AQEMIA’s Post

Stories making headlines today in the biopharma industry: Lilly CEO, David Ricks, has highlighted concerns regarding the potential ramifications of the $16.5 billion Novo Nordisk acquisition deal on the wider manufacturing industry. Adding to the ever-evolving bio-pharma landscape, venture capital fund, Scion Life Sciences, backed by former investors from OrbiMed, Apple Tree Partners, and Medicxi has successfully raised $310 million. The new funds are set to drive the creation of approximately six or seven biotech firms, aiming to shape a sustainable operating landscape akin to that of major players such as Regeneron or Vertex. I-Mab Biopharma is also set on redefining its structure, announcing plans to separate its US and China business operations to cater to cost reduction and risk mitigation strategies. This move will result in the establishment of a new entity, I-Mab Biopharma (Hangzhou), backed by local investors and steered by company founder, Jingwu Zang. In other news, Gilead Sciences is sharpening its focus on late-stage research and early development of its pipeline following a string of deals last year. The company’s strategic M&A decisions will be solely driven by scientific considerations, according to CEO Daniel O'Day. Elsewhere, neuroscience specialist Asa Abeliovich has launched Leal Therapeutics, raising an encouraging $39 million seed round to develop treatments for ALS and schizophrenia. Meanwhile, Denali Therapeutics released encouraging data showing potential clinical benefits for patients from its lead program. As the obesity market continues its upward trajectory, Amgen is making strides in the development of its experimental drug, MariTide. BridgeBio has also made headlines, securing a $100 million upfront deal with Kyowa Kirin to develop a skeletal disorder treatment. In a surprising move, Gilead has chosen not to proceed with the acquisition of oncology biotech firm Tizona. Lastly, Boston-based biotech gets a boost as Joshua Boger, founder of Vertex, joins as Chair and prepares the biotech for a mid-stage readout of a dementia drug. In the realm of AI, an AI firm specializing in supporting contract development and manufacturing organizations has successfully closed a $20M Series C fundraising round. #pharma #biotech #topstories #biodatastudio

New funding for building a leader in degrading circulating and membrane proteins: TOP 100 Swiss startup GlycoEra AG extends its Series A with Bristol Myers Squibb joining as new investor. Great news - we are congratulating the team of biotech entrepreneurs Greg Fralish, Tanmoy Ganguly, and Ganesh Kaundinya! https://lnkd.in/eTeVaKi8 Bristol Myers Squibb joins existing investors, including 5AM Ventures, Roche Venture Fund, and Sofinnova Partners, to advance GlycoEra's preclinical programs. About: GlycoEra AG is a development-stage biotechnology company building a pipeline of transformative medicines for the treatment of a range of autoimmune diseases. GlycoEra’s innovative platform enables high-throughput design and production of candidates for fast and deep degradation of pathogenic proteins. The company’s programs take advantage of selective and sustained removal of pathogenic proteins, which is highly relevant in a broad variety of additional settings, including oncology, neurology and infectious disease. GlycoEra AG was a laureate of the TOP 100 Swiss Startups in 2022 and 2023. #TOP100SSU #SwissStartups

📢$121 𝐌𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 Raised in 𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐁!💸 🔬Seismic Therapeutic confirmed yesterday they have raised $121 Million in a Series B funding round which was 20% over their expected total! The self proclaimed "Machine Learning Immunology Company" will use the funding to drive the progress of the company's primary two programs by achieving clinical proof-of-mechanism. Additionally, facilitate the ongoing expansion of the biologics pipeline and the growth of the IMPACT platform. 🤝Bessemer Venture Partners spearheaded the Series B funding round, joined by Amgen Ventures, Codon Capital, Alexandria Venture Investments, Gaingels, and GC&H. Existing investors, including Timothy A. Springer, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Polaris Partners, Boxer Capital, LLC, GV (Google Ventures), Samsara BioCapital, alongside management and founders, also participated in the round. 🗣Andrew Hedin of Bessemer Venture Partners will join the board of directors at Seismic and had the following the say.. “𝘚𝘦𝘪𝘴𝘮𝘪𝘤 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘮𝘢𝘥𝘦 𝘪𝘮𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘢 𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘵 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘰𝘸𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘦 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘥𝘦𝘦𝘱 𝘥𝘳𝘶𝘨 𝘥𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘱𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘴𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘸𝘰 𝘥𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘮𝘴, 𝘦𝘢𝘤𝘩 𝘰𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘦𝘭𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘰𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘶𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘢𝘥𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘶𝘯𝘮𝘦𝘵 𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘰𝘪𝘮𝘮𝘶𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘦𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘢 𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘸𝘢𝘺,”. 🎉Excellent news, big congratulations to the entire team over at Seismic Therapeutic, wishing them success with their biologics entering the clinic! Check out the full press release on their website - link below 🔽 #biotechnology #immunology #biologics #seriesb

