Biotherapeutics

Northwest Biotherapeutics, a biotechnology company developing DCVax personalised immune therapies for solid tumour cancers in the United States, has announced the closing of a $15 million financing.  The company plans to use the funding to help accelerate its activities related to its brain cancer programme.    The financing is in the form of a 22-month loan which requires no payments for eight […]

Twist Bioscience has launched Revelar Biotherapeutics to develop and commercialise an antibody that neutralises all known variants of concern of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in preclinical studies.   In addition, Revelar will have the ability to leverage the antibody discovery and optimisation platform of Twist Biopharma to license additional antibodies for up to five targets over the next four years.  Emily Leproust, CEO and co-founder of Twist Bioscience, said: […]

The importance of biotherapeutics as a class of drugs continues to increase. Indeed, their low toxicity and high specificity justify their investigation as drug candidates. Yet, quantification studies of biotherapies in complex biological matrices can be very challenging. In particular, high background noise and interferences due to endogenous proteins may compromise the assay. Dr. Xin Zhang, […]

Beximco Pharmaceuticals has launched a generic molnupiravir, an oral antiviral drug for symptomatic Covid-19 patients developed by Merck, Sharp & Dohme (MSD) and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, following Emergency Use Authorisation by the Directorate General of Drug Administration (DGDA), the regulatory authority in Bangladesh.   Molnupiravir is world’s first oral product to treat symptomatic Covid-19, which was approved by the UK’s Medicines and […]

The importance of biotherapeutics as a class of drugs continues to increase. Indeed, their low toxicity and high specificity justify their investigation as drug candidates. Yet, quantification studies of biotherapies in complex biological matrices can be very challenging. In particular, high background noise and interferences due to endogenous proteins may compromise the assay. Dr. Xin Zhang, […]

The MHRA has authorised Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics’ molnupiravir pill for the treatment of at-risk Covid-19 patients, following positive clinical trial results. Molnupiravir is the first oral antiviral medicine authorised for the treatment of mild-to-moderate Covid-19 in adults with a positive SARS-CoV-2 diagnostic test and who have at least one risk factor for developing severe illness.   In the […]

PerkinElmer is expanding its Horizon Discovery CHOSOURCE platform to include a new expression cell line, CHO-K1 ADCC+, which may improve potency and efficacy of therapeutic antibodies and fusion protein biotherapeutics, as well as reduce dosage requirements and side effects for patients.   This new expression host was built from Horizon’s biomanufacturing cell line, CHO-K1 GS KO, […]

Gene therapies could revolutionise the management of chronic cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) such as heart failure, according to GlobalData. The data and analytics company notes that there are currently 87* CVD gene therapies currently in development, and they hold potential to vastly improve patients’ quality of life.  Fiona Chisholm, Pharma Analyst at GlobalData said: “As the leading cause of death […]

Fusion Antibodies has entered into a commercial collaboration with Eurofins to provide laboratories worldwide with high-quality, cost-effective and efficient services that work with one another to support biotherapeutic discovery.   Under the agreement, Fusion Antibodies will provide comprehensive pre-clinical antibody development services from discovery, engineering, and critical reagent supply to Eurofins so that together they can provide a […]

News round-up by DDW’s Megan Thomas for 16-20 August  DDW’s Megan Thomas selects five news stories which spotlight the deals, collaborations and funding keeping the industry moving forward, enabling academics and drug developers to continue with life-saving research.   1. OGT training initiative with CytoCell University  OGT has expanded its activities with CytoCell University, an initiative that provides training to scientists […]