Lilly’s deal with Regor is another example of large pharmaceutical companies in the U.S. and Europe showing interest in Chinese biotechs for their research, rather than as a means of accessing the second-largest market for prescription drugs.
In recent years, Amgen, Pfizer and Seagen have struck partnerships with, or invested in China-based biotechs, while AstraZeneca set up a new R&D center in Shanghai to, among other things, better collaborate with companies there. The investment has come as Chinese biotechs have taken advantage of new rules for stock listings in Hong Kong to raise record-setting sums.
Amgen’s 2019 partnership with Beigene, which has a market capitalization of $30 billion on Nasdaq, was the most notable, both by financial value and for the number of clinical-stage drugs involved.
Lilly, too, has dipped its toes into China-based biotech research. In 2015, the drugmaker grabbed partial rights to a cancer immunotherapy developed by Innovent Biologics. That drug, now known as Tyvyt, has since been approved in China for two types of lymphoma and could be cleared for lung cancer as well. Last year, Lilly paid $200 million to broaden the partnership. READ MORE
By Ned Pagliarulo
Source: biopharmadive.com
CureVac and the University of Texas’s MD Anderson Cancer Center have announced a co-development and licensing agreement to develop novel messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA)-based cancer vaccines. The strategic collaboration will focus on the development of differentiated cancer vaccine candidates in selected haematological and solid tumour indications with high unmet medical needs.
FUJIFILM Corporation is planning to invest $1.2 billion to expand the planned FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies manufacturing facility in Holly Springs, North Carolina, US. This news follows the organisation’s announcement of a $2 billion investment in the facility in March 2021. This additional financial boost totals the investment to over $3.2 billion, FUJIFILM confirmed.
Sanofi’s global restructuring and downsizing is now fully underway, with layoffs stretching to the company’s Belgian offices. Belgian newspaper De Tijd reports that 67 employees have been laid off at a site in Ghent and 32 jobs are on the chopping block at Sanofi’s Belgium HQ in Diegem.
