Merck touts new data for breakthrough pneumococcal vaccine as it heads to PhIII trials

Heather Platt (Merck)

June 21, 2022 08:35 AM EDTUpdated June 23, 02:43 AM

Merck touts new data for breakthrough pneumococcal vaccine as it heads to PhIII trials

Paul Schloesser

Associate Editor

Two months after Merck’s pneumococcal vaccine candidate V116 won breakthrough therapy designation based on Phase I/II trial data, Merck is now starting to share data from that study — touting topline results as the Big Pharma pushes to Phase III clinical trials.

Merck reported Tuesday that V116 showed non-inferior and superior immune responses, depending on the serotype, in hundreds of adult patients in the Phase II portion of the study. For shared serotypes with Merck’s older vaccine, Pneumovax 23, the responses were non-inferior. But for those not in the older shot, responses were superior, Merck said.

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Paul Hudson, Sanofi CEO (Cyril Marcilhacy/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

June 30, 2022 07:13 AM EDTUpdated 07:26 AM

R&D

FDA+

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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July 2, 2022 06:00 AM EDT

Weekly

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

July 1, 2022 11:13 AM EDTUpdated 11:23 AM

People

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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ENDPOINTS CAREERS

Director of Quality Assurance

ImmunityBio

Dunkirk, NY, USA

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July 1, 2022 09:43 AM EDT

#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's taking social media followers around the globe as it introduces the many different

July 1, 2022 12:47 PM EDT

Pharma

Marketing

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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Credit: Shutterstock

July 1, 2022 12:18 PM EDT

Pharma

Marketing

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)

July 1, 2022 11:34 AM EDT

Pharma

Marketing

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.

ENDPOINTS CAREERS

Product Sales Manager

ImmunityBio

Remote

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June 30, 2022 11:34 AM EDT

Pharma

Manufacturing

Novartis to resume the production of two radioligand therapies after resolving quality issues

Tyler Patchen

News Reporter

Earlier this year, Novartis touted its radioligand as a major piece to counter competition in the cancer space. However, the physical production of its products has had anything but a smooth ride.

In May, Novartis had to suspend production of Lutathera and Pluvicto, its two primary radiotherapies. According to the company, this was done out of an abundance of caution as a result of potential quality issues identified in its manufacturing. The production suspension impacts the commercial and clinical trial supply of the products.

June 30, 2022 10:49 AM EDT

Pharma

Marketing

Roche, Pfizer top list of ESG leaders in patient groups' view, but many still think pharmas can do better

Beth Snyder Bulik

Senior Editor

The rise of pharma environmental, social and governance (ESG) efforts in the past two years has been meteoric as investors turn their attention to sustainable funding. However, investors aren’t the only ones watching. Patients are beginning to tune into pharmas’ ESG promises too.

Patient advocacy groups familiar with ESG regard it as an important issue and want to be included in helping pharma companies set ESG policies and targets, according to a new report from PatientView. That’s quite different from what the investment community wants across a variety of Gartner’s defined financial, competitive, strategic and perception goals.