Frank Vinluan
Xconomy Editor Frank Vinluan is a business journalist with experience covering technology and life sciences. Based in Raleigh, he was a staff writer at the Triangle Business Journal covering technology, biotechnology and energy before joining MedCityNews.com as North Carolina bureau chief. Prior to moving to North Carolina’s Research Triangle in 2007 he held business reporting positions at The Des Moines Register and The Seattle Times.
Recent posts
In biotech, you can go home again. Four years ago, Illumina spun out cancer diagnostics startup Grail. This week, the gene sequencing giant announced it is acquiring Grail in an $8... Read more »
Many drugs work by binding to a protein and blocking it. Technology for eliminating disease-causing proteins altogether remains experimental, but this approach has gained ground in the past year with hundreds... Read more »
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) has no cure and few available treatments but the past decade has revealed new knowledge about the pathology of the disease. Libra Therapeutics is turning that research... Read more »
An Alzheimer’s disease drug from partners AC Immune and Roche has failed a mid-stage clinical trial, adding another compound to the list of experimental therapies that have fallen short of demonstrating... Read more »
The key to Athira Pharma’s approach to Alzheimer’s disease is already inside each of us: a repair mechanism that can regenerate damaged neurons. What’s needed to begin the process is a... Read more »
[Updated, 3:45 pm ET.] Grail is set to be acquired for $8 billion by Illumina, the gene sequencing giant that formed the cancer diagnostics developer and spun it out... Read more »
Gilead Sciences CEO Daniel O’Day has spoken openly about acquisitions as a way to build up the company’s drug pipeline. This week, it made its biggest buy yet.
The $21 billion... Read more »
Dyne Therapeutics, a company developing genetic medicines for rare muscular disorders, has raised $233 million in an IPO that topped the preclinical-stage biotech’s projections.
Late Wednesday, Dyne priced its offering of... Read more »
When Seres Therapeutics reported positive late-stage data for its experimental microbiome treatment last month, scientists at Finch Therapeutics cheered the results from the rival company whose lead drug candidate addresses the... Read more »
An Arrowhead Pharmaceuticals drug for a rare liver disease now has early Phase 2 results and the data so far look good. Not only did the therapy reduce levels of a... Read more »
Cell therapy offers another option for addressing the most difficult blood cancer cases, but such treatments, which are engineered from a patient’s own immune cells, don’t yet work on solid tumors.... Read more »
Unity Biotechnology is cutting nearly one third of its staff, a move that comes a month after the biotech’s lead drug candidate failed a mid-stage study in osteoarthritis.
South San Francisco-based... Read more »
Seattle Genetics is in line to receive $1.72 billion from Merck via a pair of deals, one for a cancer drug that’s still in development and the other for partial... Read more »
Gilead Sciences is acquiring Immunomedics in a $21 billion deal, the latest in a string of transactions the company has made to bolster its cancer drug portfolio.
The acquisition announced Sunday... Read more »
COVID-19 research efforts are often characterized as a race between companies, a description that reflects the urgency to develop a vaccine for the novel coronavirus. The description is not quite right.... Read more »
Codiak BioSciences, a company developing therapies based on tiny bubbles secreted by cells, is lining up an IPO as it prepares for the first tests of its technology in humans later... Read more »
[Updated, 7:31 p.m. EDT. See below.] An experimental Satsuma Pharmaceuticals treatment for acute migraine has failed a late-stage clinical trial, dealing a setback to the company’s plans to offer... Read more »
When biotech startups emerge from stealth, executives typically talk about new molecules in the pipeline and novel approaches they take to treating a disease. The founders of Generate Biomedicines want to... Read more »
Grail, a company developing blood tests intended to detect cancer well before symptoms show, is taking its pitch to a broader swath of investors. The diagnostics company is looking ahead to... Read more »
Alkahest, a company that analyzes blood proteins to develop therapies that address neurological disorders including Alzheimer’s disease, is set to be acquired by partner Grifols in a $146 million deal.
Grifols... Read more »
