Source: Aviva investors

In September, Unilever announced a €1bn investment to improve the sustainability of its cleaning brands from the ground up. European Biotechnology spoke to Dr Neil Parry, R&D programme director of biotechnology and biosourcing at Unilever about the goals of Clean Future.

Picture: Sino Biological

Sino Biological is a world-leading manufacturer of recombinant protein and antibody reagents for life science researches and drug discoveries. In response to the current COVID-19 pandemic, we have developed a series of active reagents (virus proteins, antibodies, and pseudoviruses) to facilitate serologic tests and anti-viral drug developments.

Since September Gregory Oakes is a new Member of the Vifor Management Board and President North America of the Swiss pharmaceutical company.

© Pixabay.com

Newly formed venture capitalist Pureos Bioventures has set up a US$170m fund dedicated to Swiss and European drug developers.

© pixabay.com

German biotech companies and their industry association BIO Deutschland have called for appropriate investments into clinical  COVID-19 therapies.

Picture: Sino Biological

Sino Biological Inc. has developed a complete toolkit for SARS-CoV-2 antigen tests, including a large panel of antibodies specific to SARS-CoV-2 S&N proteins and antibody pairs that can be used to assemble detection assays for the corresponding antigen.

© Doris Jungo/Pixabay.com

Swiss auto-immunity specialist Polyneuron Pharmaceuticals AG has received CHF14m from HBM Healthcare Investments.
 

Dutch Amarna Therapeutics has appointed Dr Steen Klysner. The new CEO has been active in the bio­tech industry for more than 30 years

Covax-19 is an Australian-developed COVID-19 vaccine developed with the help of computational and artificial intelligence (AI)-based technologies.
© Vaxine Pty Ltd, Flinders University

Polish Mabion SA and Australian Vaxine Pty Ltd to develop Covax-19

© 4SC AG

Japanese dermatology specialist Maruho Co. Ltd and drug discovery firm 4SC AG have terminated their development agreement related to 4SC’s blockers of Kv1.3 ion channels, which are required for maintenance of activation of T cells. 4SC reacquired all rights to the preclinical development programme, which was aimed at specifically calm down chronically stimulated memory T-cell populations with Kv1.3highIK-1low phenotype as a strategy to treat autoimmune diseases.
The companies gave no reasons for the end of their collaboration. 4SC’s CEO Jason Loveridge, however, said that "a good deal of progress has been made" in the three years of the collaboration. Under the terminated colloaboration, 4SC had granted Maruho the exclusive worldwide rights to develop and commercialise two classes of these blockers in exchange for US-$103 in milestones plus royalties.