In lieu of hard M&A news, one group of analysts crunches the numbers around a $40B Seagen buy
Some of the analysts at SVB Securities have been playing with the numbers that might set the stage for Merck $MRK — or some other Big Pharma — to come in and make a buyout of Seagen $SGEN work. And while it’s all pure speculation, it does help provide a rough outline for what a deal could look like in H2 as investors wait with bated breath for the bottom of a miserable public biotech market.
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Paul Hudson, Sanofi CEO (Cyril Marcilhacy/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
FDA sidelines Paul Hudson's $3.7B MS drug after establishing link to liver damage
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
One of Sanofi CEO Paul Hudson’s top picks in the pipeline — picked up in a $3.7 billion buyout 2 years ago — has just been sidelined in the US by a safety issue.
The pharma giant put out word early Thursday that the FDA has put their Phase III studies of tolebrutinib in multiple sclerosis and myasthenia gravis on partial clinical hold, halting enrollment and suspending dosing for patients who have been on the drug for less than 60 days. Patients who have completed at least 60 days of treatment can continue therapy as researchers explore a “limited” — but unspecified in Sanofi’s statement — number of cases of liver injury.
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Pharma reacts to post-Roe; Drugmakers beef up cyber defense; Boehringer, Roche quietly axe drugs; and more
Amber Tong
Senior Editor
Welcome back to Endpoints Weekly, your review of the week’s top biopharma headlines. Want this in your inbox every Saturday morning? Current Endpoints readers can visit their reader profile to add Endpoints Weekly. New to Endpoints? Sign up here.
As a reminder, we are off on Monday for the Fourth of July. I hope this recap will kick off your (long) weekend well and that the rest of it will be just what you need. See you next week for a shortened edition!
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Eric Hughes, incoming Teva EVP of global R&D and CMO
Teva chief raids Vertex for his new global head of research and development
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
Teva CEO Kåre Schultz has found his new R&D chief and CMO in Vertex’s ranks.
The global generics giant, which has some 3,500 staffers in the R&D group, has named Eric Hughes to the top research spot in the company. He’ll be replacing Hafrun Fridriksdottir, who held the role for close to five years, on Aug. 1.
Hughes hasn’t been at Vertex for long, though. He jumped from Novartis less than a year ago, after heading the immunology, hepatology & dermatology global development unit. Before that, he completed a five-year stint as head of early clinical research for the specialty discovery medicine department in the exploratory clinical & translational research group at Bristol Myers Squibb, according to his LinkedIn profile.
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#BIO22: Managing a biotech in turbulent times. 'There's a perfect shitshow out there'
John Carroll
Editor & Founder
On Tuesday, June 14, Endpoints News EIC John Carroll sat down with a group of biotech execs to discuss the bear market for industry stocks and how they were dealing with it. Here’s the conversation, which has been lightly edited for brevity.
Martin Meeson, sponsor opening:
Thank you, John. Hello everyone. My name’s Martin Meeson, I’m the CEO of Fujifilm Diosynth. For those of you who don’t know Fujifilm Diosynth, we operate in the development of clinical and commercial product scale up, we have facilities in Europe and the US, and around about 4,000 employees. We run on average about 150 programs, so when it comes to managing in turbulent times over the last two years, we’ve had quite a lot of experience of that. Not just keeping the clinical pipelines and the commercial pipelines open, but also our response to the pandemic and the molecules that we’ve had within there. One of the phrases that I coined probably about a year ago when we were talking at JP Morgan, was I talked about managing through turbulent times. Well, it’s become the fact that we are not managing and leading through these times, we are managing in them, which is why that’s really the purpose of and the topic that we’ve got today.
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Amgen sells its Turkish manufacturing arm for $135M
Tyler Patchen
News Reporter
Pharma giant Amgen has decided to sell off its Turkish manufacturing arm for nine figures.
The Eczacıbaşı Group has acquired Gensenta from the California-based pharma. The deal will see Eczacıbaşı pay $135 million for a 99.96% stake in the company. The purchase of Gensenta will be finalized after it gets approval from the Turkish Competition Authority.
According to Eczacıbaşı, Amgen Turkey will continue to keep its operations running and serve its customers.
Amgen's taking social media followers around the globe as it introduces the many different
From Tampa to Munich, Amgen’s ‘Places’ campaign introduces its locations around the world
Beth Snyder Bulik
Senior Editor
Amgen is taking social media followers around the world with its latest corporate campaign. Called “Places of Amgen,” the twice monthly posts highlight the biopharma’s different offices and sites – and the people who work there.
Each post runs on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram with details about the work Amgen does in that location, when it was established, comments from people who work there and other interesting facts. The most recent one about Paris, France, for example, notes that Amgen France last year signed a French association charter committed to the inclusion of LBGT+ people in the workplace.
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On Friday, Lonza announced plans to construct a large-scale commercial drug product fill and finish facility in the town of Stein, Switzerland.
Lonza to invest $500M+ on fill-finish facility on its home turf
Tyler Patchen
News Reporter
Lonza has been expanding its reach across the globe, bringing sites in China and the US online this year, but now they are looking closer to home for their next major investment.
The Swiss manufacturer on Friday announced plans to construct a large-scale commercial drug fill and finish facility in the town of Stein, Switzerland. The new facility will be delivered through an investment of approximately CHF 500 million, or $519 million, and is expected to be completed in 2026. The facility will also be constructed on the same campus as Lonza’s current clinical drug product facility.
Biohaven takes migraine campaign to patients' Twitter feeds, months ahead of Pfizer takeover
Nicole DeFeudis
Editor
Two weeks ago, Biohaven hit an all-time high in weekly Nurtec prescriptions. CEO Vlad Coric attributes at least some of that success to a new interactive Twitter campaign that encourages patients to free their feed of potential migraine triggers.
Earlier this month, Biohaven in partnership with Twitter launched the #RelieveYourFeed campaign that allows users to customize their app settings based on their migraine triggers.
Oncologists on Twitter are talking up ASCO studies, health equity and burnout, according to new deep dive research from Harris Poll (via Shutterstock)
What’s been on influential oncologists' minds? Mostly ASCO, but also health equity, according to new Harris Poll research
Beth Snyder Bulik
Senior Editor
Over the past few months, oncologists have been talking a lot about the ASCO conference. Not surprising considering its import and the study data presented, but what may be less expected is the second most talked about topic of health equity.
That’s according to data from The Harris Poll and the new expert network the researcher is building out. While the company has been doing deep data dives into specific health issues or conditions for pharma clients, it’s now monitoring influencer networks of therapy area specialists to find out what experts are really thinking about.
