Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down: No­var­tis's re­treat leaves plen­ty of ca­su­al­ties; Bio­gen or­ches­trates a shame­ful me­dia show, and more

End­points as­sess­es the big bio­phar­ma R&D sto­ries of the week, with a lit­tle added com­men­tary on what they mean for the in­dus­try.

No­var­tis ex­e­cutes a messy with­draw­al on CAR-T

What­ev­er No­var­tis’s PR Team has come up with to ra­tio­nal­ize its de­ci­sion to dis­band its 400-mem­ber cell and gene ther­a­py unit, make no mis­take that this move marks a sig­nif­i­cant pipeline re­treat on the phar­ma gi­ant’s part. Two years ago the com­pa­ny couldn’t say enough about its com­mit­ment to CAR-T de­vel­op­ment, but these new ac­tions speak much loud­er than words. That’s not to say that No­var­tis is out of the game, but it is clear­ly falling by the way­side as a much faster set of play­ers at Kite is left in sole pos­ses­sion of front place. (Juno’s re­cent prat­fall se­ri­ous­ly de­layed its en­try.)

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