Latest Posts

• Bio Roundup: Generic Drugs Graft, ASCO Ahead, ElevateBio Rises & More

  Generic drugs are supposed to give consumers more choices and a counterweight to more costly branded medications. During his tenure as FDA commissioner, Scott Gottlieb often spoke about generics as a market force that could help tame climbing drug prices. But... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan5/17/19

• ASCO Abstracts: Breast Cancer, Precision Treatments in the Spotlight

  The world’s biggest annual cancer conference is just around the corner. Data presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting each year can change medical practice and make or break companies whose drugs are under the microscope. That’s what makes... Read more »

  Ben Fidler5/16/19

• Tech Ethics, Regulation & Strategy: Here’s the Napa Summit Agenda

  With Uber’s long-awaited IPO, Facebook’s mounting controversies, and ongoing debates over drug pricing and safety issues, come a great responsibility. A big story in the innovation community now is about the ethics and regulation of tech and life sciences. What are... Read more »

  Gregory T. Huang5/10/19

• Bio Roundup: Rare Disease Showdowns, Prices on TV, Dealmania & More

  The market for drugs for rare or “orphan” diseases continues to grow. An April report from Evaluate Pharma predicted sales of orphan drugs to rise 12 percent a year between now and 2024, when they will account for an estimated 20... Read more »

  Ben Fidler5/10/19

• Two Days, Five Biotech IPOs, and $359M Raised for Clinical Trials

  It will be hard to top last year’s flurry of biotech companies joining the public markets, but this week is shaping up to be the busiest for life science IPOs in recent memory. Five biotechs priced their IPOs and at least... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan5/9/19

• SMA, Migraine Data Lead Neuro Highlights from AAN Meeting

  The American Academy of Neurology meeting in Philadelphia is rolling on through the end of this week. There has been plenty of news to digest already. New clinical data could herald cutting-edge treatments for migraine, the rare disease spinal muscular atrophy,... Read more »

  Ben Fidler5/7/19

• Bio Roundup: Head and Spine Previews, Biogen Moves, IPO Dreams & More

  America continues to suffer from healthcare headaches. Our convoluted private-public insurance system was under scrutiny this week from Democrats, holding a “Medicare for All” hearing in the House, and from Republicans, as several GOP-led states and the Trump administration asked... Read more »

  Alex Lash5/3/19

• At Big Neuro Meeting, Migraine Drug Competitors to Make Oral Arguments

  The first new class of migraine drugs in decades won FDA approval last year. But the companies who commercialized these new therapies and their potential competitors are already planning new, more convenient versions, taken as pills instead of injectoins just... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan5/3/19

• Beyond Meat’s IPO Bags $241M to Make Plant-Based Burgers Mainstream

  A Beyond Meat burger is coming to a location near you—and soon. The food technology company’s upsized IPO has raised $241 million to finance plans to bring its plant-based “meat” to more grocery stores and restaurants across the country.

  Beyond Meat... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan5/2/19

• SMA Moment: Will Gene Therapy Shift Treatment, Costs of Muscle Disease?

  This is a big moment for people diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy, or SMA, a rare and potentially lethal genetic disorder that destroys muscles. For decades, there was no way to change the trajectory of their disease. They now have one... Read more »

  Ben Fidler5/2/19

• Retailers, Startups Work to Offer Efficient E-Commerce Delivery

  The on-demand delivery war in retail is on.

  In its quarterly earnings call Thursday, Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) announced it would switch to one-day shipping for Prime members, halving the time the 100 million-plus people who subscribe to the service must... Read more »

  Angela Shah5/1/19

• Ford, Lincoln Owners Can Get Amazon Packages Delivered to Their Cars

  Many of us know that anxious feeling that comes when Amazon texts a notification that it has delivered your package, except you’re nowhere near home at the time to receive it. The mind races: is the package sitting out in plain... Read more »

  Sarah Schmid Stevenson4/30/19

• Elanco Bolsters Pet Products Pipeline With $234M Deal for Aratana

  Drugs that treat dogs and cats are some of Elanco’s fastest growing products, and the animal health company is poised to make that category even bigger through a deal to buy pet medicines developer Aratana Therapeutics.

  Greenfield, IN-based Elanco (NYSE: ELAN... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan4/26/19

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• Bio Roundup: Biogen’s Strategy, Drug Price Convo, NASH News & More

  The road to every new drug approval is littered with the remains of earlier failures. Biopharmaceutical companies don’t like to talk about the failures. But it’s earnings season now, so some of them don’t have much choice.

  Biogen’s (NASDAQ: BIIB)... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan4/26/19

• To Help Boost Female-led Startups, More Women Join Investor Ranks

  Houston—Men have long leveraged their networks to succeed in business, and the tech industry has been no exception. Women, finding themselves outside of the club, are now creating their own networks to do the same.

  Katelyn O’Shaughnessy already had a... Read more »

  Angela Shah4/25/19

• Midwest Growth Capital Symposium to Feature VC University Seminar

  Later next month, the Midwest Growth Capital Symposium (MGCS) will kick off its 38^th annual two-day event dedicated to showcasingthe region’s high-growth companies to a cadre of local and out-of-town investors.

