Busy Amgen swings another deal, this time with RNA drugging player Arrakis for ‘several billion’

Michael Gilman, Arrakis CEO (via Obsidian)

January 11, 2022 09:00 AM ESTUpdated 10:08 AM

Busy Amgen swings another deal, this time with RNA drugging player Arrakis for 'several billion'

Max Gelman

Senior Editor

Less than a week after inking a $1.9 billion collaboration with Flagship’s Generate to boost its AI capabilities, Amgen is returning to the dealmaking table.

The biopharma’s newest partner is Arrakis, as the companies announced Tuesday morning they will team up to develop five RNA degrader therapeutics, with Amgen retaining an option for more. Amgen will shell out $75 million upfront and promise “several billion dollars” in biobucks if all milestones are met, though the company wouldn’t pin an exact number.

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MedTech clinical trials require a unique regulatory and study design approach and so engaging a highly experienced CRO to ensure compliance and accurate data across all stages is critical to development milestones.

Innovative MedTech Demands Specialist Clinical Trial Regulatory Affairs and Design

Tom Avery

Scientific and Medical Affairs Specialist, Medical Devices

Avance Clinical is the Australian CRO for international biotechs providing world-class clinical research services with FDA-accepted data across all phases. With Avance Clinical, biotech companies can leverage Australia’s supportive clinical trials environment which includes no IND requirement plus a 43.5% Government incentive rebate on clinical spend. The CRO has been delivering clinical drug development services for international biotechs for FDA and EMA regulatory approval for the past 24 years. The company has been recognized for the past two consecutive years with the prestigious Frost & Sullivan CRO Best Practices Award and a finalist in Informa Pharma’s Best CRO award for 2022.

August 10, 2022 08:25 AM EDT

Editor's note

Who are the women blazing trails in biopharma R&D? Nominate them for Endpoints' 2022 special report

Nicole DeFeudis

Editor

Amber Tong

Senior Editor

Over the past three years, Endpoints News has spotlighted 60 women who have blazed trails and supercharged R&D across the biopharma world. And judging from the response we’ve received, to both our special reports and live events, telling their stories — including any obstacles they may have had to overcome — has inspired our readers in many different ways.

But change takes time, and the fact remains that women are still underrepresented at the upper ranks of the drug-making world.

August 10, 2022 07:33 AM EDTUpdated 54 minutes ago

Pharma

Updated: Amid massive restructuring, Biogen looks to reduce physical presence in Boston

Amber Tong

Senior Editor

Biogen is putting a sizable chunk of office and research space in Kendall Square and Weston, MA up for sublease, marking another big change as the biotech grapples with the aftershock of a disastrous and controversial rollout for its Alzheimer’s drug.

The subbleases are “part of Biogen’s overall implementation of the ‘Future of Work,’ which is allowing us to optimize our footprint and reduce the amount of space we occupy, taking into consideration new elements such as the hybrid work model,” Biogen spokesperson Ashleigh Koss wrote in a statement to Endpoints News, adding that the company has had subleases across several buildings for years.

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Experimental Drug Development Centre

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Illustration: Kim Ryu for Endpoints News

August 9, 2022 07:00 AM EDTUpdated 08:48 AM

R&D

In Focus

Why non-opioid pain drugs keep failing — and what's next for the field

Lei Lei Wu

News Reporter

In 1938, Rita Levi-Montalcini was forced to move her lab into her bedroom in Turin, as Mussolini’s facist government expelled Jewish people from studying or working in schools in Italy. Levi-Montalcini, then just a few years out of medical school and using sewing needles as scalpels in her makeshift lab, would soon discover nerve growth factor, or NGF, in chicken embryos.

Her discoveries formed the basis of our understanding of the peripheral nervous system and how cells talk to each other, and Levi-Montalcini went on to win the Nobel Prize in 1986. Much later, NGF was hailed as a promising target for new pain therapies, with some analysts quoting an $11 billion market. However, the latest anti-NGF candidate, Pfizer and Eli Lilly’s tanezumab, was rejected by the FDA last year because of a side effect that dissolved bone in some of its patients.

