Qiagen NV, the Netherlands-based holding company for the German diagnostics company of the same name, has announced agreements with two US companies for rights to biomarkers that are expected to play a role in the treatment of cancer.
Cardio3 BioSciences SA has secured €3.1 million in new funding from the Walloon regional government of Belgium and from the European Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) to support development of its stem-cell technology.
KalVista Pharmaceuticals Ltd, a new UK ophthalmology company, is set to receive up to $2.2 million in milestone-based support from the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) to finance a pre-clinical drug to treat diabetic macula edema.
Bristol-Myers Squibb Company has announced plans to acquire the Georgia-based company Inhibitex Inc for $2.5 billion in order to expand its portfolio of new medicines in virology and investigational medicines for hepatitis C.
BerGenBio AS of Norway has completed an $8.8 million Series A financing round to take its lead cancer compound into the clinic and develop a companion diagnostic. The lead investors are Sarsia Seed AS and Investinor AS.
Scientists from Cambridge and Harvard Universities have reported that the deterioration of CNS tissue in aged mice can be reversed by exposing them to cells from younger animals. Their findings appear in the 6 January issue of Cell Stem Cell.
AstraZeneca Plc is to advance into preclinical development, three siRNA programmes stemming from a research collaboration with Silence Therapeutics Plc, a developer of RNA interference technology for use in human therapeutics.
Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH has agreed to pay $65 million upfront over four years, plus research funding, to Forma Therapeutics Inc of the US to discover new small molecule drugs for cancer using Forma’s protein-protein interaction technology.
AstraZeneca Plc has decided to further invest in a candidate drug for Alzheimer’s disease arising from a research collaboration with Targacept Inc, according to the US company. The molecule modulates the alpha4beta2 neuronal nicotinic receptor.
Apogenix GmbH has raised €7.5 million from private investors to advance development of its lead product for glioblastoma. The announcement comes shortly after the company said it will investigate a new indication for the same product.