#News: The #AI-enabled #biotechs Recursion and Exscientia have entered into a merger that will create a company with $850 million in cash and 10 upcoming #clinicalreadouts over the next 18 months, according to Thursday’s announcement. Both companies raised hundreds of millions of dollars when they went public in 2021 on the strength of technology designed to tackle long-standing drug development challenges. However, the share prices of both companies have fallen around 80% since the initial public offerings. Now, Recursion and Exscientia have concluded combining their capabilities is the best option. The resulting biotech, which will take Recursion’s name, will have a pipeline that could deliver 10 clinical readouts in the next 18 months. Recursion sees no competitive overlap between the pipelines, with its first-in-class #oncology, #raredisease and #infectiousdisease drug candidates covering different ground than Exscientia’s focus on best-in-class #cancertherapies. Together, Recursion and Exscientia had around $850 million in cash and cash equivalents at the end of the second quarter of 2024. By realizing estimated annual synergies of around $100 million, Recursion calculates the money can fund operations into 2027. Both companies have deals that may provide additional cash, including $200 million tied to milestones that could be achieved over the next two years. Recursion is partnered with Roche and Bayer. Exscientia has partnerships with Sanofi and Merck KGaA. Read more in BioSpace 👇🏼

VC investors from China and Hong Kong have backed the first close of a $21 million Series B round for Cambridge-based Life Science company CN Bio . Beijing-based Bayland Capital 康君资本 and founding shareholder CN Innovations Holdings Ltd from Hong Kong are to invest $10m and $5.5m, respectively. Other serial backers have reinvested. https://lnkd.in/eWSmHU_s The new money will enable CN Bio to expand product development and scale the organisation across key global markets to meet increased demand for Organ-on-a-Chip (OOC) solutions. CN Bio is a leading provider of single- and multi-organ microphysiological systems. The global OOC market’s CAGR is estimated at 30.94 per cent. CN Bio is delivering an ambitious expansion strategy to meet the increasing demand for its PhysioMimix® OOC technology and research services – and to provide deeper, clinically-relevant insights into early-stage preclinical drug discovery in a wider range of application areas, whilst reducing reliance on animal models. Dr Paul Brooks, CEO at CN Bio, said: “We are seeing pivotal growth across our industry, whereby drug developers are increasingly recognising the potential of OOC technology to augment, supplement and optimise their workflows. “We have strategically positioned ourselves accordingly to respond to the market needs and are proud to have received recognition from our major shareholder, CN Innovations, and new institutional investors such as Bayland Capital, to drive this vision forward.” Yuexing Su, Founding Partner, Bayland Capital, commented: “OOC technology is an exciting market with compelling opportunity for growth. CN Bio has taken key steps to build a team with extensive industry expertise and robust networks across the industry, with a longstanding track record of success.” Charles Chong, Managing Director, CN Innovations, added: “We are encouraged by CN Bio’s ongoing success and, in particular, the team’s achievements over the past years, during which conditions have been difficult in the broader economy. “In this time, key milestones have been met, not just for the Company, but also the wider industry – including CN Bio providing critical human-relevant compound efficacy data to support the FDA’s approval for Inipharm’s Phase 1 clinical trial for metabolic liver disease. “We are pleased to be supporting CN Bio again as it looks ahead and strengthens its future growth plans, of which, expanding its product portfolio in markets that hold huge impact for the industry, such as metabolic disease modelling and toxicology, will be key.”

