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If racial justice wasn’t front of mind for biopharma, the events of 2020, from the COVID-19 pandemic to police brutality, put it there. Companies are tackling the issue on multiple fronts, including diversifying their workforce and making sure they’re testing their drugs in diverse populations. With its latest efforts, Eli Lilly is focusing on building startups.The company invested $30 million in Unseen Capital Health Fund, a venture fund aimed at supporting founders of early-stage healthcare companies who are Black or of other racial minorities, Lilly announced on Friday. In addition to identifying, funding and supporting minority-led businesses, the fund will…

Earlier this week at the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, Thermo Fisher Scientific CEO Marc Casper said 2021 is going to be a year that sees the company quickly accelerate its long-term plans, including a full pipeline of M&A deals. He wasn’t kidding.Buoyed by revenues from COVID-19 testing over the past year, Thermo Fisher announced that it has now acquired Henogen, Novasep’s viral vector manufacturing division, for about €725 million or $878.2 million in cash. Henogen provides contract manufacturing services from formulation to packaging across two locations in Belgium, and maintains over 75,000 square feet of production space and about 400…

Xontogeny’s Landos Biopharma is jumping into warm biotech IPO waters as it looks to go public with a $100 million offering. Landos is based upon the work of CEO Josep Bassaganya-Riera, Ph.D., a serial entrepreneur and Virginia Tech professor who outlined the potential for targeting the lanthionine synthetase c-like protein 2 (LANCL2) pathway to affect immune and inflammatory responses in a 2014 paper. Bassaganya-Riera went on to discover a drug that selectively binds to LANCL2, found Landos and pick up $10 million from Perceptive Advisors to drive its lead program. Landos Biopharma was the first biotech to come out of…

Philips and Germany’s Merck KGaA have launched a multi-year partnership to help bring digital technologies to fertility treatments—combining informatics, mobile ultrasound diagnostics and more.Using artificial intelligence and remote patient monitoring services, the two companies hope to provide highly personalized solutions, plus information guiding the choice and timing of treatments to help maximize the chance of conception. “The journey for aspiring parents is sometimes a difficult one, and by collaborating with Merck, a world leader in fertility treatment, we aim to develop integrated digital solutions that improve the patient experience and can ultimately have a positive impact on health outcomes,” said…

Maybe you have started a business or are running from pillar to post to pick up your existing business. Digital Marketing is the solution to all your problems. No matter what the scale of your business is big or small – digital marketing is accessible to everyone. Digital marketing helps to build the customer base and grow the business. Digital Marketing is an umbrella term that covers a plethora of digital marketing services. However, it is imperative to follow the right practices if you want to get the right results. Here are some tips that will help you to boost…

All eyes are on Biogen’s aducanumab as the FDA’s decision date for the controversial Alzheimer’s drug looms.FDA staff found the drug’s data package “highly persuasive” in briefing documents published in November, but a panel of outside experts disagreed, panning it in multiple votes. However, industry watchers and executives are hopeful for approval come March, partly because of a dearth of approvals since that of Namenda (memantine) nearly 20 years ago. Virtual Clinical Trials Summit Virtual Clinical Trials Summit: The Premier Educational Event Focused on Decentralized Clinical Trials In this virtual environment, we will look at current and future trends for…

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues apace, Steris has moved to acquire Cantel Medical in a $4.6 billion deal for its portfolio of infection prevention products aimed at safeguarding endoscopic and dental procedures.The cash and stock transaction comes in at $84.66 per share for Cantel, equivalent to its Jan. 11 closing price, amounting to about $3.6 billion in total equity value. The remaining $1 billion accounts for Cantel’s net debt and convertible notes. “The last year has demonstrated more than ever the importance of innovative and comprehensive infection prevention and control solutions that protect healthcare providers and patients,” Cantel CEO George…

We’re used to formal clothing expensive hotels and meeting venues that solitary confinement cells look spacious, with the offer of $20 coffees (if spending a minimum of $100), but this year, things are very different. We are not in San Francisco, but all watching from our desks, remembering how this time last year a strange pneumonia-like illness appeared to be taking hold in China, but that it was likely largely under control. How wrong we were. The show must go on, virtually however, and whilst the J.P. Morgan Healthcare conference has become a little more muted for major deals and…

The FDA is alerting healthcare professionals that mutations in the novel coronavirus’s genetic code—such as the type powering the fast-spreading variant identified in the U.K.—can trigger false negative results in gold-standard COVID-19 tests.Accuracy can suffer if the alterations occur within the specific region of the virus’s RNA used by molecular diagnostics to line up a positive result, which may vary product to product, the agency said. While FDA staff said they believe these risks are low, the agency listed three currently authorized tests—Thermo Fisher’s TaqPath combo kit, Mesa Biotech’s hand-held Accula test and Applied DNA Sciences’ Linea assay—that may be…

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has tapped LabCorp to help conduct a large-scale genomic study tracking new mutations in the COVID-19 virus—after a fast-spreading variant, first identified in the U.K., has recently surfaced on U.S. shores.The public health agency plans to collect random samples from across the country, to provide a baseline that will enable national and state-level surveillance programs to hone in on emerging cases. With the addition of LabCorp’s facilities, the CDC said it aims to more than double the number of genomic samples sequenced per week. Virtual Clinical Trials Summit Virtual Clinical Trials Summit: The…