceuticals AB of Sweden said that data from a compassionate use programme of its experimental therapy for treating ulcerative colitis has been published in the journal, Inflammatory Bowel Diseases.
Noxxon Pharma AG has started a Phase 2a trial of an oligonucleotide-based drug for patients with diabetic nephropathy. The drug, NOX-E36, aims to bind and neutralise MCP-1, a protein that is involved in inflammation.
Researchers from the US have tested bone grafts grown from purified adipose-derived stem cells and discovered that the cells regenerated bone tissue better than current methods.The findings were published in the June, 2012 issue of Stem Cells, Translational Medicine.