Latest Posts

• Could Facebook’s Crypto Break Financial System? Congress Airs Fears

  In late 2017, a federal watchdog unit assigned a working group to keep an eye on cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, and to sound an alert if those alternate currencies showed signs of becoming a risk to the stability of the US... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey7/19/19

• Bio Roundup: Opioid Exposé, Gilead’s Gambit, Life Science IPOs & More

  The opioid crisis reaches all corners of the nation, and newly released data this week revealed how the growth of the epidemic tracked with a massive increase in the production and distribution of these drugs.

  From 2006 to 2012, the number... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan7/19/19

• VMWare Plans to Acquire Bitfusion for Application-Enhancing Software

  Austin—VMWare announced Thursday it intends to acquire Bitfusion, a startup with offices in Austin, TX and Silicon Valley that makes software aimed at optimizing the way hardware such as graphic processing units are used by applications. Terms were not... Read more »

  David Holley7/18/19

• Kronos Bio Reels In $105M for Drugs That Hit “Undruggable” Targets

  Kronos Bio has raised $105 million in financing to develop therapies intended to target disease-causing proteins that have so far eluded the best efforts of drug hunters.

  The Series A round of funding announced Thursday was led by Vida Ventures and... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan7/18/19

• Genmab, Mirum Pharma & Fulcrum Raise $653M in Wall Street Debuts

  Initial public offerings took a brief summer break the week of Independence Day, but healthcare IPO activity resumed this week as three more companies joined the US public markets. Here’s a recap of the biotech companies that priced IPOs Wednesday evening.... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan7/18/19

• Skyhawk Inks Deal With Genentech for Cancer and Neuro Drug Discovery

  Skyhawk Therapeutics has added Genentech to the growing list of companies it’s working with to find new drugs.

  The deal with Genentech, a Roche subsidiary, calls for Cambridge, MA-based Skyhawk to use its technology to discover and develop RNA-targeting drugs... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan7/16/19

• Prenatal Testing Firm Cradle Genomics Debuts With $17M, Illumina Ties

  Another company headed by former Illumina executives has launched, fueled with a $17 million Series A round from investors including a local venture capital firm.

  The new firm, Cradle Genomics, is seeking to commercialize improved non-invasive prenatal tests, which analyze blood... Read more »

  Sarah de Crescenzo7/16/19

• Gilead Ups Stake in Galapagos With $5B Deal to Jumpstart Its R&D

  Gilead Sciences on Sunday looked to another firm to rejuvenate its research capabilities, agreeing to put more than $5 billion in cash into Galapagos NV and get access to a slew of experimental drugs in return.

  Gilead (NASDAQ: GILD)... Read more »

  Ben Fidler7/15/19

• Neon’s Early Vaccine Study Is a Peek at Immunotherapy’s Third Wave

  In this new age of cancer immunotherapy, two versions have been approved. The first are checkpoint inhibitors, which have begun to change the way skin, lung, and other cancers are treated. The second are CAR-T cell therapies, which have... Read more »

  Ben Fidler7/15/19

• Bio Roundup: Michael Becker, Suzanne Eaton, Gene Therapy Moves & More

  The life science and healthcare worlds are vast. We often talk about impact in terms of millions of patients and billions of dollars. But these worlds can be small, too. It seems at times we’re never far removed from any one... Read more »

  Alex Lash7/12/19

• Amgen, Novartis BACE Inhibitor Joins List of Failed Alzheimer’s Drugs

  Amgen and Novartis are stopping work on an experimental Alzheimer’s disease drug after an early look at clinical data showed worsening cognitive function in patients.

  The interim results announced Thursday were part of a pre-planned review of data from two pivotal... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan7/11/19

• Trump Kills His Administration’s Plan to End Secret Drug Rebates

  Donald Trump’s criticism of high drug prices began during the 2016 presidential campaign and continued through his presidency, perhaps most famously just before his inauguration when he said that drug companies were “getting away with murder.”

  This week has... Read more »

  Alex Lash7/11/19

• Record Exit Value for VC-Backed Startups Could Fuel Investment

  More than a third of the companies that went public in the first half of this year were backed by venture capital.

  That, plus robust merger and acquisition activity, set a record for venture-backed exit value—$165.2 billion in money returned to... Read more »

  Sarah de Crescenzo7/11/19

Load More News ›

• Grocer H-E-B Explores Autonomous Delivery With SF-Area Startup Udelv

  San Antonio — Pretty soon, the milkman may be making a comeback—at least, a robotic version.

  San Antonio-based grocery chain H-E-B is beginning a pilot program later this year to test out using an autonomous vehicle for grocery delivery. H-E-B plans... Read more »

  David Holley7/10/19

• Cisco Invests in Optical Tech With $2.6B Acacia Communications Deal

  Cisco is buying Maynard, MA-based Acacia Communications (NASDAQ: ACIA) for $2.6 billion in a deal to boost the networking giant’s stock of optical technologies, the companies announced Tuesday.

  The deal values Acacia at $70 per share, a 46 percent premium... Read more »

  Brian Dowling7/9/19

• After Amgen’s Spark, Revolution Med Nabs $100M to Push RAS Cancer Drugs

  In May, Amgen (NASDAQ: AMGN) revealed intriguing data from the first-ever human trial of a drug that targets tumors with a specific mutation to the gene KRAS, which occurs in about one-quarter of all cancers.

