News

Novo Nordisk A/S is to pay an undisclosed amount of money to Evotec SE to gain access to the German company’s cell therapy technology and manufacturing capacity for its experimental therapies in a number of indications including diabetes. The collaboration, announced on 26 September, is an expansion of the Danish company’s platform technologies which are currently dominated by insulins and peptide therapies for obesity. Novo currently has cell therapy programmes under investigation for chronic heart failure, Parkinson’s disease and Type 1 diabetes.

Enara Bio Ltd, a UK biotech, has raised $32.5 million in Series B financing to build a pipeline of therapies for cancer that target peptide antigens in the dark genome. The financing round was co-led by the new investors Pfizer Ventures and M Ventures whose executives, respectively, Rana Al-Hallaq and Bauke Anninga, have joined the company’s board of directors.

A preclinical project designed to treat Huntington’s disease has received £35 million in Series A financing on early evidence that it can slow or even halt progression of the disease. Huntington’s is an inherited disorder that attacks areas of the brain that help control movement. The funding was awarded to LoQus23 Therapeutics Ltd, a biotech company based in Cambridge UK. The venture capital group Forbion led the round, alongside existing investors SV Health Investors’ Dementia Discovery Fund and the Novartis Venture Fund.

Mabylon AG, Swiss biotech company developing new antibody technologies, has received grant funding of more than CHF 1.3 million ($1.54 million) to discover a new approach for treating amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The funding for ALS is being provided by the non-profit groups Target ALS and the ALS Association, while that for IBD is coming from Innosuisse, the Swiss Innovation Agency.

Mabylon develops intrabodies which are antibody fragments expressed inside a cell that bind to specific proteins within that cell.

A privately held Italian company has raised $52 million to progress development of an in vivo gene therapy to treat methylmalonic acidemia (MMA), a genetic disorder that is manifest in early infancy. Genespire Srl is a 2020 spin-out of the San Raffaele Telethon Institute for Gene Therapy, a cell and gene therapy research institute. The funds will support development of the company’s lead product, GENE202, up to a clinical Phase 1/2 trial.

An antibody-drug conjugate drug for breast cancer, jointly developed by AstraZeneca Plc and Daiichi Sankyo Co Ltd, failed to show statistical significance in overall survival at Phase 3 versus chemotherapy despite having achieved progression free survival for the same patient group. Announcing the results on 23 September, AstraZeneca said that the survival results were likely to have been affected by changes in the standard of care for breast cancer during the drug’s development period.

A vaccine company founded by the Medicxi investment group has raised $100 million in a Series B financing round to develop multivalent respiratory virus vaccines. The company, Vicebio Ltd, recently started a Phase 1 trial with its lead product, VXB-241, a bivalent vaccine targeting both respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and human metapneumovirus (hMPV). The viruses affect elderly patients and those with weakened immune systems.

Novo Nordisk A/S has entered a collaboration with Korro Bio Inc of the US to develop a potentially new class of genetic medicines for cardiometabolic diseases. This includes new drugs for diabetes and obesity, medicines of which Novo already has a global market position. Announced on 16 September, the deal has a value of up to $530 million which covers upfront, development and commercial milestone payments. This is in addition to the financing of R&D for potential projects and royalties from any products that reach the market.

Nanobiotix SA, whose lead product is a radioenhancer for cancer, has extended its cash runway into the fourth quarter of 2025 following receipt in January of a $20 million milestone payment from Janssen Pharmaceutica NV, its development partner. The lead product, NBTXR3 has been given a ‘fast track’ designation by the US Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of elderly patients with locally advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma who are ineligible for cisplatin chemotherapy. In an ongoing Phase 3 trial, the drug is being evaluated with or without cetuximab (Erbitux).

AstraZeneca Plc has received US approval for a new indication for Fasenra (benralizumab), an antibody therapeutic originally developed for asthma and now authorised to treat eosinophilic granulomatosis with polyangiitis (EGPA), a rare disease caused by inflammation of small to medium-sized blood vessels. Fasenra binds to a subunit of the interleukin-5 receptor which is predominantly expressed on human eosinophils, a type of white blood cell. Although affecting only an estimated 118,000 people globally, the disease can be fatal without treatment.