Today, a brief rundown of news from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Vivatides Therapeutics, as well as updates from Gilead, Roche and Shionogi that you may have missed.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officially published a new charter that grants Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. broader authority to reshape the influential vaccine panel, ACIP. The new rules significantly expand the expertise required to become an ACIP member and stress vaccine safety, naming among the qualifications for would-be panelists knowledge about “recovery from serious vaccine injuries.” A New York Times report linked that emphasis to a petition from Aaron Siri, a lawyer who has sued vaccine makers and presented at an ACIP meeting last year. The charter also added new vaccine-skeptical organizations, such as the Independent Medical Alliance, as “liaisons” that help ACIP work groups review data. The panel has been effectively paralyzed by a federal judge’s ruling last month that stated many new members chosen by Kennedy "appear distinctly unqualified."
Vivatides Therapeutics has secured a $54 million Series A round to develop next-generation RNA drugs. The Suzhou, China and Boston-based company said in a Friday statement that it has built a "differentiated" method of delivering RNA-based therapies to tissues outside the liver, and can apply that approach to antisense oligonucleotides and small interfering RNA, two popular types of nucleic acid therapies. Co-led by Qiming Venture Partners, the financing will help Vivatides advance "multiple" programs into clinical development.
Gilead Sciences has exercised an option to license a protein-degrading drug from Kymera Therapeutics. The move announced Thursday hands Gilead rights to a preclinical drug candidate called KT-200 and that’s designed to degrade CDK2, a known driver of tumor growth. CDK2 is a popular target among protein degradation companies, a few of which are aiming to show that their approach is superior to drugs that block the protein instead. Gilead acquired an option to KT-200 through a deal last June, and will pay $45 million to acquire drug rights.
Roche also tapped into a form of targeted protein degradation Thursday via a new deal with C4 Therapeutics. The collaboration centers around “degrader-antibody conjugates,” which link a targeting antibody to a protein-degrading molecule. The approach has gained attention of late, and Roche and C4 intend to use it to develop new cancer medicines. The partners will collaborate on up to two programs against undisclosed oncology targets, with C4 designing the degrader payloads and Roche leading work on the antibody and linking molecule. C4 will get $20 million upfront and could receive more than $1 billion overall in the deal.
The U.S. government on Wednesday awarded Shionogi a contract to help boost production of an antibiotic that can help thwart drug-resistant bacteria. Through the deal, Shionogi will establish a U.S. manufacturing site for its antibiotic Fetroja, advance it for treatment of infections caused by certain "high priority biothreat pathogens,” and seek Food and Drug Administration clearance of the treatment in children, the company said in a statement. Shionogi will receive $119 million initially, and could get up to $482 million overall.
