Genen­tech team does some cut­ting-edge work on a new class of an­tibi­otics — here's why that's im­por­tant

One of my many mantras about R&D is that Big Phar­ma large­ly bowed out of ba­sic an­tibi­ot­ic re­search to fo­cus on more prof­itable ven­tures — leav­ing the field most­ly to small­er biotech play­ers which have been field­ing some of the new play­ers with mar­gin­al com­mer­cial po­ten­tial.

And now Genen­tech wants to spoil that meme.

A dis­cov­ery team at Roche’s big biotech op­er­a­tion has been work­ing on a new an­tibi­ot­ic for gram-neg­a­tive bac­te­ria. And now they have a pre­clin­i­cal can­di­date they say has re­al po­ten­tial to go on to be­come the first break­through in that field in more than half a cen­tu­ry.

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