  Amgen showed 30 percent of... Read more »

  Sarah de Crescenzo7/9/19

• How Do YOU Think the Internet Will Evolve? A Sampling of Your Tweets

  [Editor’s note: This is part of a series examining the internet’s first 50 years and predicting the next half century. Join Xconomy and World Frontiers Forum on July 16 for Net@50, an event exploring the internet’s past and future.... Read more »

  Wade Roush7/9/19

• AV Mapping Startup Carmera Joins Baidu’s Open-Source Apollo Platform

  Just as Google is developing autonomous vehicles through its subsidiary Waymo, China’s largest online search engine, Baidu, is also racing to develop AVs. Last week, the company announced a new milestone: It has now tested self-driving cars on more... Read more »

  Sarah Schmid Stevenson7/9/19

• Performance Management Firm 15Five Pulls in $30M to Scale Up

  Many companies have been adjusting to the changing workforce as millennials become a larger component of their staff rosters. Some are adapting with the help of talent management services such as 15Five, which has studied the millennial mindset.

  San Francisco-based... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey7/8/19

• As Sangamo Touts Data, BioMarin Preps Hemophilia Gene Therapy For FDA

  [Updated 7/8/19, 9:22 am. See below.] Gene therapy for hemophilia is as close as it’s ever been to market. And the race to get there got more heated this past weekend at a medical meeting in Australia.

  At the... Read more »

  Ben Fidler7/8/19

• Future of the Internet: What Scares Networking Pioneer Radia Perlman

  [Editor’s note: This is part of a series examining the internet’s first 50 years and predicting the next half century. Join Xconomy and World Frontiers Forum on July 16 for Net@50, an event exploring the internet’s past and future.... Read more »

  Wade Roush7/8/19

• Why Bob Metcalfe Is an Optimist About the Internet

  [Editor’s note: This is part of a series examining the internet’s first 50 years and predicting the next half century. Join Xconomy and World Frontiers Forum on July 16 for Net@50, an event exploring the internet’s past and future.... Read more »

  Wade Roush7/8/19

Load More News ›

• Bio Roundup: Duchenne Race, Warren v. Gottlieb, A $599 Genome & More

  As we pause to celebrate the 4th of July, another birthday is top of mind: A third baby whose embryonic DNA was edited by Chinese scientist He Jiankui. As Xconomy reported in November, He hinted about a second pregnancy after his... Read more »

  Ben Fidler7/5/19

• Talk of Broadcom Buyout of Symantec Puts Broader IT Focus Into View

  Broadcom is once, twice, three times a multi-billion-dollar dealmaker (well, basically) in the past year if it follows through on its reported talks to acquire Mountain View, CA-based cybersecurity giant Symantec.

  The potential acquisition, which was first reported Tuesday by Bloomberg... Read more »

  David Holley7/3/19

• The Next Internet: Usability Guru Don Norman Calls for Starting Over

  [Editor’s note: This is part of a series examining the internet’s first 50 years and predicting the next half century. Join Xconomy and World Frontiers Forum on July 16 for Net@50, an event exploring the internet’s past and future.... Read more »

  Wade Roush7/3/19

• Uber Rejiggers App to Highlight Its Bikes, Scooters in San Diego

  San Diego is one of two metropolitan areas in which ride-hailing giant Uber has reformatted its mobile app to make it simpler for users to rent an electric bicycle or scooter.

  With the previous version of Uber’s (NYSE: UBER) app,... Read more »

  Sarah de Crescenzo7/2/19

• Special Report 2069: Predicting the Internet’s Next 50 Years

  [Editor’s note: This is part of a series examining the internet’s first 50 years and predicting the next half century. Join Xconomy and World Frontiers Forum on July 16 for Net@50, an event exploring the internet’s past and future.... Read more »

  Wade Roush7/2/19

• Tracing the ARPANET Roots of the Internet’s Cybersecurity Crisis

  [Editor’s note: This is part of a series examining the internet’s first 50 years and predicting the next half century. Join Xconomy and World Frontiers Forum on July 16 for Net@50, an event exploring the internet’s past and future.... Read more »

  Brian Dowling7/2/19

• IPO to Watch: Digital Health Developer Livongo Plans to Go Public

  Digital health businesses haven’t had trouble raising venture capital funds from investors—2018 was a record year with $8.1 billion in funding—but few of them have made the move to hold initial public offerings.

  Livongo Health, a digital health company developing... Read more »

  Jeff Buchanan7/1/19

• Peter Gabriel Joins Net@50 Lineup; Tix Going Fast for July 16 Event

  Legendary rock musician and longtime internet evangelist Peter Gabriel has joined the all-star cast of speakers for Net@50, a historic event celebrating the 50th anniversary of the first net message—while also looking ahead to the internet’s next 50 years.

  The... Read more »

  Robert Buderi7/1/19

• As Cities Ban Face Recognition, Body-Cam Firm Axon Also Nixes It

  This week’s decision by police equipment manufacturer Axon to forego using facial recognition software in its body cameras follows a string of other actions against the use of face-matching technology by public agencies. They include a pioneering ban in San... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey6/28/19

Read More Posts ›