March 31, 2022 11:35 AM EDT

A ransomware attack on a Pfizer vendor triggered overpayments to hourly staffers — and now the pharma giant wants most of that money back

John Carroll

Editor & Founder

A ransomware attack on a vendor that helps track work time for a multitude of Pfizer’s hourly staffers is causing the pharma giant a major headache.

The Ultimate Kronos Group was hit with the cyberattack late last year, triggering a mixup in just how many hours its hourly staffers had been working. Some were overpaid, and others were underpaid. Now Pfizer is paying everyone who got shortchanged and wants any overpayments refunded — or at least most of it, minus a company contribution for the mixup.

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2023 Spotlight on the Future of Drug Development for Small and Mid-Sized Biotechs

Allucent

In the context of today’s global economic environment, there is an increasing need to work smarter, faster and leaner across all facets of the life sciences industry. This is particularly true for small and mid-sized biotech companies, many of which are facing declining valuations and competing for increasingly limited funding to propel their science forward. It is important to recognize that within this framework, many of these smaller companies already find themselves resource-challenged to design and manage clinical studies themselves because they don’t have large teams or in-house experts in navigating the various aspects of the drug development journey. This can be particularly challenging for the most complex and difficult to treat diseases where no previous pathway exists and patients are urgently awaiting breakthroughs.

Gossamer Bio CEO Faheem Hasnain at Endpoints' #BIO22 panel (J.T. MacMillan Photography for Endpoints News)

December 6, 2022 07:15 AM ESTUpdated 10:52 AM

Bioregnum

R&D

Gossamer’s Faheem Hasnain defends a round of positive PAH data as a clear win. But can these PhII results stand up to scrutiny?

Gossamer Bio $GOSS posted a statistically significant improvement for its primary endpoint in the key Phase II TORREY trial for lead drug seralutinib on Tuesday morning. But CEO Faheem Hasnain has some explaining to do on the important secondary of the crucial six-minute walk distance test — which will be the primary endpoint in Phase III — as the data on both endpoints fell short of expectations, missing one analyst’s bar on even modest success.

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December 7, 2022 07:00 AM ESTUpdated 03:57 PM

Special

Special report 2022: Meet 20 women blazing trails in biopharma R&D

ENDPOINTS

When you run a special report for a fourth year, it can start feeling a little bit like a ritual. You go through the motions — in our case opening up nominations for top women in biopharma R&D and reviewing more than 500 entries — you make your choices of inclusion and exclusion. You host a ceremony.

But then things happen that remind you why you do it in the first place. Perhaps a Supreme Court rules to overturn the constitutional right to abortion and a group of women biotech leaders makes it clear they strongly dissent; perhaps new data on gender diversity in the industry come out that look all too similar to the old ones, suggesting women are still dramatically underrepresented at the top; perhaps protests and conflicts around the world put in stark terms the struggles that many women still face in earning the most basic recognition.

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ENDPOINTS CAREERS

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Mark McKenna, Prometheus Biosciences chairman & CEO

December 7, 2022 11:22 AM ESTUpdated 11:39 AM

R&D

With clear PhII win in IBD, Prometheus thwarts Pfizer comparisons as it follows Humira 'playbook'

Kyle LaHucik

Associate Editor

Prometheus Biosciences reported a clear Phase II win in two inflammatory bowel disease conditions in a clinical development race with Pfizer, planting the biotech’s flag in a field of antibodies attempting to go against black box-cornered JAK inhibitors and AbbVie’s Humira.

Shares $RXDX have soared since the summer — a small dip last week notwithstanding when rival Pfizer teamed up with Roivant on a new company for their competing anti-TL1A monoclonal antibody. And they skyrocketed once again Wednesday morning, climbing from $36 apiece to more than $100 on the back of two Phase II studies: one placebo-controlled in ulcerative colitis and the other an open-label trial in patients with Crohn’s disease.

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Kristen Hege, Bristol Myers Squibb SVP, early clinical development, oncology/hematology and cell therapy (Illustration: Assistant Editor Kathy Wong for Endpoints News)

December 6, 2022 12:30 PM ESTUpdated 03:44 PM

Pharma

Marketing

Q&A: Bristol Myers' Kristen Hege on cell therapy, cancer patients and mentoring the next generation

Beth Snyder Bulik

Senior Editor

Kristen Hege leads Bristol Myers Squibb’s early oncology discovery program carrying on from the same work at Celgene, which was acquired by BMS in 2019. She’s known for her early work in CAR-T, having pioneered the first CAR-T cell trial for solid tumors more than 25 years ago.

However, the eminent physician-scientist is more than just a drug developer mastermind. She’s also a practicing physician, mother to two young women, an avid backpacker and intersecting all those interests — a champion of young women and people of color in STEM and life sciences.