Mergers & acquisitions
This week’s release of the Make America Health Again report revealed continued emphasis on vaccine safety; Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s faceoff with senators last week amounted to political theater; the FDA promises complete response letters in real time and shares details on a new rare disease framework; and Summit disappoints at the World Conference on Lung Cancer in Barcelona.
Contingent value rights are rising in a down market, helping to close the gap between buyer and seller expectations in biotech transactions.
Executives at Novartis have not been shy about a desire to buy more companies, with cardiovascular a big focus. In total, the Swiss pharma has put $17.23 billion on the line in M&A and licensing deals this year.
Novartis has been investing heavily in its cardiovascular pipeline this year, forging partnerships with Flagship startup ProFound Therapeutics and China’s Argo Biopharmaceutical, among others.
KER-0193 is a modulator of ion channels connected to autism spectrum disorder. The FDA bestowed orphan drug and rare pediatric drug designations on the candidate earlier this year.
Eli Lilly drops a second Phase III readout for orforglipron; AbbVie committed to the psychedelic therapeutics space with the $1.2 billion acquisition of Gilgamesh’s depression asset; the CDC taps vaccine skeptic Retsef Levi to lead its COVID-19 immunization working group; and the FDA prioritizes overall survival in cancer drug development.
The deal extends AbbVie’s commitment to the psychedelics space and depression, after emraclidine’s high-profile flop in schizophrenia last November.
After a slow 2024, the biotech shell company Concentra Biosciences is back, offering to buy four biotechs in the past month and seven so far this year.
For $1.3 billion in aggregate—including upfront and milestone payments—Bayer will get exclusive global access to Kumquat Biosciences’ small-molecule KRAS G12D blocker.
There is no certainty that the buyout will come to pass, according to The Financial Times, which first reported the rumors.
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