#News: All roads lead to Rome, at least according to Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Innovation and Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS), who were amongst the investors in an oversubscribed #SeriesB extension financing in ROME Therapeutics. Joined by Eurofarma Ventures, Luma Group Investment Firm and Mirae Asset Capital, along with existing investors, including Sanofi Ventures and @Section 32, the addition of the two pharma giants brought in $72m in the extension. This brings the total funds raised in the Series B round to $149m. The Boston, US-based b#iotech was incubated by GV (Google Ventures), which remains an investor. The company aims to harness what is called the “dark genome” – the area of genetic code beyond traditional genes. This includes viral-like repetitive elements and non-coding sequences, though most of the function of this unexplored section of DNA is unknown. The biotech is targeting early clinical trials for its LINE-1 reverse transcriptase (RT) inhibitor – a viral-like protein. This includes a Phase I study of the drug candidate to evaluate safety, dosing, and proof of mechanism tests. Read more from Pharmaceutical Technology 👇🏼

Private Biotech investment is on the steady rise reaching new highs in April with $3.1 billion raised that is surpassing previous three months activity according to Labiotech.eu report (https://lnkd.in/gUY2_xc7). In terms of geography, Europe and Asia-Pacific are trailing US. Among specific therapeutic areas Biotech companies developing Oncology assets are attracting largest investment that went solely to US and Asia-Pacific regions. This brings a question if European Biotech companies developing Oncology drugs face some unique challenges despite a very active recent trend of M&A. During 2023 there was high activity involving European based Biotechs with oncology pipeline. Interest in ADCs drove a licensing deal between Synaffix and MacroGenics, followed by the acquisition of Synaffix by Lonza. In addition, radiopharmaceutical Biotech ITM Isotope Technologies Munich raised one of the largest private investment rounds in European Biotech in 2023. In 2024 MorphoSys was acquired by Novartis, RedX Pharma was acquired by Jazz Pharmaceuticals, and Autolus Therapeutics was acquired by Bio NTech SE in February. Interesting to follow trends for Europe and see if there is influence of fragmented nature of the EU healthcare market making drug adoption prediction complex, possibly more risk-averse approach of EU-based buyers, as well as evolution of global reimbursement market on financial dynamics of the EU Biotech activity. #Biotech #Europe #US #Asia-pacific #M&A #private funding #therapeutic focus #oncology #ADC #radiopharmaceuticals

Gene&Cell Therapy >> Former RayzeBio CEO quickly returns with new biotech; Amgen’s global research leader steps down: Ken Song Ken Song is back in business. He left RayzeBio in February after leading the radiopharmaceuticals startup from Series A to IPO in three years, and then a $4.1 billion exit to Bristol Myers Squibb just months after that Nasdaq debut. Now, he’s founder, chair and CEO of a new biotech called Candid Therapeutics, according to his LinkedIn. The roles started in May, according to his profile on the job networking site. The company is working on biologics in the autoimmune field, according to a job posting. With about two decades of leadership experience at biotech startups, a diagnostics company and a healthcare VC firm, Song is ready for his next post. “I’ve actually been looking at quite a few things already. I love that part of just building and pursuing innovation,” Song told Endpoints News in early March. “I’m usually not one to sit idle, so I have been looking at a fair number of different potential interesting opportunities on the company side. I’m unlikely to go back to being an investor.” It’s unclear who is funding Candid at this time. The RayzeBio deal led to a big payday for Song. The cash value of shares he and his family trust beneficially owned came out to $101 million, according to an SEC filing on Bristol Myers’ tender offer. He also had about $70 million in cash value from “in-the-money options,” according to the paperwork. — Kyle LaHucik Ray Deshaies → Amgen SVP of global research Ray Deshaies wrote on LinkedIn that Angela Coxon will take over his role on an interim basis. Coxon has been with Amgen since 1999 and spent the last three years as VP of discovery oncology research. In his LinkedIn post, Deshaies touched on some of the molecules that defined his tenure: the KRAS G12C drug sotorasib (now marketed as Lumakras), the obesity candidate MariTide and the siRNA heart drug olpasiran, among others. “Stepping down from my leadership role has led me to reflect on my time at Amgen over the past 7 years. This reflection has triggered two emotions: gratitude and pride,” he said. “It has been a tremendous privilege to have such an awesome set of colleagues as I have been blessed with at Amgen. It has been an experience — and opportunity — of a lifetime.” Eric Cox → As momentum builds with its Boehringer Ingelheim-partnered weight loss drugs, Zealand Pharma has selected Eric Cox as chief commercial officer. He begins on Aug. 5 and comes from Carmot Therapeutics, where he was VP, commercial strategy and business development. Roche’s $2.7 billion deal for Carmot is off to an auspicious start with early readouts for two obesity drugs, CT-388 and CT-996. Cox had a 16-year career with Merck before his appointment at AstraZeneca as US commercial franchise leader responsible for… #lucidquest #genetherapy #celltherapy

