The Michael J. Fox Foundation has awarded $1.5 million to six international research teams which are working on potentially disease-modifying therapies for Parkinson’s disease. The programme is financially supported by Elan Corporation Plc.
The ReNeuron Group Plc expects to start its long-awaited human trial of a stem cell therapy for stroke in the first quarter of 2010, provided it obtains formal ethics committee approval.
GW Pharmaceuticals Plc, which is developing a range of new cannabinoid medicines, expects European regulators to give a decision in the first half of 2010 on its application to market a drug to treat spasticity due to multiple sclerosis.
NicOx SA of France has launched a rights issue of approximately €70 million following the successful completion of a €30 million private placement. An NDA for the company’s lead drug has been filed with the Food and Drug Administration.
Clavis Pharma ASA of Norway has reached an agreement to partner its candidate drug for pancreatic cancer with a start-up oncology company in the US in a deal valued at up to $380 million. The partner is Clovis Oncology Inc of Colorado.
The European Medicines Agency has given a positive opinion to a new fertility treatment developed by NV Organon of the Netherlands, now part of Merck & Co, that can be used as part of an assisted reproductive technology programme.
Oxagen Ltd, a privately held UK company researching treatments for inflammation and allergies, has obtained a £16 million, Series C financing from a syndicate led by Novartis Venture Funds.
The European Commission is asking companies and others involved in clinical trials in Europe to give their views about whether the rules governing these trials should be changed.
Merck Serono of Geneva, Switzerland plans to invest more than €150 million in a new centre for pharmaceutical research and development in Beijing, China. The new centre will be in addition to R&D centres in Germany, Switzerland and the US.
The European Medicines Agency has rejected an application from Roche to extend the use of its cancer drug Avastin (bevacizumab) for the new indication of relapsed glioblastoma. It said there was insufficient evidence of the medicine’s benefits.