Heart drug co. Relypsa gets $10M more to complete trials
Pharmaceutical company Relypsa announced that its investors extended its first round of funding by $10 million to a total $43 million to help it finish phase-two clinical trials on its lead drug candidate, a treatment that could alleviate symptoms of heart failure and chronic kidney disease.
Based in Santa Clara, Calif., Relypsa predicts the phase to close by the end of 2009 and already plans to raise new funds in 2010. The drug being tested treats… Continue Reading
Amgen, Relypsa and the art of the biotech-spinout-startup-restart
(UPDATED: See below.)
A common dilemma in biotech acquisitions is how to keep a startup’s entrepreneurial management happy and productive when they’ve just been assimilated by the Borg. The answer, often enough, is not to bother, and to let them spin out a new company with scientific “leftovers” that weren’t the point of the acquisition in the first place.
That’s more or less what Amgen has just done in launching Relypsa, a new Santa Clara, Calif., biotech just… Continue Reading
EPO’s makers may be down, but they’re not out
(UPDATED: See below.)
Erythropoietin, or EPO, and its close relatives didn’t become the world’s most popular biotech drugs — at least through last year, when they pulled in sales of almost $12 billion — for nothing. On the plus side of the ledger, the anemia treatment owed its early success to the near miraculous improvement it wrought in the health of kidney-dialysis patients, who previously required numerous blood transfusions and frequently died relatively quickly anyway. On the… Continue Reading
Amgen grabs the axe, chops up to 2,600 jobs
(UPDATED: See below.)
The biotech colossus Amgen, stung by safety and regulatory issues that hit hard at sales of its core anemia drugs, announced today that it will cut its headcount between 12 percent and 14 percent, ratchet back on new plant construction, close production operations and prioritize its research spending. The giant biotech said these measures will yield savings of up to $1.3 billion by next year.
The restructuring is the first in Amgen’s history, and virtually… Continue Reading
Weekend update: That cold, cold artificial heart, Dendreon-related skulduggery, congressional earmarks, and more
(UPDATED: See below.)
Catching up on a few life-science related items you may have missed over the weekend:
If you prick a cyborg, does he not bleed? — The WaPo’s Joel Garreau brings us this fascinating story about Peter Houghton, the first permananent recipient of a “left ventricular assist device” — a mechanical replacement for a failing chamber of his heart. Houghton’s heartbeat no longer goes lub-dub — instead, it whirrs as an impeller pushes blood through it. He… Continue Reading
Healthcare roundup: Doctor shortages everywhere, why the states can’t do universal healthcare, how to reform consumer drug ads, and more
Patients, patients everywhere, yet not a doc to treat – From Massachusetts to Colorado, there’s an increasingly acute shortage of primary-care physicians. In Massachusetts, where the nation’s only universal healthcare plan is gearing up, hundreds of thousands of newly insured individuals are having trouble finding doctors. According to this report, new patients wait an average of 52 days to see an internist or family doctor for a routine visit, and with up to 500,000 people set… Continue Reading
Brownian motion: Personnel moves in the life sciences
NeurAxon, a Waltham, Mass., biotech developing new pain drugs, named Lawrence Bloch as its new CEO. Bloch was previously chief financial officer of NitroMed, a company best known for BiDil, the first drug approved specifically to treat heart disease in African-Americans. BiDil sales haven’t really taken off, and NitroMed’s stock has fallen considerably since its recent high in February. Bloch left his position at NitroMed almost a year and a half ago.
Amira Pharmaceuticals, a San… Continue Reading
Amgen snaps up another biotech startup, Alantos Pharma, for $300M
Amgen suddenly has a voracious appetite for startups. In its second deal this week, the biotech giant acquired Cambridge, Mass., biotech Alantos Pharmaceuticals for $300 million in cash. (The release is here.)
Founded in Heidelberg, Germany in 1999, Alantos changed its name from Therascope in 2003 and moved to Cambridge in 2004. The company develops traditional “small molecule” drugs — that is, therapies that can be delivered as pills rather than shots — for a… Continue Reading
Amgen buys kidney-disease biotech Ilypsa for $420M
Biotech powerhouse Amgen agreed to acquire Santa Clara, Calif.-based Ilypsa, a developer of drugs to treat complications of kidney disease, for $420 million in cash, roughly ten times what the company had raised in venture capital. The company’s release is here.
