biopharma

Building on existing integrations with cloud leaders AWS and Google Cloud and collaborations with Arcadia and TD2, Atropos Health is now partnering with Merck. This new collaboration will tap Atropos Health’s GENEVA OS (Generative Evidence Acceleration Operating System) and related tools with the aim of speeding the generation of real-world evidence. Under the agreement, Merck’s…

What’s the difference between a multimodal generative AI system to plan a vacation itinerary versus guiding cancer treatment? For the former, data quality is a definite plus, but for the latter, it’s indispensable. “If I ask ChatGPT to plan a vacation for me and it spits out something, I might sit there and second guess…

[Updated May 21, 2024.] 2023 may not go down as the brightest year for the pharma sector, but the entry of Novo Nordisk’s Ozempic (semaglutide) into the ranks of top-selling drugs like Keytruda, Dupixent, and Eliquis signals a new era in the treatment of metabolic disease. Novo Nordisk’s sales jumped by more than one-third in…

A recent review of financial data from 25 major pharmaceutical companies reveals an inconsistent relationship between R&D spending, revenue, and stock returns. The analysis, which included industry giants such as Merck, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and AbbVie, among others, aimed to uncover potential correlations between these key performance indicators. The companies with the highest highest…

Yes, generative AI is hyped. And yes, the technology has shortcomings. But the landscape is swiftly changing. Bloomberg Intelligence estimated that the GenAI market would grow from $40 billion in 2022 to $1.3 trillion by 2032. A recent study from Deloitte Consulting estimates that for a top 10 biopharma company with $65-75 billion in revenue,…

The buzz surrounding generative AI may be undeniable, but its real-world impact on heavily-regulated sectors like drug discovery continues to evolve. Consequently, most drug candidates, circa 90%, continue to fail. Kimberly Powell, vice president of Healthcare at NVIDIA, believes that a new microservices-based offering known as NIMs (NVIDIA Inference Microservices) could help pharma firms navigate…

In 2023, the U.S. continued to demonstrate its position as the biotech funding leader, commanding over one-third, 35%, of the global investment in the sector. Overall, U.S. biotech firms attracted $56.79 billion in funding, according to a survey of Crunchbase data. Next in line was China, which contributed about 12.7% to the global funding pool,…

Zai Lab is a global biopharmaceutical company founded in 2014 and based in China and the U.S.. Led by Chairperson and CEO Dr. Samantha Du, the company now has more than 2,000 employees internationally. Focusing on developing novel therapies for oncology, autoimmune disorders, infectious diseases, and neurological disorders, it has built a broad pipeline of…

Genmab’s senior vice president, global head of data science and AI, Hisham Hamadeh, describes the company’s journey to becoming “a data-driven decision-making company.” In one sense, there is little choice but to do so. “We’re swimming in data like never before. We’ve seen the volumes of data, the ability to compute on that data, and…

The White House has released an executive order that contains what it hails as “the most sweeping actions ever taken to protect Americans from the potential risks of AI systems.” Relevant to drug development, a fact sheet on the order describes its aim to help further “the responsible use of AI in healthcare and the…

In the realm of drug discovery, AI is making waves, and 2023 could potentially be a pivotal year for this technology. As the technology enters the popular consciousness, pharma employees are wondering “why they can’t have similar AI-driven tools for their professional tasks,” said Diane Wuest, head of digital R&D at Sanofi, in a recent…

The biopharma industry is pushing back against increased scrutiny of mergers and acquisitions from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). More than 30 biopharma companies and industry associations announced the formation of the Partnership for the U.S. Life Science Ecosystem (PULSE) to advocate for the role of M&A activity in the biopharma sector. A M&A landscape…

To date, there have been more than 770 million confirmed COVID-19 cases and nearly 7 million deaths from the virus, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Vaccines remain one of the most potent tools in blunting the severity of SARS-CoV-2 infection, and vaccine developers have distributed more than 13.5 billion vaccine doses to date.…

The biotech industry is facing a reckoning in 2023. To date, roughly 100 biopharmas have cut workers this year, matching the total number of layoffs in the sector in 2022. Many biotech startups have been hit hard. The wave of job cuts comes on the heels of a biotech boom following the COVID-19 pandemic, when…

The venture capital firm Artis Ventures, founded in 2001, coined the term “techbio” sector to describe biotech platforms where technology and engineering take the lead in advancing drug discovery and biomanufacturing. In circa 2019, the firm contributed to shaping the techbio landscape by setting up venture capital fund named Artis techbio that bridges the gap…

The pharma industry in 2023 has been marked by an uptick of M&A activity. The year began with a relative frenzy of massive mergers. Pfizer’s $43 billion acquisition of Seagen and Amgen’s $27.8 billion purchase of Horizon Therapeutics earlier in the year were notable examples. But that initial spike of billion-dollar megamergers significantly cooled in…

Large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT promise advances that extend beyond capturing public interest. Because transformer models like GPT have an architecture that supports the understanding of language in context, they point to an array of novel possibilities for scientific research. “The transformer architecture is critical,” according to Michael Connell, the chief operating officer…

Cataracts are one of the most common ailments of an aging population, manifesting in the fifth or sixth decade of life. This condition, which leads to blurred or cloudy vision, is caused by proteins that break down in the lens of our eyes, forming an increasingly opaque mass. Although cataracts can cause blindness if untreated,…

Emerging as a spinoff from Alphabet’s experimental division X, SandboxAQ recently pulled back the curtain on its latest endeavor —  the biopharma molecular simulation division AQBioSim. The venture has attracted investments from significant figures like former Alphabet CEO Eric Schmidt, who is now the chair of Sandbox AQ, and Salesforce.com Inc. founder Marc Benioff’s Time…

Vericel (Nasdaq:VCEL), a biopharma focused on sports medicine and severe burn care therapies, has a portfolio including the cartilage repair treatment MACI and the burn treatments Epicel and NexoBrid. Focal cartilage defects, which occur in approximately 60% of arthroscopies, can lead to debilitating osteoarthritis if left untreated. Vericel’s flagship product, MACI, tackles this medical challenge…

After a relatively quiet 2022, 2023 is anticipated to be a more robust year for pharma M&A activity. In recent months, players such as Pfizer (NYSE:PFE), Sanofi (NYSE:SNY), Chiesi, AstraZeneca (LON:AZN) and Amgen (Nasdaq:AMGN) have unveiled acquisition plans that could reshape the landscape of the sector. This article delves into the details of prominent recent…

For the past three years, CRB has published an annual report on the life sciences with an emphasis on the biopharma industry.  The latest Horizons: Life Sciences report, clocking in just short of 100 pages in length, relies on feedback from approximately 500 respondents from North America and Europe. A significant number of those respondents are managers,…

The pandemic exposed the innovation divide between the digitally transformed and those that lagged. Strict regulation made life sciences and bio/pharma organizations hesitant to modernize too quickly away from proven legacy methods and technologies, resulting in varying levels of digital transformation. But since the pandemic, organizations now recognize the necessity of digitalization and smart automation…

The pharmaceutical industry appears to have addressed a decade-long decline in R&D productivity, according to a recent analysis from Deloitte. In 2021, the projected R&D return on investment (ROI) rose 7%. For comparison, the ROI level in 2010 was 2.7%. Forecast peak sales per asset hit $521 million, up more than 23% over the $422 million…

The pharma industry has been slower to embrace technologies such as AI and digital technology than many less-regulated sectors. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the equation, forcing pharma companies to become more agile and open-minded in approaching drug discovery and development, including managing evolving clinical trials. In this article, several experts offered their predictions of…