Kevin Grogan

Deal Snapshot: December is just over a week old but the UK giant has packed a lot in, signing collaborations with likes of Duality Biologics (cancer) and Muna Therapeutics (neurodegeneration). Now it is targeting fibrotic diseases and osteoarthritis after inking a deal with Relation Therapeutics.

Founder Ken Mulvany has returned to the artificial intelligence drug discovery specialist determined to ensure it plays to its “foundational strengths.” The UK firm has therefore initiated a major restructuring plan, along with the intention to delist from Euronext Amsterdam.

The French group says it can only fund operations in the first quarter of 2025 but having secured “a clear and reasonable pathway towards an accelerated approval” after talks with the US Food and Drug Administration for its Viaskin Peanut patch in toddlers, the future is looking much brighter.

The company's deupirfenidone, a selectively deuterated version of Roche's Esbriet, has bested the original in a Phase IIb trial in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients. Now, PureTech can finalize the Phase III program and decide how to finance it.

Almost three years to the day, Novartis and UCB heralded a pact that could have been worth $1.5bn to the Brussels-based group for a first-in-class, small-molecule, alpha-synuclein misfolding inhibitor for Parkinson’s disease. However, after a Phase IIa fail, the development of minzasolmin has been terminated.

Faced with going out of business after repeated Phase II fails in a variety of tumor types for its investigational universal cancer vaccine, Norway's Ultimovacs has been saved by compatriot Zelluna.

Certa and OccuRx both came out of Fibrotech and are now joining forces to advance asengeprast as a potential therapy for scleroderma and focal segmental glomerulosclerosis.

The biopharma sector has once again experienced highs and lows this year. With just a week left, and in no particular order, Scrip takes a look at five of the biggest stories of 2024.

The Swiss group has had an up and down year and it is not ending well, as the proposed sale of its recently-approved antihypertensive Tryvio has been delayed.

The partners have decided to voluntarily withdraw their EU marketing application for datopotamab deruxtecan in lung cancer, based on regulator feedback, a month after a similar move in the US.