Evotec SE booked reorganisation costs of €62.3 million in the first nine months of 2024 in its ongoing effort to readjust its business model as a service company for the biopharmaceutical industry. The changes have been underway since January and the departure of Werner Lanthaler, the former chief executive. They affect the company’s global business in drug discovery and development as well as certain manufacturing activities.
Novartis more than doubled its operating income in IFRS terms in the third quarter on higher sales of its lead products for heart disease, breast cancer, plaque psoriasis, and multiple sclerosis as well as lower impairments for its portfolio assets. Research and development spending fell in the quarter from a year earlier, but still represented 18.7% of sales. R&D spending focused on six products that are in registration in the US, EU, Japan and China. A seventh product, a treatment for malaria, is being reviewed in Switzerland for distribution in the developing world.
GSK Plc is forecasting an increase in group turnover of 7% to 9% at constant exchange rates this year, but growth is expected to be powered by specialty medicines rather than vaccines. Vaccines for shingles and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) put in a strong performance earlier this year but slumped in the third quarter following a raft of new regulatory measures.
The Roche Group expects to raise its dividend this year on the back of a recovery in sales led by strong demand for products treating multiple sclerosis, haemophilia A, and severe eye diseases. Group sales are expected to increase by a mid-single digit figure after rising by just 1% at constant exchange rates in 2023. The expected recovery reflects sales gains by newer products which are gradually offsetting the impact of competition from biosimilar versions of the company’s leading cancer medicines.
Agomab Therapeutics NV of Belgian has raised $89 million in new capital to advance a pipeline of candidate products for fibrotic disorders. Announced on 25 October, the Series D round brings total funds raised from investors to more than $320 million since the company’s launch in 2017. Based in Belgium, Agomab’s newest investors are Sanofi SA and Invus, a US private equity company. Existing investors include Fidelity Management & Research Co and EQT Life Sciences.
Biopharma executives in Europe and Asia, together with their financial supporters, have launched a new company to develop therapies that will both activate and inhibit the function of regulatory T cells (Tregs). Tregs are white blood cells that play a key role in regulating the immune system to ensure that the body responds appropriately to foreign antigens and neoantigens. Announced on 18 October, Regimmune/Kiji TX is the result of a merger between Kiji Therapeutics of France and Regimmune Ltd of Taiwan. The Japan based venture capital group DCI Partner Co Ltd helped execute the merger.
Cambridge, US, based Wave Life Sciences Ltd reported positive proof of mechanism data on 16 October from a Phase 1b/2a study of an RNA editing oligonucleotide drug which restored levels of a critical protein in patients with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, a genetic disease affecting the lung and liver. The estimated prevalence of the disease, with the mutation studied in the trial, is 200,000 in the US and Europe.
For the first time, a drug for diabetic macular oedema has been tested and shown to be effective in a cohort of individuals from minority groups who are disproportionately affected by the disease, the developer Roche announced on 18 October. Vabysmo (faricimab) is a bispecific antibody that was first approved in 2022 to treat age-related macular degeneration and diabetic macular oedema. Since that time it has also been authorised for retinal vein occlusion.
A retrospective analysis of biopsies taken from cancer patients who had undergone treatment with a checkpoint inhibitor and subsequently received an mRNA vaccine for coronavirus disease has shown an association between the vaccination and immune response to the therapies. Results of the analyses were presented at the 13 to 17 September meeting of the European Society for Medical Oncology. The lead author of the paper is Adam Grippin, a resident in radiation oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, US.
A new oral medicine for schizophrenia was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration on 27 September introducing a mechanism of action for treating the disease – a leading cause of disability worldwide. The drug, Cobenfy (xanomeline and trospium chloride), is the first antipsychotic drug approved to treat schizophrenia that targets cholinergic receptors as opposed to dopamine receptors, which is currently the standard of care. The drug was developed by Bristol-Myers Squibb Co.