On Thurs­day, three re­searchers an­nounced they had start­ed up a new im­munother­a­py biotech called LTZ Ther­a­peu­tics, short for “Lift To Zenith,” and launched with a mod­est raise they’re call­ing a “pre-Se­ries A.” In to­tal, it’s a $17 mil­lion round, led by K2 Ven­ture Part­ners and as­sist­ed by Qim­ing Ven­ture Part­ners and Tigermed.

Robert Li

There are few de­tails so far, but the com­pa­ny is mak­ing an ini­tial im­pres­sion thanks to a di­rect con­nec­tion to Genen­tech.

LTZ Ther­a­peu­tics, with of­fices in Chi­na, Cal­i­for­nia and Ger­many, has three co-founders: Robert Li, Jian­hui Zhou and Mar­tin Tred­er. Li, the CEO, has had a lengthy ca­reer in phar­ma, hav­ing worked for No­var­tis, Roche, Bris­tol My­ers Squibb and Genen­tech.

While at Genen­tech for five years, Li had worked his way up to im­munol­o­gy ther­a­peu­tic area lead, safe­ty as­sess­ment be­fore go­ing out to Vir Biotech­nol­o­gy, the Glax­o­SmithK­line part­ner known for their Covid-19 mon­o­clon­al an­ti­body sotro­vimab. And be­fore Li of­fi­cial­ly start­ed work­ing on form­ing LTZ back in Jan­u­ary, he was the CEO of Lin­ton­Pharm, a Chi­nese on­col­o­gy biotech.

Jian­hui Zhou

Li worked with Zhou at Genen­tech, who will now serve as the SVP of bi­o­log­ics dis­cov­ery and CTO at LTZ. Zhou spent eight years at the Roche sub­sidiary as a se­nior re­searcher, spe­cial­iz­ing in an­ti­body en­gi­neer­ing.

The fi­nal co-founder, Tred­er, has most re­cent­ly spent time as the CSO at mul­ti­ple biotechs in the last few years. While in­fo on his role at LTZ is yet un­con­firmed, Tred­er worked at Ar­ju­na Ther­a­peu­tics, Af­fimed and CT At­lantic. Af­fimed had pre­vi­ous­ly signed a deal with Genen­tech in 2018 to de­vel­op NK cell en­gagers for a whop­ping $5 bil­lion in mile­stones.

Tred­er left Af­fimed the fol­low­ing year to pur­sue oth­er op­por­tu­ni­ties, in­clud­ing a stint as an in­de­pen­dent con­sul­tant, be­fore join­ing Ar­ju­na in 2020.

Mar­tin Tred­er

Mem­bers of LTZ’s new sci­en­tif­ic ad­vi­so­ry board al­so have his­to­ry at Genen­tech, and LTZ named three of them: for­mer VP of pro­tein sci­ences Sarah Hy­mowitz, for­mer VP of re­search and ear­ly de­vel­op­ment Greg Cos­ma, and for­mer ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor of on­col­o­gy bio­mark­er de­vel­op­ment Lukas Am­ler.

De­spite the scant de­tails on com­pa­ny plans, here is what we know: The com­pa­ny is look­ing at can­cer as an ini­tial start­ing point — along with oth­er un­named dis­eases.

The biotech said in a state­ment that the funds from the fi­nanc­ing will be used to de­vel­op the com­pa­ny’s three-pronged plat­form, es­tab­lish its ini­tial pipeline and to fur­ther build LTZ’s op­er­a­tions team. That ‘three-pronged plat­form,’ Li said in a state­ment, is to re­duce im­muno­sup­pres­sion, re-pro­gram in­nate im­mu­ni­ty and mod­u­late adap­tive im­mu­ni­ty.

The EMA is putting EU member states on alert over the shortage of two drugs that counter heart attacks due to an uptick in demand.

On Friday, the EMA sent out a warning that two Boehringer Ingelheim drugs are experiencing a shortage: Actilyse and Metalyse. The drugs are used as emergency treatments for adults experiencing acute myocardial infarction, or a heart attack, by dissolving blood clots that have formed in the blood vessels.

Back in April, Amgen said it was encouraged by the solicitor general’s anticipated review of its Supreme Court petition to rehear a Repatha patent case. They’re likely much less optimistic about the outcome now.

Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar wrote in a recent 27-page brief that Amgen’s arguments “lack merit and further review is not warranted.”

The case traces back to a suit filed in 2014 against Sanofi and Regeneron’s Praluent, which ended up beating Amgen’s PCSK9 blockbuster Repatha to market by a month just a year later.

At Klick Health’s first Ideas Exchange conference with biotech and pharma industry insiders since before the pandemic began, it was no surprise many conversations included Covid topics. Yet while vaccines and treatments were discussed, so too were the effects on drug development, federal responses, health inequities — and what to do now and next.

George Yancopoulos, chief scientist and cofounder of Regeneron, opened the conference responding to a question from Acorda CEO Ron Cohen about the spotlight on the industry during Covid and some of the “flak” biopharma has taken in the past.

Almost a year after the FDA gave the green light to LA-based Aadi Bioscience’s first drug, the biotech is looking to private investors to keep itself going.

The oncology player announced Thursday that it has engaged with both new and existing investors in a PIPE financing — selling 3.3 million shares at $12.50 a share, the biotech’s closing price at Nasdaq on Wednesday. The company is also selling off pre-funded warrants to purchase over 2.4 million more shares at $12.4999 per pre-funded warrant.