West Coast Biotech Roundup: Amgen/deCODE, Calico, Orexigen & extra
For sheer quantity, San Diego incorporates the week’s West Coast biotech news, with the whole thing from trial disasters (Lpath, MEI Pharma) to inventory sales and deals (Retrophin, Vical, Mast) to good product news (Orexigen, Conatus). For scientific affect, then again, Amgen tips the scales with the large e-newsletter of Icelandic genomic data from its subsidiary DeCode Genetics. meanwhile two Bay house firms, Calico and Avalanche, have constructed ties to tutorial establishments. All this and much more within the roundup, so let’s get to it.
—deCODE Genetics, the Icelandic subsidiary of Amgen (NASDAQ: AMGN) of Thousand o.k., CA, published 4 papers in Nature Genetics that paint a fancy portrait of the genetic version of the Icelandic individuals. The researchers sequenced the entire genomes of more than 2,500 Icelanders and did partial research of 104,000 more. The work sheds light not simplest upon the final field of genomic studies but also upon the perform of the Y chromosome, the occurrence of people who find themselves missing sure genes, and a selected risk for Alzheimer’s illness.
—Calico, the South San Francisco, CA, startup backed fully through Google, stated Tuesday it will fund growing older-related research at the college of California’s QB3, which has built a community of scientists and entrepreneurs from three UC campuses and personal trade. The 4-year partnership offers Calico the way to take exclusive rights to discoveries that stem from sure Calico-QB3 collaborations.
—Avalanche Biotechnologies (NASDAQ: AAVL) of Menlo Park, CA, and the college of Washington in Seattle are teaming to improve treatments for color blindness. Researchers Jay and Maureen Neitz are using Avalanche’s gene treatment know-how of their lab and have joined the corporate’s scientific advisory board.
—San Diego’s Orexigen (NASDAQ: OREX) received advertising and marketing approval in Europe for its weight-loss product Mysimba, a drug combination that is authorized in the U.S. below the logo identify Contrave.
—GlaxoSmithKline (NYSE: GSK) has opened an office in San Diego, a bodily footprint for its business development team. It follows two years after GSK inked a take care of San Diego’s Avalon Ventures to jointly fund as much as 10 brand-new startups scouted by using Avalon.
—San Diego oncology agency MEI Pharma (NASDAQ: MEIP) misplaced over two thirds of its market value Monday after it stated its lead most cancers drug, pracinostat, failed to satisfy the primary purpose of a mid-stage find out about for myelodysplastic syndrome (when the bone marrow doesn’t produce enough wholesome blood cells). MEI was once earlier an Australian agency referred to as Marshall Edwards, which moved to San Diego in 2010 to reboot following the failure of its late-stage ovarian most cancers therapy.
—extra unhealthy scientific news from San Diego: Lpath (NASDAQ: LPTN) mentioned Tuesday that a mid-stage trial of its therapeutic antibody drug Asonep failed to satisfy the primary purpose in a study of sufferers with advanced renal cell carcinoma. Lpath shares fell 23 %.
—Hans Bishop, CEO of Juno Therapeutics (NASDAQ: JUNO), and Arch undertaking partners cofounder Bob Nelsen, both of Seattle, penned an op-ed in Forbes this week arguing against proposed adjustments to U.S. patent legislation.
—Seattle’s Institute for programs Biology announced Thursday a 3-12 months venture to delve into the biology of Lyme illness and develop diagnostics.
—Tekmira (NASDAQ: TKMR) of Vancouver, BC, raised $ 151 million in a secondary providing.
—Mast Therapeutics (NYSE: MSTX) of San Diego has filed for a secondary stock offering that might raise $ 167 million. the company will use the proceeds to proceed growing therapies for impaired microvascular blood waft and sickle cell illness.
—ny and San Diego-based Retrophin (NASDAQ: RTRX) raised virtually $ 150 million from an providing of nearly eight.9 million shares. Of the cash, $ 27 million will go to Asklepion prescribed drugs to assist pay for a drug Retrophin acquired when it offered the Baltimore, MD firm remaining week.
—Vical Therapeutics (NYSE: VICL) of San Diego said Wednesday it has bought from Astellas Pharma the rights to a preclinical remedy to struggle Aspergillus fungal infection. Vical is paying Astellas $ 250,000 in cash and about 1 % of its fill up entrance. it will possibly turn out paying Astellas as much as $ one hundred million if the drug ever comes to market.
—uniqueness pharma SteadyMed (NASDAQ: STDY) of San Ramon, CA, went public late ultimate week and raised about $ forty million in its IPO.
—Nightingale, an alumnus of Bay space accelerators StartX and Y Combinator, launched its eponymous app that gives data management and prognosis for well being suppliers caring for autism patients. The staff, led with the aid of a recipient of a Thiel Fellowship furnish, will soon amplify the app to let parents enter and achieve get entry to to data.
—San Diego’s Conatus prescribed drugs (NASDAQ: CNAT) stated a mid-stage trial of its emricasan, its drug for patients with nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) and nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), met its main purpose. The drug blocks a signaling pathway that triggers programmed cell death and irritation, believed to power the development of liver illness.
—more San Diego dealmaking: the city’s Biocept (NASDAQ: BIOC plans to mix cancer diagnostic applied sciences with Israel’s Rosetta Genomics (NASDAQ: ROSG). Biocept makes a speciality of expertise used to research biomarkers of cell-free circulating tumor DNA. Rosetta focuses on microRNA-based diagnostics.
—San Diego’s Allele Biotechnology & prescribed drugs agreed to provide its technology for producing human brought on pluripotent stem cells to Marlborough, MA-based totally Ocata Therapeutics (NASDAQ: OCAT), a expert in regenerative medication for ophthalmology.
—Amgen will appeal a courtroom’s ruling that Novartis (NYSE: NVS) can proceed with gross sales of Zarxio, a biosimilar model of Amgen’s white-blood cell booster Neupogen, Reuters said Wednesday. Zarxio was once the first biosimilar to receive FDA approval.
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