Novartis spinout resTORbio is grappling with the collapse of its lead clinical program this morning — an anti-aging R&D failure that will badly damage their rep in the field.
Unlock this story instantly and join 154,100+ biopharma pros reading Endpoints daily — and it's free.
In the context of today’s global economic environment, there is an increasing need to work smarter, faster and leaner across all facets of the life sciences industry. This is particularly true for small and mid-sized biotech companies, many of which are facing declining valuations and competing for increasingly limited funding to propel their science forward. It is important to recognize that within this framework, many of these smaller companies already find themselves resource-challenged to design and manage clinical studies themselves because they don’t have large teams or in-house experts in navigating the various aspects of the drug development journey. This can be particularly challenging for the most complex and difficult to treat diseases where no previous pathway exists and patients are urgently awaiting breakthroughs.
Gossamer Bio $GOSS posted a statistically significant improvement for its primary endpoint in the key Phase II TORREY trial for lead drug seralutinib on Tuesday morning. But CEO Faheem Hasnain has some explaining to do on the important secondary of the crucial six-minute walk distance test — which will be the primary endpoint in Phase III — as the data on both endpoints fell short of expectations, missing one analyst’s bar on even modest success.
Unlock this article along with other benefits by subscribing to one of our paid plans.
Kristen Hege leads Bristol Myers Squibb’s early oncology discovery program carrying on from the same work at Celgene, which was acquired by BMS in 2019. She’s known for her early work in CAR-T, having pioneered the first CAR-T cell trial for solid tumors more than 25 years ago.
However, the eminent physician-scientist is more than just a drug developer mastermind. She’s also a practicing physician, mother to two young women, an avid backpacker and intersecting all those interests — a champion of young women and people of color in STEM and life sciences.
Unlock this article along with other benefits by subscribing to one of our paid plans.
When Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk tweeted this weekend, “Just a note to thank advertisers for returning to Twitter,” he likely wasn’t talking about big pharma companies. The vast majority of the top spending pharma advertisers had not returned last week, according to updated tracking data Pathmatic for Endpoints News.
Only three pharma advertisers spent any money at all, which is about the same as the past several weeks. AstraZeneca rejoined the active advertiser list, although at $700 spent hardly worth a personal Musk expression of gratitude. GSK remained active with $3,500 spent ad much lower than its previous spending, according to the Pathmatics data. Only Bayer spent any significant amount in advertising, with $244,000 spent last week, but that’s a considerable drop from almost $500,000 spent on OTC, prescription and corporate Twitter ads in each of the previous two weeks.
Unlock this story instantly and join 154,100+ biopharma pros reading Endpoints daily — and it's free.
Affinia Therapeutics has ditched its plans to go public in a relatively closed-door market that has not favored Nasdaq debuts for the drug development industry most of this year. A pandemic surge in 2020 and 2021 opened the doors for many preclinical startups, which caught Affinia’s attention and gave the gene therapy biotech confidence in the beginning days of 2022 to send in its S-1.
But on Friday, Affinia threw in the S-1 towel and concluded now is not the time to step onto Wall Street. The biotech has put out few public announcements since the spring of this year. Endpoints News picked the startup as one of its 11 biotechs to watch last year.
Unlock this story instantly and join 154,100+ biopharma pros reading Endpoints daily — and it's free.
After hitting a dead end with Summit Therapeutics’ lead program, Bob Duggan has found the drug that he believes will usher into a compelling second act. So compelling, in fact, that it involves $500 million cash — and he’s taking money out of his own pocket to fund the deal.
Striking a partnership with Akeso Therapeutics out of China, Summit is bringing in a bispecific antibody that blocks both PD-1 and VEGF called ivonescimab. Akeso, which has a PD-1/CTLA-4 bispecific approved in China, has already taken ivonescimab into multiple clinical trials, including a Phase III in lung cancer.
Unlock this story instantly and join 154,100+ biopharma pros reading Endpoints daily — and it's free.
One company is moving forward in its bid to make a cell therapy for sickle cell disease viable — and after previous setbacks, including a hold earlier this year, execs are touting some really early data.
Editas Medicine announced Tuesday morning that it had positive safety and efficacy data from two patients in a Phase I/II trial investigating EDIT-301, a cell therapy candidate that Editas developed. Safety was measured in both patients, and efficacy data are from only the first patient dosed.
Unlock this story instantly and join 154,100+ biopharma pros reading Endpoints daily — and it's free.
HotSpot Therapeutics has managed to gain some steam financially in the past few years, as the company wrangled several multi-million dollar raises. But its latest deal not only puts more cash into its pockets, it also connects with a major name in pharma.
On Tuesday, AbbVie and HotSpot announced they have entered an “exclusive” global collaboration, with the option to license HotSpot’s IRF5 program, which is designed to treat autoimmune diseases. The deal will see AbbVie hand HotSpot $40 million upfront, with the biotech eligible to receive $295 million in “option fees” and R&D milestones.
Compugen presented a batch of data from early-stage trials of its anti-PVRIG candidate in dual and triple combination studies, including one with an anti-TIGIT therapy, but the pairings are no longer part of the biotech’s strategy after it recently axed a yearslong Bristol Myers Squibb collaboration.
And, for a brief period this fall, the indication was not a focus of the biotech’s future development plans, but Tuesday’s data are enough to shore up confidence for another study in platinum resistant ovarian cancer, the Holon, Israel-based drug developer said Tuesday.