The high price could mean Amgen had to win a bidding war for Ilypsa, since one of the startup’s main investors was none other than the venture arm of Amgen archrival Johnson & Johnson.
Ilypsa has… Continue Reading
Roundup: Genetic links to breast cancer, Avandia under attack, death and the drug official, and more
More genetic links for breast cancer – Whole-genome association studies that tease out links between minute genetic variations and the likelihood of disease are definitely building momentum. Over the last several days, researchers reported six new variations that increase the risk of breast cancer for women who have inherited them. (For background, see this Boston Globe piece or my recent take on the subject.) It’s now conceivable that scientists may soon have an excellent handle on… Continue Reading
ProCertus pulls in $2.3M for prevention of chemo, radiation side effects
ProCertus BioPharm, a Madison, Wis., company developing drugs to minimize the side effects of radiation and chemotherapy, raised $2.3 million in a first round of financing. The company will use the money to begin human tests of products such as DermX, which is supposed to prevent radiation-therapy induced dermatitis.
The round was led by Venture Investors, a significant Midwest-based healthcare and IT venture firm. Existing investors including the Novartis Venture Fund also joined the round.
These… Continue Reading
Roundup: Anemia drugs under assault, stem-cell trial moves forward, medical interventions and poor “quality of death,” and more
Is the bell tolling for EPO? – The news keeps going from bad to worse for the wonder drugs of biotech — the anemia treatments known as ESAs or EPO, shorthand for “erythropoiesis stimulating agents” and “erythropoietin,” respectively. Earlier today, an FDA advisory panel recommended new warnings for the drugs, which stimulate the production of oxygen-carrying red blood cells, as well as fresh clinical studies on their safety. Recent studies in kidney-dialysis patients linked higher doses… Continue Reading
Making obviousness more obvious
Yesterday, the Supreme Court handed down a patent decision (PDF) that makes it easier to deny or challenge a patent that seems “obvious” to a patent examiner or a court. This decision has already been hailed by the technology industry, which has lobbied hard for legal changes that would limit inventors’ rights somewhat in order to discourage “patent trolls.”
The biotech and pharma industries, by contrast, could find themselves in more of a pickle. Reinterpretation of… Continue Reading
Health and science roundup: Amgen, generic biologics, the origins of white people and more
Amgen’s anemia rollercoaster — Biotechnology titan Amgen may have dodged a bullet when a study released Thursday showed that its anemia drug Aranesp didn’t shorten the lives of patients, after several other studies had suggested the opposite. But its anemia franchise isn’t out of the woods yet. A Wednesday report in the Journal of the American Medical Association revealed that for-profit dialysis clinics prescribe far higher doses of anemia drugs to their patients than do their non-profit… Continue Reading
Health and science roundup: Amgen, generic biologics, the origins of white people and more
(Note: This item has been copied over to the Life Sciences page from its original location on the VentureBeat main page. To view it in its original context, with comments, click here.)
Amgen’s anemia rollercoaster — Biotechnology titan Amgen may have dodged a bullet when a study released Thursday showed that its anemia drug Aranesp didn’t shorten the lives of patients, after several other studies had suggested the opposite. But its anemia franchise isn’t out of the… Continue Reading
Biotech Roundup: Heart-disease biomarkers, drugs that go too far, “non-profit” drugs
(Note: This item has been copied over to the Life Sciences page from its original location on the VentureBeat main page. To view it in its original context, with comments, click here.)
Cautionary tales: An occasional look at events with potential long-term impact for biotechnology
Personalized medicine takes a hit — Scientists have spent more than a decade scouring the human genome to identify genetic alterations that might predict your risk of developing, say, heart trouble or cancer…. Continue Reading
Biotech Roundup: Heart-disease biomarkers, drugs that go too far, “non-profit” drugs
Cautionary tales: An occasional look at events with potential long-term impact for biotechnology
Personalized medicine takes a hit — Scientists have spent more than a decade scouring the human genome to identify genetic alterations that might predict your risk of developing, say, heart trouble or cancer. Now, however, a new study (subscription required) Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggests that many of these disease “biomarkers” identified so far may be little more than junk…. Continue Reading