Three executive vice presidents at Sanofi SA have decided to step down resulting in a reorganisation of the company’s executive committee which is led by Olivier Brandicourt, chief executive of the company since April 2015.
In a bid to highlight oncology, Novartis has split its pharmaceuticals division into two new business units, one of which will be devoted exclusively to cancer medicines including cell and gene therapies. Bruno Strigini will head the new unit, reporting directly to Joseph Jimenez, the chief executive.
Netherlands-based oncology developer Merus has raised $55 million in an initial public offering (IPO) on the Nasdaq market, less than originally planned. Life Sciences Partners, the company’s venture capital backer, said the sums were raised in “challenging market conditions.”
The US Food and Drug Administration has approved a checkpoint antibody developed by Roche, Tecentriq (atezolizumab), to treat bladder cancer. It is the first product in its class to treat this type of cancer, inhibiting the PD-L1 pathway thereby enabling the body’s immune system to fight cancer cells.
A startup company founded by Oxford University professors is making waves in the stem cell community because it has technology that promises to control in vivo the destination of cells that can repair and replace tissues affected by disease. The technology will be used to create small molecule drugs that can activate repair mechanisms that already exist in the body to treat major age-related diseases such as cancer, neurodegeneration, heart failure and macular degeneration.
The medaka fish, sometimes known as the Japanese rice fish, has a long history as a pet. In recent years it has also been a model organism for biological research – most recently in a study of the regeneration of damaged retinal cells.
Australian researchers have identified two genes that control a universal molecular programme responsible for placing immune cells at a point where they can quickly fight off pathogens before they establish themselves in the body. This role is said to be particularly important for protecting organs against disease.
Four years on from a study that classified breast cancer into 10 distinct subtypes, researchers at the University of Cambridge have dug deeper into the genetic evidence to discover that 40 mutated genes cause the disease to progress.
Paris-based Neovacs SA and Boston-based Stellar Biotechnologies Inc have agreed to form a new company, Neostell SAS, to manufacture and sell conjugated vaccines to third parties worldwide as well as to support Neovacs’ proprietary therapeutic vaccine pipeline.
Novimmune SA, a Swiss antibody developer, has raised a second round of CHF 30 million ($31 million) from its existing shareholders after obtained the same amount from them in January.