Big Phar­ma just struck its sec­ond dis­tri­b­u­tion deal with the grow­ing glob­al med­ical mar­i­jua­na busi­ness.

Nine months af­ter No­var­tis’ San­doz group al­lied it­self with Tilray, the med­ical cannabis grow­er Can­ndoc says it will use Te­va’s SLE group to dis­trib­ute its med­ical cannabis prod­ucts in Is­rael, and then spear­head the glob­al dis­tri­b­u­tion of its prod­ucts to mar­kets around the world where med­ical cannabis is le­gal.

“Through its SLE part­ner­ship, Can­ndoc has aligned it­self with one of the most promi­nent phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal com­pa­nies in the world, for the dis­tri­b­u­tion of cannabis-based med­ical treat­ments to coun­tries that rec­og­nize the val­ue of these med­i­cines for peo­ple in need,” not­ed com­pa­ny chair­man Ehud Barak in a state­ment.

Barak is the for­mer prime min­is­ter of Is­rael, un­der­scor­ing just how deeply en­trenched the com­pa­ny is with the coun­try’s busi­ness es­tab­lish­ment. Back in April, Haaretz re­port­ed that Can­ndoc was do­ing a road­show for an IPO on Nas­daq and talk­ing up its shot at a uni­corn val­u­a­tion of around $5 bil­lion.

But the bloom has come off the mar­ket rose, with share prices at the top play­ers like Tilray wilt­ing as the overnight mar­ket bub­ble that grew up around mar­i­jua­na quick­ly de­flat­ed. Share prices may be down, but Te­va and No­var­tis clear­ly see some longterm po­ten­tial in med­ical mar­i­jua­na. And more of their col­leagues in the busi­ness may well fol­low.

Can­ndoc is a sub­sidiary of In­ter­Cure and has cul­ti­va­tion sites in Is­rael as well as JVs un­der­way for cul­ti­va­tion and dis­tri­b­u­tion in the EU and Cana­da. In­ter­Cure al­so has mi­nor­i­ty stakes in 2 biotech com­pa­nies, Re­gen­era and Nov­el­lus.

The Endpoints News team is continuing to track IPO filings for 2021, and we’ve designed a new tracker page for the effort.

Check it out here: Biopharma IPOs 2021 from Endpoints News

You’ll be able to find all the biotechs that have filed and priced so far this year, sortable by quarter and listed by newest first. As of the time of publishing on Feb. 25, there have already been 16 biotechs debuting on Nasdaq so far this year, with an additional four having filed their S-1 paperwork.

In the search for a better Covid-19 therapeutic, GlaxoSmithKline and Vir have partnered up on two antibodies they hope have a chance. GSK is also testing its own in-house antibody, and early results may have shut the door on its widespread use.

A combination of GSK’s monoclonal antibody otilimab plus standard of care couldn’t best standard of care alone in preventing death and respiratory failure in hospitalized Covid-19 patients after 28 days, according to data from the Phase IIa OSCAR study unveiled Thursday.

S&P Global has taken a look at the dominant forces shaping the pharma market and come to the conclusion that there will be more downgrades than upgrades in 2021 — the 8th straight year of steady decline.

But it’s not all bad news. Some things are looking up, and there’s still plenty of money to be made in an industry that enjoys a 30% to 40% profit margin, once you factor in steep R&D expenses.