Here are the latest stories being discussed in biopharma today:
Heading: Healthcare Market News
Content:
1. Umoja Biopharma has secured two deals with AbbVie for its in vivo CAR-T cell therapy programs. AbbVie has the option to license Umoja’s lead program, a CD19-directed therapy for blood cancers, and will collaborate with Umoja to develop up to four in vivo CAR-T therapy candidates. If all milestones are reached, Umoja could receive up to $1.44 billion plus sales milestones and royalties.
2. Novo Nordisk and Flagship Pioneering have announced new research partnerships in the field of cardiometabolic diseases. The first two projects will involve Omega Therapeutics, which will work on an mRNA therapeutic for obesity, and Cellarity, which will develop a small molecule for metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis.
3. Moonwalk Biosciences, co-founded by CRISPR pioneer Feng Zhang, has secured $57 million in funding for its epigenetics platform and preclinical pipeline. The funding round was led by Alpha Wave Ventures with support from ARCH Venture Partners, Future Ventures, GV, Khosla Ventures, and YK Bioventures.
4. Former Merck R&D head, Roger Perlmutter, has shared his insights on the biggest problem in Big Pharma, his decision to leave Merck, and the process of building Eikon Therapeutics.
5. TCGX has raised $1 billion for its second investment round as it adjusts its focus towards public biotech investments due to the changing biotech funding landscape.
6. Lyndra Therapeutics’ schizophrenia drug LYN-005 has achieved its Phase III trial endpoints. A single dose of the once-weekly risperidone formulation is shown to deliver comparable medication levels to daily risperidone.
7. After successfully meeting interim Phase III endpoints for its oral weekly risperidone, Lyndra Therapeutics is preparing for a final registrational study. The six-month double-blind trial aims to validate the safety of Lyndra’s LYNX drug delivery platform in schizophrenia patients. The trial is scheduled to start in the second half of the year.