  During the symposium, 32 companies actively seeking funding... Read more »

  Sarah Schmid Stevenson4/25/19

• Teva’s Approved Migraine Drug Fails Again to Blunt Rarer Headache

  With a second big clinical failure, Teva Pharmaceutical is abandoning efforts to extend the use of its approved migraine drug to the treatment of cluster headaches, a rarer form of headache that typically affects one side of the head... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan4/23/19

• SPECIAL REPORT: 2019 Blockchain Outlook — Reality Check

  After a breakout year in 2017, the blockchain sector suffered a series of blows in 2018, from crashing cryptocurrency prices to increased regulatory scrutiny of crypto ventures and deepening skepticism about whether the technology was actually useful. Now, the industry has... Read more »

  Jeff Engel4/23/19

• Can We Afford to Be Cured? A Conversation With ICER’s Steve Pearson

  [Corrected, 4/23/19, 7:10 p.m. See below.] New cell and gene therapies bring the possibility of cures once hardly imaginable. But the potential cures could also cost millions of dollars, like Novartis (NYSE: NVS), the owner of the gene... Read more »

  Alex Lash4/23/19

• Bio Roundup: Nationwide’s Rise, a Surgeon’s Quest, CRISPR USA & More

  Persistence and perseverance were the themes of two of our top stories this week.

  First there’s the story of Nationwide Children’s Hospital. The Columbus, Ohio, hospital chose to invest in gene therapy when the field was in its darkest days. After... Read more »

  Ben Fidler4/19/19

• $100M for Talaris Gives Surgeon a Shot to Reinvent Organ Transplants

  When Novartis dissolved its gene and cell therapy unit a few years ago, a bunch of projects the Swiss pharma giant had incubated were tossed aside. One of them was the work of surgeon Suzanne Ildstad, who has spent decades trying... Read more »

  Ben Fidler4/18/19

• How an Ohio Kids’ Hospital Quietly Became Ground Zero for Gene Therapy

  [Updated, 4/22/19, see below] If a once-modest regional hospital and its new biotech allies have their way, the capital of Ohio could one day rival America’s other biomedical hubs.

  “Our goal is to make Columbus the center of the... Read more »

  Ben Fidler4/15/19

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• Thwarting Opposition, Bristol Gets Shareholder OK for $74B Celgene Buyout

  The early opposition has turned out to be just noise. Shareholders of Bristol-Myers Squibb today approved the pharma giant’s planned buyout of Celgene, paving the way for a deal that will create one of the largest biopharma organizations in the world,... Read more »

  Ben Fidler4/12/19

• Bio Roundup: EASL Does It, Alnylam’s BFF, Gene Therapy Deals & More

  A major conference devoted to liver disease kicked off with updates from the race for approval of the world’s first drug to treat a form of advanced liver disease called nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, or NASH. The gene therapy field continued to attract... Read more »

  Alex Lash4/12/19

• Senators Grill Pharmacy Benefit Execs About Skyrocketing Drug Prices

  Executives from five of the companies that negotiate drug prices on behalf of insurers testified Tuesday before the Senate finance committee. It was the latest in a series of hearings centered on the rising cost of prescription medication, which has captured... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan4/9/19

• VC Trends in 2019: More Money, Fewer Deals But Women Still Get Less

  [Updated 11:23 a.m. See below.] If you’ve been following venture capital trends, what you expected to happen in the first quarter of 2019 did: More money is being invested in fewer deals, and women founders still are getting less... Read more »

  David Holley4/9/19

• Bio Roundup: Gottlieb’s Goodbye, AACR Recap, Migraine Drug Fight & More

  Scott Gottlieb’s last day as FDA commissioner is today. His resignation announcement last month surprised some, given the earlier denials about leaving. But after two years of commuting between Connecticut, where his family remained, and the FDA’s Maryland headquarters, he... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan4/5/19

• AACR 2019 Roundup: Notes from a Weekend of Early Stage Cancer Results

  [Editor’s note: Alex Lash co-authored this report] The American Association for Cancer Research’s annual meeting is wrapping up in Atlanta today. The conference typically focuses on early research and clinical work, not the big trials that can change the... Read more »

  Ben Fidler4/3/19

• Bio Roundup: Amyloid Angst, NASH News, Brammer Bagged & More

  A week after the failure of Biogen’s Alzheimer’s drug aducanumab, the ripple effects are still being felt—and not just by Biogen, which lost billions of dollars in market value in a flash.

  We’ll kick off this week’s roundup with the... Read more »

  Ben Fidler3/29/19

• Bio Roundup: Sage Postpartum Help, Biogen Bids Adu, Heart Beats & More

  One group of people in dire need of medical relief got good news this week. The first drug for postpartum depression was approved. With its complicated logistics, side effects, and potential high cost, it won’t be for everyone who experiences the... Read more »

  Alex Lash3/22/19

• Bio Roundup: Golumbeski’s Legacy, CRISPR Moratorium, Rebate Week & More

  While all eyes in the biopharmaceutical world are currently trained on Bristol-Myers Squibb’s proposal to buy Celgene for $74 billion, it wasn’t that long ago that another company’s gaze was fixed on the Summit, NJ, drug maker.

  In the early... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan3/15/19

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