The field of off-the-shelf cell ther­a­peu­tics is grow­ing, with the promise of quick­er, cheap­er, and eas­i­er to man­u­fac­ture ther­a­pies than the first gen­er­a­tion of au­tol­o­gous CAR-Ts that im­pressed with their po­ten­cy but fell short on adop­tion due to man­u­fac­tur­ing wob­bles. And Pre­ci­sion Bio­Sciences — which is us­ing its gene edit­ing tech­nol­o­gy to de­vel­op cell based im­munother­a­pies de­rived from healthy donors in­stead of the pa­tient — is plan­ning ahead. On Thurs­day, the com­pa­ny un­veiled a new Durham, NC fa­cil­i­ty ded­i­cat­ed to mak­ing its off-the-shelf CAR-T prod­ucts.

No­var­tis’ pi­o­neer­ing CAR-T drug — Kym­ri­ah — was ap­proved by the FDA amidst great fan­fare in 2017, but adop­tion was ham­pered by man­u­fac­tur­ing woes. No­var­tis lat­er added ca­pac­i­ty, hav­ing bought cell and gene ther­a­py man­u­fac­tur­er Cell­for­Cure. These prod­ucts re­quire enor­mous man­u­fac­tur­ing heft — mak­ers first iso­late cells from the pa­tient, ma­nip­u­late them in the lab by adding chimeric anti­gen re­cep­tors to di­rect T cells to snuff out can­cer cells and then re-in­fuse them back in­to the pa­tient.

Durham, North Car­oli­na-based Pre­ci­sion is hard­ly the first drug de­vel­op­er that has tak­en note of these chal­lenges. Take­da, for in­stance, which plans to take its off-the-shelf CAR-Ts in­to the clin­ic in 2021, is in the fi­nal stages of com­plet­ing its in-house man­u­fac­tur­ing fa­cil­i­ty in the Boston area, which is armed with the ca­pac­i­ty to sup­ply a range of clin­i­cal tri­als.

For Pre­ci­sion $DTIL, this new plant is part of a larg­er in­vest­ment in its can­cer im­munother­a­py plat­form and fa­cil­i­ties ex­pan­sions in North Car­oli­na this year.

“(W)e’ve known from the be­gin­ning that it was crit­i­cal for us to ad­dress the need for scal­able man­u­fac­tur­ing of cell-ther­a­py prod­ucts…” not­ed co-founder and chief Matt Kane in a state­ment.

“[The plant] al­so has the po­ten­tial to be a com­mer­cial launch fa­cil­i­ty with the ca­pac­i­ty to gen­er­ate up to 10,000 dos­es of CAR T cell ther­a­pies and 4,000 dos­es of gene ther­a­pies per year,” he added.

The drug de­vel­op­er is aim­ing to have its cer­ti­fi­ca­tions in place to be­gin man­u­fac­tur­ing in the fourth quar­ter — and plans to use the fa­cil­i­ty to cre­ate drug in­gre­di­ents for Phase I/II clin­i­cal tri­als sched­uled to be­gin next year.

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AbbVie is approaching the FDA with a new therapy to potentially treat Parkinson’s disease, using prodrugs of two medications commonly used for the condition.

The Big Pharma submitted its NDA for ABBV-951, a solution of levodopa and carbidopa prodrugs being evaluated in advanced Parkinson’s patients who don’t respond well to oral therapy, AbbVie announced Friday morning. Researchers are hoping a positive Phase III study that reads out in late October will help move things along quickly at the agency.

With atopic dermatitis rivals breathing down Dupixent’s neck, Sanofi and Regeneron on Friday secured a first win in new territory in what Sanofi’s head of immunology and inflammation Naimish Patel called the fastest approval he’s ever seen.

The FDA approved Dupixent on Friday to treat patients 12 years and older with eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE), an inflammatory condition that causes swelling and scarring of the esophagus. The approval came just a couple months after regulators granted Dupixent priority review, and months ahead of its PDUFA date on Aug. 3.

A Japanese conglomerate is making a big play in China with the opening of a new facility, as it continues to expand.

Fujifilm Irvine Scientific has opened its new Innovation and Collaboration Center in Suzhou New District, China, an area in Jiangsu province specifically designated for technological and industrial development.

According to Fujifilm, the 12,000-square-foot site will be responsible for the company’s cell culture media optimization, analysis and design services. Cell culture media itself often requires customization of formulas and protocols to achieve the desired quantity and quality of therapeutic desired. Fujifilm Irvine Scientific is offering these services from its headquarters in California and Japan to its customers globally, as well as in China now.

Aromatic amino acid decarboxylase (AADC) deficiency is an ultra-rare genetic disease that leaves patients unable to produce certain hormones in the brain, such as dopamine and serotonin, usually leading to developmental delays, weak muscle tone and inability to control the movement of the limbs. It can also lead to multiple organ failure.

To date, there have been no treatments approved for AADC deficiency, which has been identified in less than 150 patients.

Athersys’ stem cell therapy has failed yet again.

In a 206-person trial conducted in Japan, Athersys’ stem cell therapy for stroke failed its primary endpoint of “excellent outcome,” a combined measure of three stroke recovery scores.

While a greater percentage of patients in the treatment group reached the primary endpoint compared to placebo, that difference was not statistically significant.