Alumis, an 𝐢𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 𝐛𝐢𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐜𝐡 on the cusp of 𝐏𝐡𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝟑, has secured $𝟐𝟓𝟎𝐌 𝐢𝐧 𝐚 𝐬𝐡𝐫𝐮𝐧𝐤𝐞𝐧 𝐈𝐏𝐎. The Bay Area startup sold 𝟏𝟑.𝟏𝟐 𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐭 $𝟏𝟔 𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡 to fund the late-stage testing of its lead 𝐓𝐘𝐊𝟐 𝐝𝐫𝐮𝐠, studies of a second asset in neuroinflammatory conditions, and preclinical projects. While the IPO was smaller than initially projected, an additional 𝟐.𝟓 𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐬 were sold in a concurrent private placement. With $𝟑𝟒𝟓 𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐝 toward clinical development, Alumis aims to create a next-gen immunology treatment, facing competition from Bristol Myers Squibb’s Sotyktu and Takeda’s TAK-279. Alumis has spent heavily on R&D, with $𝟏𝟑𝟕 𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐥𝐚𝐬𝐭 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐝 $𝟏𝟎𝟏 𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐧 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟐. The company, led by Martin Babler, hopes to buck the trend of biotechs trading below their IPO price. https://lnkd.in/eK_H6kda #Biotech #Immunology #IPO #Pharma #HealthcareInnovation

“As Fierce Pharma Virtual J.P. Morgan Week is unfolding following the #JPMHC24 Conference last week, Nanoform’s own CCO Christian Jones, FRSC participated in a panel on “Getting Your Molecule Thru the Clinic in Challenging Times – a View from Partner’s C-Suite” along top industry executives from Alcami, Seran and Ecolab. You can listen to the full panel for free here:  https://lnkd.in/d7p7Ks3Q And if you haven't registered do so first here: https://lnkd.in/gnA3ds7Q Christian's key takeaways on a great discussion with fellow CDMO leaders:   We see the need for speed is most pronounced in oncology, rare diseases and drug development, but we encourage partners with bioavailability issues to also spend time properly understanding their molecule and formulation at the early stages of development, because they won’t have time to optimise their formulation in the clinic. Time is critical, but investing some time early is equally important as it will save so much resource later and lead to an optimised and improved product that can move forward quickly. -- In 2023 we saw FDA approvals recover to pre-pandemic levels, and an uptick in biotech indices at year end too and I’m hopeful these positive trends will continue. I am concerned however that the focus on late-stage development, lifecycle management, and moving programmes to Phase 2 and licensing out to show ROI to Biotech investors in a challenging market may create an ‘innovation deficit’ in the early development pipeline, as that will cause an industry-wide headache later. With Nanoform's technologies we can increase the possibilities and the probabilities of success in early stage development to help bridge this gap whilst also support the growing trend for extending value with existing assets. -- We are in an industry that spends some $200 billion a year on R&D, yet get only around 50 drugs to market each year. The attrition rate isn’t altogether surprising given that we deal with very complex biologic systems, but the pandemic proved we can get a drug to market fast when needed, through collaboration. The true value of innovation is only realised through commercialisation, so there’s an enormous opportunity to work together to make more programmes successful, and in helping them reach market faster. __   To talk to Nanoform and see how we can add value to your early stage assets or to identify novel ways to create value in lifecycle management contact us at info@nanoform.com