CHICA­GO — J&J will be look­ing to ex­pand its block­buster mar­ket for Zyti­ga (abi­raterone) af­ter post­ing stel­lar da­ta at AS­CO show­ing that the drug com­bined with stan­dard hor­mone ther­a­py reg­is­tered a ma­jor im­prove­ment in pro­gres­sion-free sur­vival among new­ly di­ag­nosed pa­tients with metasta­t­ic prostate can­cer.

The LAT­I­TUDE study da­ta demon­strat­ed that the com­bi­na­tion ther­a­py de­liv­ered an av­er­age stretch of 33 months with­out the dis­ease wors­en­ing, com­pared to 14.8 months for stan­dard hor­mone ther­a­py. Zyti­ga plus pred­nisone in com­bi­na­tion with ADT de­creased the risk of pro­gres­sion or death by 53% com­pared to place­bo plus ADT in pa­tients with mH­N­PC. And while over­all sur­vival was not reached yet for the Zyti­ga com­bo, the com­par­i­son arm came in at 34.7 months.

J&J $JNJ has been duk­ing it out with Pfiz­er’s Xtan­di — re­cent­ly ac­quired in the $14 bil­lion Medi­va­tion deal — in the area of prostate can­cer, where both drugs are cred­it­ed with a ma­jor im­prove­ment in the stan­dard of care for prostate can­cer.

The progress for J&J will like­ly be viewed as Pfiz­er’s loss. The phar­ma gi­ant has post­ed shrink­ing sales for Xtan­di since it com­plet­ed the buy­out. And its fol­low-on da­ta hasn’t been good.

Karim Fizazi, Uni­ver­si­ty Paris-Sud

Late last year Pfiz­er and its part­ners at Astel­las con­ced­ed that Xtan­di com­bined with Zyti­ga and pred­nisone failed to bend the curve on pro­gres­sion-free sur­vival for chemo-naïve pa­tients whose dis­ease had pro­gressed fol­low­ing treat­ment with Xtan­di, com­pared with a group of pa­tients treat­ed with Zyti­ga and pred­nisone alone. The in­ves­ti­ga­tors had been look­ing for a ra­tio­nale to con­tin­ue treat­ment with Xtan­di, which would have ex­pand­ed its block­buster mar­ket even fur­ther.

Said J&J’s prin­ci­pal in­ves­ti­ga­tor Dr. Karim Fizazi:

This is im­por­tant new in­for­ma­tion, as not all pa­tients re­spond well to the cur­rent stan­dard of care. LAT­I­TUDE sug­gests that abi­raterone ac­etate plus pred­nisone, in com­bi­na­tion with an­dro­gen de­pri­va­tion ther­a­py, can of­fer a new and much-need­ed op­tion for pa­tients with high-risk new­ly di­ag­nosed mH­N­PC.

The European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) recommended nine drugs for approval this week while also giving thumbs up for six expanded indications, including Novo Nordisk’s approved obesity medication Wegovy for younger people. Wegovy is already approved as an obesity treatment in the EU for adults, and the new indication would allow prescriptions for adolescents aged 12 and older.

The German life science group Sartorius will be picking up French contract manufacturer Polyplus for the price of €2.4 billion, or $2.6 billion.

On Friday, Sartorius announced the acquisition through its French subgroup, Sartorius Stedim Biotech, which will be acquiring Polyplus from private investors ARCHIMED and WP GG Holdings IV. Polyplus has 270 employees and produces materials and components that go into making viral vectors that are used in cell and gene therapies. This includes DNA/RNA reagents as well as plasmid DNA. Polyplus has locations in France, Belgium, China and the US.

RNA biotech GreenLight Biosciences has been handed an offer for potential acquisition.

GreenLight said in a release that it has received a non-binding “indication of interest” from Fall Line Endurance Fund to acquire GreenLight’s capital stock for $0.60 per share in cash. The release said any potential agreement between the two parties would depend on certain conditions.

Through a special committee, the biotech will evaluate the offer but added there’s no certainty a deal will go forward. GreenLight will also not make any more announcements until a deal comes through or “otherwise determines” a statement is necessary.

A public T cell biotech’s chief executive has decided to leave the company.

TScan Therapeutics said Friday morning that CEO David Southwell stepped down earlier this week, leaving both his chief executive and board member roles. Filling in is Gavin MacBeath, the company’s CSO and COO. He became the acting CEO on Tuesday, and will continue to remain CSO and COO, TScan’s announcement read.