© PharmaMar

Spanish specialist for sea-derived synthetic oncology drugs, PharmaMar SA, has inked a licence agreement with US antibody drug conjugate (ADC) company Seattle Genetics Inc. PharmaMar will provide fully-synthetic toxic payloads.

In a strategic acquisition, Roche has completed its capabilities to use Big data to build new business cases in digital diagnostics solutions and personalised healthcare. The pharma major agreed to pay US$1.9bn to take over the US specialist for digital electronic medical records, Flatiron Health Inc.

The lungs of cystic fibrosis patients are flooded by excessive amounts of neutrophils, which upon entering the lungs release their DNA out into the airways. © Celtaxys Inc.

Santhera Pharmaceuticals has licenced the inhaled neutrophil eleastase blocker POL6014 from Polyphor Ltd for CHF6.5m upfront and CHF121m in potential milestones.

Bioluminescence imaging  of mice with AML: allo-HCT is not enough (above). If all-HCT and sorafenib are co-administered, tumour cells are pushed back. (red: many cancer cells, blue: few cells). © Zeisser/Nat. Med.

Co-administration of an allogenic blood stem cell transplant and sorafenib cured AML patients refractive to chemotherapy and stem cell transplants alone, oncologists report in Nature Medicine.

Poxel S.A. is advancing its proof-of-concept type 2 diabetes programme imeglimin (PXL008) into Phase III studies in the US an the EU by means of a licence deal with Swiss Roivant Sciences GmbH.

Anticalin combination options. © Pieris

Anticalin developer Pieris and Antibody-drug conjugate specialist Seattle Genetics have agreed to co-develop three bispecific cancer drugs using Seattle Genetic’s cancer targets and Pieris’ co-stimulatory agonist and anticalin platform.

Italfarmaco SpA’s Givinostat, a small molecule histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitor in clinical testing against several forms muscular dystrophies, is also an option to treat heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF), a form of congestive heart failure that affects 50% of heart failure patients.

German researchers have identified a target to switch off intestinal acute graft-versus-host disease (GVHD), which occurs in about 50% of leukemia patients that have been given a allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (allo-HCT).

Members of the General Court of the European Union © CVEU

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has won a landmark battle about the amount of data from clinical dossiers that may be made public. The European Court of Justics (EJC) rejected the demand of three drug developers not to publish what they called confidential information under the EMA’s transparency rules. 

© Kinderhilfswerk

Global health product development partnership FIND (Foundation for Innovative New Diagnostics) has announced four major diagnostics projects to combat antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in resource-poor settings.