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Alessandro Maselli, Catalent CEO

August 10, 2022 12:50 PM EDTUpdated 01:37 PM

Deals

Manufacturing

Catalent acquires North Carolina CDMO for $475M, boosting oral solids work

Tyler Patchen

News Reporter

As Catalent has been expanding its reach in the US this year, as well as recently completing a C-suite shuffle, the company announced last night that it has acquired the CDMO Metrics Contract Services for $475 million from Mayne Pharma Group.

The acquisition will increase Catalent’s capabilities in oral solid formulation development, manufacturing and packaging as well as expand its capacity to handle more highly potent compounds.

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Craig Thompson, Cerevance CEO

August 9, 2022 08:01 AM EDTUpdated 11:02 AM

Deals

UPDATED: Merck makes first big splash for Alzheimer’s drug R&D since 2017 fail, inking research pact with Cerevance

Kyle LaHucik

Associate Editor

For the first time since discontinuing its late-stage Alzheimer’s program, Merck has found promise on the path forward in the memory-robbing disease.

After a Phase III flop of its drug verubecestat, the New Jersey Big Pharma axed the study in early 2018. More than four years later, the company is ready to sign up for another pact to test the waters of the befuddling disease.

This time, there’s $1.1 billion in biobucks on the line and a target that its partner says no other biopharma is looking at en route to finding the next treatment for Alzheimer’s, a neuroscience field that has hit hurdle after hurdle for decades.

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August 10, 2022 02:24 PM EDTUpdated 02:52 PM

Pharma

Pfizer launches rebate program for rare disease patients who have to stop taking Panzyga

Nicole DeFeudis

Editor

Pfizer is launching its second-ever rebate program, this time for Panzyga, its treatment for a rare neurological disease of the peripheral nerves.

The program began last month, according to STAT which first reported the news, and offers a refund of out-of-pocket costs for patients who must discontinue their course before the fifth treatment for “clinical reasons.”

Panzyga was approved back in 2018 to treat primary immunodeficiency (PI) in patients two years and older and chronic immune thrombocytopenia (cITP) in adults. It has since picked up an indication in chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP), a condition that’s characterized by weakness of the arms or legs, tingling or numbness, and a loss of deep tendon reflexes, according to the NIH.

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Horizon's back-to-school campaign for children with cystinosis includes an all about me poster as part of a care package box.

August 10, 2022 02:22 PM EDT

Pharma

Marketing

Horizon readies kids and families for back to school with weeklong activities around rare disease cystinosis

Beth Snyder Bulik

Senior Editor

Going back to school is usually a bumpy readjustment from summer freedom for all kids, but especially for kids with chronic health conditions. Horizon Therapeutics is hoping to help smooth the way for some who have the rare disease cystinosis. Cystinosis is a genetic disease that causes the amino acid cystine to build up in different tissues and organs.

The “Gear Up” for school campaign is running all week with different online and at-home events and activities for families and children with cystinosis. Each family who signed up receives a care package mailed to their home including an activity coloring book “Michael’s Show-and-Tell.” The book tells Michael’s story about living with cystinosis while offering kids matching, coloring and finding object games along with information.

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August 10, 2022 12:43 PM EDT

Pharma

Marketing

Pharmas spend millions on diabetes advertising, but few patients can recall brand names — survey

Beth Snyder Bulik

Senior Editor

While many Big Pharma diabetes brands spend millions of dollars on TV ads every year, most people with type 2 diabetes don’t recognize specific drug brand names, according to a new study.

No brand garnered more than 30% recognition in Phreesia Life Science’s latest in-office patient survey of more than 4,000 adults with type 2 diabetes. Eli Lilly’s Trulicity topped the list as the most recognized brand with 29% of those surveyed recalling it, followed by Boehringer Ingelheim and Lilly’s Jardiance at 27% and Merck’s Januvia and Novo Nordisk tying for the third spot with 24%. Meanwhile, 76% of the patients surveyed were familiar with the generic treatment metformin.

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