Entries by Uta Mommert

Funds for MDx manufacture

Belgian molecular diagnostics company Biocartis Group NV has raised €55m and will use the funds mainly to expand manufacturing capacities for its PCR-based molecular diagnostics system Idylla.

Elix High-Throughput water purification system

Merck’s advanced water purification system with new high-throughput line delivers up to 9,000 liters of pure water daily with real-time monitoring and ensures constant water quality with low and predictable running costs. 

Out of this world: UK tech in space

When NASA blasted off to the International Space Station on Monday morning, it had UK tech on board. A miniature DNA sequencer from Oxford Nanopore will be used to keep an eye on the ISS atmosphere – and may even analyse alien DNA one day. 

Cell Medica picks up antibody tech

Cell Medica has acquired Swiss antibody specialist Delenex Therapeutics. The deal nets the British cellular therapeutics developer Delenex’ proprietory antibody fragment platform Pentrabody.

Themis bags vaccine license

Vienna-based vaccine specialist Themis Bioscience GmbH has secured broad access to a promising virus vaccine vector tech by extending its license agreement with French Institut Pasteur. Its goal: to develop a Zika vaccine.

Medivation opens books to Sanofi

Californian biopharma Medivation has agreed to confidential negotiations with its suitors, in particular the French pharmaceutical company Sanofi, which aggressively has buffeted the cancer therapy specialist for months.

Next chapter in Dx IP dispute

The European Commission started an investigation into Illumina’s and Sequenom’s 2014 patent agreement, UK-competitor Premaitha Health said. The two US companies had agreed to pool their Noninvasive Prenatal Testing IP. 

Cinfa shows biosimilar equivalence

Cinfa Biotech is shuffling for position on the lucrative biosimilar market. The Spanish-German company has published positive results in a study for a pegfilgrastim copycat with 172 healthy volunteers in Germany. 

Oncolytic viruses: Natural Born Killers

Amgen’s Imlygic was approved last year – a move that finally added onco­lytic viruses (OVs) to the healthcare toolkit. Although the treatment’s scope of application as a stand-alone therapy is limited, many are viewing the event as Ground Zero for an explosive new age in medicine. Evidence is mounting that the full potential of virotherapies can only be realised in combination with other immuno­therapies, chemotherapies or small-molecule therapies. A number of other European drug developers have now jumped on Amgen’s bandwagon.