Europe
Amid growing concern of the overuse and misuse of obesity drugs, the UK’s pharmacies regulator rolled out stricter guidelines for online pharmacies selling medicines including Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and Eli Lilly’s Mounjaro.
J&J, AstraZeneca, Novo Nordisk and Roche are among the companies that might take a hit from the soon-to-be-enacted fees, according to analysts.
In a good-news-bad-news week for Biogen, the company will cut an undisclosed number of employees, just as a higher dose of its Ionis-partnered therapy Spinraza for spinal muscular atrophy will be considered by the FDA and EMA.
The deal follows a $1.06 billion U.S. contract in July 2024 and a $1.24 billion agreement with an Asia-based pharma a few months later.
The closures follow Novartis’s acquisition of MorphoSys earlier this year.
Novo’s latest investment comes just days after the U.S. FTC greenlit the highly contentious acquisition of Catalent, which analysts expect will help the pharma expand its production capacity.
Now that they’ve received the go-signal from both U.S. and EU anti-trust regulators, Novo Holdings and Catalent expect to wrap up their deal in the coming days.
The EMA approved a kidney disease–related label expansion for the blockbuster GLP-1 drug after a study showed reduced risk of death by 20%.
BNT327, now in early-phase trials, is part of a class of drugs that could one day challenge Keytruda’s dominance. BioNTech obtained the candidate when it bought Biotheus last month in an acquisition deal that could reach up to $950 million.
In the U.S., the chorus of opposition against the proposed buyout continues to grow and now includes the CEOs of Roche and Lilly, a broad coalition of unions and consumer groups and at least one senator.
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