Doing deals in a time of coronavirus: Biotech CEO Bill Haney says 'you focus on the things that make a difference'
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
Bill Haney counts his blessings where he finds them these days.
As CEO of two biotechs — Skyhawk and Dragonfly — he’s had a front row seat to watch the “dramatic” impact the pandemic can have on operations. But he’s quick to offer thanks that no one in his two companies — or their families — have yet to be infected.
Yet.
“We know this challenge is coming for people we care about, and we’re concerned about that,” says Haney.
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January 17, 2022 06:00 AM EST
ZS Perspective: 3 Predictions on the Future of Cell & Gene Therapies
Ben Hohn
The field of cell and gene therapies (C>s) has seen a renaissance, with first generation commercial therapies such as Kymriah, Yescarta, and Luxturna laying the groundwork for an incoming wave of potentially transformative C>s that aim to address diverse disease areas. With this renaissance comes several potential opportunities, of which we discuss three predictions below.
Allogenic Natural Killer (NK) Cells have the potential to displace current Cell Therapies in oncology if proven durable.
Despite being early in development, Allogenic NKs are proving to be an attractive new treatment paradigm in oncology. The question of durability of response with allogenic therapies is still an unknown. Fate Therapeutics’ recent phase 1 data for FT516 showed relatively quicker relapses vs already approved autologous CAR-Ts. However, other manufacturers, like Allogene for their allogenic CAR-T therapy ALLO-501A, are exploring novel lymphodepletion approaches to improve persistence of allogenic cells. Nevertheless, allogenic NKs demonstrate a strong value proposition relative to their T cell counterparts due to comparable response rates (so far) combined with the added advantage of a significantly safer AE profile. Specifically, little to no risk of graft versus host disease (GvHD), cytotoxic release syndrome (CRS), and neurotoxicity (NT) have been seen so far with allogenic NK cells (Fig. 1). In addition, being able to harness an allogenic cell source gives way to operational advantages as “off-the-shelf” products provide improved turnaround time (TAT), scalability, and potentially reduced cost. NKs are currently in development for a variety of overlapping hematological indications with chimeric antigen receptor T cells (CAR-Ts) today, and the question remains to what extent they will disrupt the current cell therapy landscape. Click for more details.
What kind of biotech startup wins a $3B syndicate, woos a gallery of marquee scientists and recruits GSK's Hal Barron as CEO in a stunner? Let Rick Klausner explain
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
It started with a question about a lifetime’s dream on a walk with tech investor Yuri Milner.
At the beginning of the great pandemic, former NCI chief and inveterate biotech entrepreneur Rick Klausner and the Facebook billionaire would traipse Los Altos Hills in Silicon Valley Saturday mornings and talk about ideas.
Milner’s question on one of those mornings on foot: “What do you want to do?”
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GSK R&D chief Hal Barron jumps ship to run a $3B biotech startup, Tony Wood tapped to replace him
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
In a stunning switch, GlaxoSmithKline put out word early Wednesday that R&D chief Hal Barron is exiting the company after 4 years — a relatively brief run for the man chosen by CEO Emma Walmsley in late 2017 to turn around the slow-footed pharma giant.
Barron is being replaced by Tony Wood, a close associate of Barron’s who’s taking one of the top jobs in Big Pharma R&D. He’ll be closer to home, though, for GSK. Barron has been running a UK and Philadelphia-based research organization from his perch in San Francisco.
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FDA+ roundup: FDA's neuroscience deputy departs amid ongoing Aduhelm investigations; Califf on the ropes?
Zachary Brennan
Senior Editor
Amid increased scrutiny into the close ties between FDA and Biogen prior to the controversial accelerated approval of Aduhelm, the deputy director of the FDA’s office of neuroscience has called it quits after more than two decades at the agency.
Eric Bastings will now take over as VP of development strategy at Ionis Pharmaceuticals, the company said Wednesday, where he will provide senior clinical and regulatory leadership in support of Ionis’ pipeline.
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Secondary patents prove to be key in biosimilar blocking strategies, researchers find
Zachary Brennan
Senior Editor
While the US biosimilars industry has generally been a disappointment since its inception, with FDA approving 33 biosimilars since 2015, just a fraction of those have immediately followed their approvals with launches. And more than a handful of biosimilars for two of the biggest blockbusters of all time — AbbVie’s Humira and Amgen’s Enbrel — remain approved by FDA but still have not launched because of legal settlements.
Billionaires Chamath Palihapitiya and Pablo Legorreta hatch an $825M SPAC for cell therapy biotech
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
Three years after Royalty Pharma chief Pablo Legorreta led a group of investors to buy up a pair of biotechs and create a new startup called ProKidney, the biotech is jumping straight into an $825 million public shell created by SPAC king and tech billionaire Chamath Palihapitiya.
ProKidney was founded 6 years ago but really got going at the beginning of 2019 with the $62 million acquisition of inRegen, which was working on an autologous — from the patient — cell therapy for kidney disease. After extracting kidney cells from patients, researchers expand the cells in the lab and then inject them back into patients, aiming to restore the kidneys of patients suffering from CKD.
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CBO: Medicare negotiations will hamper drug development more than previously thought
Zachary Brennan
Senior Editor
As President Biden’s Build Back Better Act — and, with it, potentially the Democrats’ last shot at major drug pricing reforms in the foreseeable future — remains on life support, the Congressional Budget Office isn’t helping their case.
The CBO last week released a new slide deck, outlining an update to its model on how Medicare negotiations might take a bite out of new drugs making it to market. The new model estimates a 10% long-term reduction in the number of new drugs, whereas a previous CBO report from August estimated that 8% fewer new drugs will enter the market over 30 years.
FDA orders DMD trial halt, raising questions about a whole class of promising drugs
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
Dyne Therapeutics’ stock took a nasty hit this morning after the biotech put out word that the FDA had slapped a clinical hold on their top program for Duchenne muscular dystrophy. And now speculation is bouncing around Biotwitter that there could be a class effect at work here that would implicate other drug developers in the freeze.
Dyne execs didn’t have a whole lot to say about why the FDA sidelined their IND for DYNE-251 in DMD while “requesting additional clinical and non-clinical information for” the drug.
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UCB buys its way to epilepsy showdown with Jazz with $1.9B Zogenix acquisition
Amber Tong
Senior Editor
Zogenix’s epilepsy drug Fintepla may only have brought in around $100 million of sales in its first year, but UCB clearly believes it can go much, much higher.
The Belgian pharma has inked a $1.9 billion deal to buy out Zogenix, paying $26 per share in cash and offering a contingent value right worth $2 more per share if Fintepla lands an extra EU approval by the end of 2023.
But even the upfront marks a 72% premium to California-based Zogenix’s shares, which were trading just north of $15 on Tuesday.
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