🔬 Latest pharma industry updates 👇
🤝 Merck is acquiring Terns Pharmaceuticals for about $6.7B, adding TERN-701 in Phase 1/2 for chronic myeloid leukemia, as it prepares for future Keytruda patent loss.
💰 Earendil Labs raised $787M to scale an AI-driven pipeline of biologics for autoimmune diseases and cancer, backed by investors including Sanofi.
🤝 Gilead Sciences will buy Ouro Medicines for up to about $2.2B to strengthen immunology, gaining OM336, a BCMAxCD3 T-cell engager in early trials for severe autoimmune diseases like AIHA and ITP.
✅ Corcept Therapeutics won FDA approval for Lifyorli with nab-paclitaxel in platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, marking the 1st approved selective glucocorticoid receptor antagonist.
⚖️ Novo Nordisk sued in India to stop Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories’s from selling generic semaglutide as “Olymviq,” arguing the name is too close to Ozempic.
🏢 Recordati confirmed possible takeover discussions with CVC Capital Partners, with a reported offer that could value the Italian drugmaker at roughly €11B.
🤝 Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. will acquire Transcend Therapeutics for up to $1.3B, to gain an experimental psychiatric medicine being explored for PTSD and other mental health disorders.
🌏 China pledged fairer trade and more openness to foreign companies, including in pharma, promising stronger IP protection, clearer policies, and equal treatment for international drugmakers.
🤝 Novartis will acquire Excellergy in a deal worth up to $2B to gain Exl-111, an experimental allergy therapy targeting IgE that could improve on widely used medicine Xolair.
🦠 Valneva and Pfizer reported positive Phase 3 Lyme vaccine data, but markets reacted cautiously because the trial narrowly missed the prespecified statistical threshold.
💶 Abivax ended 2025 with €530.4M in cash, funding operations into Q4 2027, while confirming no new safety signal in Phase 3 ulcerative colitis testing of obefazimod ahead of key data due by end-Q2 2026.
🔬 Sanofi licensed Kali Therapeutics’s Phase 1 trispecific T-cell engager KT501 for autoimmune diseases for up to $1.2B total.
🤝 Merck also partnered with Quotient Therapeutics, paying up to $2.2B total, to use somatic genomics to discover new inflammatory bowel disease drug targets.
💰 Shionogi & Co., Ltd will pay $100M upfront to buy Apnimed’s 50% stake in their sleep-disorder joint venture.
🏦 RA Capital filed a $50M SPAC aimed at merging with a China-based biotech or healthcare company, betting both on a SPAC comeback and China’s continued strength in clinical-stage biotech assets.
🧠 FDA granted accelerated approval to Denali Therapeutics’s Avlayah for Hunter syndrome, the 1st biologic designed to reach the brain and treat neurological symptoms.