Top ALK expert and cancer drug researcher Alice Shaw bids adieu to academia, hello to Novartis
Jay Bradner has recruited a marquee oncology drug researcher into the ranks of the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research. Alice Shaw is jumping from prestigious posts intertwined through Mass General, Harvard and Dana-Farber to take the lead of NIBR’s translational clinical oncology group.
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January 14, 2020 08:32 AM EST
Ted W. Love, M.D.
Turning the corner on treating the root cause of sickle cell disease
Early in my career, as a medical resident, I saw first-hand the enormous challenges faced by children and adults with sickle cell disease (SCD), a genetic blood disorder that historically has lacked adequate treatment options. People living with this life-long disease are mainly those with ancestors from sub-Saharan Africa, as well as people of Hispanic, South Asian, Southern European and Middle Eastern descent. These patients suffer from devastating physical symptoms, including progressive, eventually fatal, organ damage and excruciating pain. In addition, they encounter emotional, mental and social burdens – non-physical aspects of living with SCD that also take a serious toll on patients and their caregivers.
Revolution Med shoots for $100M+ IPO — and divulges some secrets about that Warp Drive buyout
Biotech investors who like to wager on the race to the front of the KRAS market now have a new team to consider.
Revolution Medicines, which extended its reach on RAS with a deal to acquire Warp Drive Bio about 18 months ago, filed their S-1 in search of $100 million-plus. And they gave up a few secrets in the process.
The main clinical claim to fame that Revolution has centers on the SHP2 inhibitor RMC-4630, partnered with Sanofi back in the summer of 2018 — just after John Reed was named the incoming R&D chief. We already knew that the pharma giant handed over $50 million in cash plus a commitment of hundreds of millions more to align itself with Revolution as it makes a fresh foray into oncology. Now we know that Sanofi is also footing 80% of Revolution’s R&D bill on the program, while setting up a smorgasbord of $235 million in development milestones and $285 million in commercial bonuses.
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January 13, 2020 07:47 AM EST
Parexel Biotech
Essential criteria biopharmaceutical investors seek when evaluating compounds and companies
Currently, 81 percent of the biopharmaceutical projects in the global development pipeline are owned by small-to mid-sized companies*. These emerging companies have many challenges in furthering their development of new and exciting projects. Whether a company seeks to out-license, commercialize a compound, or position itself for acquisition, success often depends on investments. These investments can come from fully integrated pharmaceutical companies and/or venture capitalists. And, ultimately, the company’s success in securing investment can mean the development of new treatments for the patients who need them most.
Compound investment: attributes investors value the most
While clinical performance (safety and efficacy) is by far the most important investment attribute for both large biopharmaceutical companies and venture capitalists, there are differences in how they consider other compound attributes.
#JPM20: 'The NPV is always wrong.' Takeda preps another spinout — this time on psych
Editor’s Note: Endpoints News is reporting live from #JPM20 after kicking things off with an action-packed event, which you can replay here. What follows is a stream of tidbits we have collected while wandering around Union Square in San Francisco. Check back in throughout the week for updates by John Carroll and Jason Mast.
SAN FRANCISCO — A year ago Takeda CEO Christophe Weber and R&D chief Andy Plump arrived at JP Morgan right on the heels of closing their big Shire buyout. Now they’re back after shaking up the portfolio, boosting R&D spending by about 50% to $4.5 billion and adjusting the pipeline — a task which isn’t quite finished yet.
#JPM20 exclusive: Olivier Brandicourt follows the Big Pharma CEO path to private equity, joining Blackstone ahead of a mammoth fund debut
Nick Galakatos Blackstone
Seven months after Olivier Brandicourt’s surprise “early retirement” from Sanofi, he’s back in the game, this time taking meetings at JP Morgan to discuss his new role at Blackstone, where he’s quietly begun work with Nick Galakatos and the life sciences crew.
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Video Replay: Endpoints at #JPM20 — newsmakers on dealmaking, pricing and manufacturing
On Monday, we held our fourth annual #JPM event — and the team hit a key milestone that I’d like to share with the entire Endpoints News audience: We live-streamed the conversation and had nearly triple the number of executives watching online than we had in the sold-out crowd of 320.
For a media company on a mission to connect the biopharma world in bigger and better ways, we’re proud of how we were able to extend the reach of our franchise event. Paid subscribers were given access to the stream in real time, and now, two days later, we’re opening it up to everyone in this post.
Nick Leschly at Endpoints News' panel at the 2020 JP Morgan Healthcare Conference. Credit: Jeff Rumans
At #JPM20, two CEOs, two radically different therapies, and a fight to chase down sickle cell
SAN FRANCISCO – Few CEOs tell a story better than bluebird’s Nick Leschly.
He cuts a Jeff Bezos figure on stage at the Colonial Room, the JP Morgan presentation hall for A-list biotechs: lean and bald, fast-talking and vest-wearing. He explains in simple language, apologizing when he has to brush on the data. It helps that he has a good story to tell.
“We treated them one time,” Leschly tells a packed crowd, gesturing to the slide behind him. “Look what happened.”
The slide shows 9 horizontal bars studded with diamonds. Each bar, he explained, represented a sickle cell patient, and each diamond represented a severe medical event, such as a pain crisis. The diamonds stud one side – before the therapy – and vanish on the other, afterward.
“A 99% reduction in these events — this is a functional cure for sickle cell disease,” Leschly says. “This is unprecedented data.”
Upstairs and an hour later, Ted Love stands before a narrow conference room in his suit and polka-dot tie. Love, the CEO of Global Blood Therapeutics, is a 60-year-old physician. His voice trails off at the end of sentences, and the story he tells is less compelling. There are no cured patients.
“This is the first drug that addresses the root cause of sickle cell disease,” Love says, speaking in front of a slide showing a white pill bottle for GBT’s new drug Oxbryta. “Right in the label, it says that this drug inhibits polymerization.”
In the 60 years after scientists discovered the cause of sickle cell, almost no treatments emerged, even as the condition debilitated hundreds of thousands of Americans, most of them black or Hispanic. But the last few years have seen a resurgence of interest as new technologies have made the disease seem newly beatable.
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China’s fourth richest man takes a back seat at the top drugmaker he built
After spending the past 30 years transforming Jiangsu Hengrui Medicines from just another manufacturer of dirt cheap over-the-counter pills to a top 25 global biopharma player, Piaoyang Sun is taking a step back.
The billionaire is handing over the chairman role to Zhou Yunshu, his right-hand man and president of the company, Hengrui said in a statement. But Sun will stay on the board and continue to lead the strategy committee.
Novo Nordisk's blockbuster Ozempic wins FDA label boost with CV indication
Novo Nordisk’s blockbuster weekly injectable formulation of semaglutide — Ozempic — has secured an even more formidable label. Apart from its ability to stimulate insulin production in patients with diabetes, the FDA has now also endorsed its ability to reduce the risk of major adverse cardiovascular events.
Patients with diabetes are often afflicted with other comorbidities, such as obesity, CV disease, and kidney problems. Diabetes drugmakers have been clamoring for a broader market share by differentiating their drugs on the basis of therapeutic impact on these intersecting indications — but the major, most lucrative battleground is the heart.
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