Author: Jean-Claude Muller, 穆卓Executive Editor at BtoBioInnovation, jcm@btobioinnovation.com

Business

Sanofi enters a strategic collaboration with Ablynx (Ghent, Belgium) to develop nanobody-based therapeutics focused on immune-mediated inflammatory diseases. Sanofi will gain access to certain Nanobodies in Ablynx's existing portfolio as well as to Ablynx's proprietary Nanobody platform with exclusive global rights to certain multi-specific Nanobodies against selected targets, with options for similar rights to additional targets, for a total of eight potential Nanobody product candidates.  Under the terms of the deal Sanofi will make a modest €23 million upfront payment and a €8 million research funding for the initially selected targets. Upon exercise of options to additional targets, Sanofi will pay Ablynx further option exercise fees and research funding worth up to €2.4 billion plus tiered royalties on net sales. Sanofi will be responsible for the development, manufacturing and commercialisation of any products resulting from this agreement. Ablynx has already partenered its nanobody technology to Boehringer Ingelheim, Merck & Co, Merck KGaA, Novartis, Novo Nordisk and Taisho Pharma.

A recent survey by GlobalData indicated that the global immunology market will increase from about $58 billion in 2016 to $75 billion in 2022.

Shire and Novimmune enter a license agrrement on a preclinical bispecific antibody candidate as a treatment for hemophilia A. Under the undisclosed terms of the agreement Shire will be leading the development of the program to “optimize and evaluate” a fully-human, bispecific IgG antibody targeting FIXa and FX, designed to copy the body’s natural mechanism of Factor VIII-driven coagulation. The drug will be competing with Roche’s emicizumab, also a bispecific monoclonal antibody targeting factor IXa and Factor X.

Roche stops its collaboration with Oryzon on ORY-1001, aimed at treating acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and solid tumors, which it signed back in 2014. ORY-1001 is a lysine-specific demethylase- 1 (LSD1) inhibitor, a histone-modifying enzyme that acts on leukemic stem cells by regulating gene expression. LSD1 expression is also upregulated in some solid tumors. “We have been informed that the decision was not data driven but a consequence of internal reprioritization of Roche’s pipeline. During the next weeks, Oryzon will focus its efforts to regain the control of the asset as soon as possible to ensure the continuation of the clinical development plan without interruptions,” Oryzon CEO Carlos Buesa said in a statement.

Bioevents

Nordic Life Science Days (NLS) 2017 on September 12-14 in Malmö-Copenhagen (Sweden and Denmark)

BIOPharm America on September 26-27 in Boston (USA)

BIO Latin America on October 26-28 in Sao Paulo (Brazil)

BIO Europe on November 6-8 in Berlin (Germany)

World Congress on Biomedical Engineering 2017 on November 9-11 in Xian (China)

BIOFIT on November 28-29 in Strasbourg (France)

http://btobioinnovation.com/events/pharma-biotech-events/

http://btobioinnovation.com/events/in-vitro-diagnostic-events/

This document has been prepared by btobioinnovation and is provided to you for information purposes only.  The information contained in this document has been obtained from sources that btobioinnovation believes are reliable but btobioinnovation does not warrant that it is accurate or complete. The views presented in this document are those of btobioinnovation’s editor at the time of writing and are subject to change.  btobioinnovation has no obligation to update its opinions or the information in this document.