Thomas and Andreas Strüngmann have spent decades building pharmaceutical companies and backing biotech entrepreneurs, most famously BioNTech. Now, as a new generation takes a larger role in their family office, an award bearing their name is turning that investment philosophy into a search for Europe’s next biotech builders.
Danish biotech ResoTher Pharma’s heart attack drug RTP-026 was well tolerated and showed early efficacy signals in a 66-patient Phase 2a trial, according to results announced Sept. 14 that clear a key condition for Swedish-listed Hunter Capital RTO 1’s planned reverse acquisition of the company.
GSK has agreed to acquire full global rights to a preclinical trispecific T-cell engager for multiple myeloma from China-based Chimagen Biosciences in a deal worth up to $750 million (€650 million), its second purchase from the company in under two years.
Agomab Therapeutics’ inhaled idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) drug AGMB-447 showed lung-restricted exposure and inhibited its intended target in its first patient trial. The company plans to move the ALK5 inhibitor into phase 2 before the end of the year.
MaaT Pharma has received a “negative trend” opinion in response to its request for EMA to re-examine its opposition to approving a microbiome therapy.
French biotech Axoltis Pharma’s NX210c missed the primary endpoint of a Phase 2 trial in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), but post-hoc analyses showing slower functional decline are giving the company enough encouragement to plan further development.
French biotech Cellectis is abandoning development of its two internal allogeneic CAR-T programs and repositioning itself as an in vivo gene editing company focused initially on cardiovascular disease.
French biotech Genfit acquired nangibotide from Inotrem in the summer and plans to start a Phase 2a trial in acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) in the fourth quarter.
Two B7-H3-targeted antibody-drug conjugates licensed from Chinese biotechs have now delivered positive phase 3 survival data in relapsed small-cell lung cancer, strengthening the oncology bets GSK and Roche made in China.
New data from the World Conference on Lung Cancer in Seoul are giving BioNTech’s oncology strategy more substance beyond its mRNA platform. Gotistobart has shown a marked survival benefit in previously treated squamous NSCLC, while the company’s leading bispecific antibody pumitamig continues to generate encouraging signals across tumor types and in combination with an antibody-drug conjugate. The key question now is whether these early signals can translate into registrational success.
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