Amgen to lay off 350 Horizon staffers weeks after closing $28B deal

The latest round of cuts brings the company’s total announced workforce reductions this year to more than 1,000.

By Kristin Jensen • Oct. 25, 2023

OrbiMed raises $4.3B in new funds for startup investing

The money will be spread across three investment funds and comes at a time when investment into biotech remains shakier than in years past.

By Delilah Alvarado • Oct. 24, 2023

Roche to gain gut disease drug in $7.1B deal for Roivant subsidiary

The Swiss pharma has agreed to buy Televant, a company set up by Roivant and Pfizer to develop a promising inflammatory bowel disease treatment.

By Ned Pagliarulo • Oct. 23, 2023

Merck cancer drug deal caps pharma investment influx into ‘ADC’ field

With the alliance, Merck joins Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Gilead in staking major bets on the potential for antibody-drug conjugates to reshape cancer treatment.

By Jonathan Gardner • Oct. 20, 2023

Roche is stuck on molecular glue

One month after Roche’s Genentech inked a similar deal, the Swiss pharma is now paying $50 million to work with Monte Rosa on molecular glue medicines for cancer and neurological diseases.

By Jacob Bell • Oct. 17, 2023

Novo adds to deal spree with blood pressure drug buy

Worth up to $1.3 billion, the deal with Singapore-based KBP Biosciences builds the Ozempic maker’s armory of metabolic disease drugs.

By Jonathan Gardner • Oct. 16, 2023

‘Project NextGen’ picks new mRNA, intranasal COVID vaccines for funding

The awards, to biotechs Gritstone, Codagenix and CastleVax, are part of the program’s plan to develop vaccines with broader or longer-lasting benefits.

By Delilah Alvarado • Oct. 13, 2023

European Commission orders Illumina to divest Grail

The order includes an undisclosed timeline and potential additional fines. Illumina, which has been anticipating the decision, maintains the commission does not have jurisdiction over the completed merger.

By Susan Kelly • Oct. 12, 2023

After summer slump, biotech M&A has a good week

There have been few bigger-ticket acquisitions recently. But a string of deals announced in early October, including the purchase of Orchard Therapeutics, may affirm the forecasts of analysts who expect M&A to tick up.

By Jacob Bell • Oct. 10, 2023

Bristol Myers to buy KRAS cancer drug developer Mirati for $4.8B

Mirati investors could also receive another $1 billion should an experimental cancer drug the biotech is developing make it to U.S. regulators’ desks.

By Ned Pagliarulo • Oct. 8, 2023

Amgen completes $28B Horizon buyout that was challenged by FTC

Regulators’ holdup of the deal had stoked investor fears of greater scrutiny on M&A. In the end, Amgen agreed to requirements meant to guard against product “bundling.”

By Jonathan Gardner • Oct. 6, 2023

AbbVie acquires Parkinson’s drug in latest biotech buyout

The company exercised an option to buy Mitokinin, a private, Pfizer-backed drugmaker built on work by scientific co-founders Nicholas Hertz and Kevan Shokat.

By Jacob Bell • Oct. 5, 2023

Regeneron, Intellia target neurological diseases in expanded gene editing deal

The longtime partners believe that, by combining their technologies, they can create “in vivo” genetic medicines for nervous system and muscular disorders.

By Jacob Bell • Oct. 3, 2023

Lilly to enter radiopharmaceutical drug field with $1.4B Point buyout

Point Biopharma is one of the most advanced in a group of emerging biotechs working on radioligand therapies for cancer.

By Ned Pagliarulo • Oct. 3, 2023

Viatris sells off consumer, women’s health drugs in asset sales

The divestments will bring in more than $3 billion as the company works to reduce its debt and plan for future business development.

By Jonathan Gardner • Oct. 2, 2023

Roche bets on Ionis RNA medicines with neuroscience deal

The Swiss drugmaker is restocking its pipeline by buying into preclinical Ionis medicines for Alzheimer’s and Huntington’s diseases.

By Jonathan Gardner • Sept. 27, 2023

Intercept, after biotech rollercoaster ride, agrees to buyout by Alfasigma

Once valued at more than $7 billion, the liver drug company couldn’t secure a long-sought FDA approval in NASH and last month said it would abandon that research.

By Jonathan Gardner • Sept. 26, 2023

Roche’s Genentech bets on radiopharmaceuticals in partnership with PeptiDream

The new deal expands on a yearslong partnership between the two drug developers to advance targeted radioisotopes for certain cancers.

By Delilah Alvarado • Sept. 20, 2023

Novartis cancels Beigene partnership as cancer drug gains EU approval

The terminated deal leaves Novartis without a PD-1 inhibitor nine years after Merck’s Keytruda won its first approval.

By Jonathan Gardner • Sept. 19, 2023

Bausch + Lomb seeks funding for eye drug acquisition from Novartis

Fitch Ratings called the deal to buy the Xiidra treatment “strategically sound” even as the company’s plan for funding the deal would increase its leverage.

By Nick Paul Taylor • Sept. 12, 2023

Kriya, flush with funding, buys a gene therapy for NASH

Fresh off a Series C fundraise, Kriya has acquired the privately held Tramotane Therapeutics and its preclinical candidate for the widely prevalent liver disease.

By Kristin Jensen • Sept. 7, 2023

Nestle gives up on peanut allergy treatment after sluggish sales

The FDA-approved therapy, called Palforzia, was little used, leading Nestle to abandon a business it had secured in a $2.6 billion deal three years ago.

By Delilah Alvarado • Sept. 5, 2023

FTC allows Amgen’s $28B deal for Horizon to go through, with conditions

The settlement between Amgen and the FTC may reassure those in the industry who feared a more activist regulator would gum up dealmaking.

By Jonathan Gardner • Sept. 1, 2023

Novo, continuing deal streak, buys another obesity drug startup

The acquisition of Embark Biotech, which Novo helped found, gives the company another prospect to add to its arsenal of weight-loss medicines.

By Jonathan Gardner • Aug. 30, 2023

FTC pulls back on legal challenge to Amgen’s $28B bid for Horizon

Urged by a judge, the antitrust regulator said it wants to start discussions “regarding the proper resolution of this matter” — a potential prelude to a settlement.

By Jonathan Gardner • Aug. 28, 2023