Pfizer, Bristol-Myers Squibb to fund study of Portola's blood-thinner antidote

Portola CEO Bill Lis.

Portola Pharmaceuticals Inc. will get an undisclosed amount of cash in a deal with Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. and Pfizer Inc. to test its experimental treatment to reverse the effect of blood-thinning Factor Xa inhibitor drugs, the company said Thursday.

The antidote, called PRT-4445, is supposed to reverse the anticoagulation work of so-called Factor Xa inhibitors, including Eliquis from Bristol-Myers Squibb (NYSE: BMY) and Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) and South San Francisco-based Portola's betrixaban.

Alzheimer's drug failure translates into more job cuts in South San Francisco

Add about 130 jobs at Johnson & Johnson -- most of them in South San Francisco -- to the cuts following the failure of the experimental Alzheimer's disease drug bapineuzumab.
The move by the New Brunswick, N.J.-based drug giant (NYSE: JNJ) and its Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy Research & Development LLC unit comes as no surprise after the July and August announcements that bapineuzumab failed a handful of Phase III trials. Still, the decision adds to the South San Francisco workforce woes surrounding the drug.
Elan Corp., which originally developed the drug with Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, has said in regulatory filings that it will close its roughly 400-person South San Francisco drug discovery operations.

One-on-One with Medivation CEO David Hung

Medivation's David Hung.

The story of Medivation Inc. could belong in the collection of biotech’s greatest comebacks. The San Francisco company (NASDAQ: MDVN), partner Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and investors pinned many of their hopes on Dimebon, but even before that drug failed, Medivation was working on what now is called Xtandi in prostate cancer. I spoke with Medivation President and CEO David Hung about Xtandi, the competition in the prostate cancer drug arena, Medivation’s pipeline and the likelihood of bringing Dimebon back as an Alzheimer's-fighting drug.

Pfizer taps Pleasanton's SFJ Pharma to run late-stage lung cancer trial

SFJ Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Pleasanton-based company formed to run clinical trials for large drug companies, will conduct a Phase III trial of Pfizer Inc.'s experimental lung cancer drug dacomitinib. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but SFJ said it will fund and supervise the trial across sites in Asia and Europe that will help the world's largest drug maker (NYSE: PFE) submit dacomitinib for regulatory approval.

Elan looks to spin Alzheimer's research into South S.F.-based company

Fresh from the failure of an Alzheimer's disease drug, Elan Corp. plans to spin off its South San Francisco-based Neotope research organization into a separate company. Neotope was established in 2010 to identify targets for chronic degenerative diseases and other diseases, the company said, but the spinoff depends on approval by shareholders and holders of Elan's 2016 notes. If approved, Elan (NYSE: ELN)) said, a listing for Neotope Biosciences could be on a U.S. exchange by the end of this year. The company would be incorporated in Ireland, which also is Elan's home.

Growing Nodality strikes drug-development deal with Pfizer

Nodality Inc. scored a deal Thursday to help Pfizer Inc., the world's largest drug maker, better develop drugs. The multi-year deal, financial terms for which weren't disclosed, initially will focus on autoimmune diseases, particularly lupus. Plus, Pfizer has an option to use Nodality's technology to develop companion diagnostics.

Alzheimer's drug bapineuzumab fails late-stage trial, research dropped

Bapineuzumab, one of the drug-development industry's promising Alzheimer's disease treatments, failed in a late-stage trial, dealing another blow to the Alzheimer's community of patients, doctors and caregivers. The news came on the same day as researchers from the Gladstone Institutes in San Francisco said they discovered an already-approved anti-epilepsy drug that may eventually be used by Alzheimer's patients. Until then, however, bapineuzumab's second failure in four Phase III studies deals Alzheimer's patients another in a long string of disappointments. Partners Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy R&D LLC said they would discontinue their research of intravenous bapineuzumab in patients in mild to moderate stages of the disease.

Researchers: Medivation's failed Alzheimer's drug deserves another shot

Medivation Inc.'s failed Alzheimer's drug Dimebon deserves a second chance, a group of researchers say. Dimebon in March 2010 flamed out in a Phase III trial that disappointed Alzheimer's disease patients and their advocates, leading San Francisco-based Medivation (NASDAQ: MDVN) to squash a planned space expansion and lay off employees. Medivation, which was working with Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) on Dimebon, has bounced back in spectacular style under CEO David Hung. Its prostate cancer drug enzalutamide is under priority review by the Food and Drug Administration, and its stock has crested $100 per share, a 520 percent increase in the past nine months. Now an international team, led by researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, believes that Dimebon, too, may be in line for a comeback.

Biotech Day: Tuesday morning's national biotech news

From the 40 business journals of American City Business Journals …

Shareholders seek to block Human Genome Sciences buyout (Baltimore Business Journal)
Two shareholders of Human Genome Sciences Inc. have filed a lawsuit to blockthe acquisition by GlaxoSmithKline. The class-action complaint says the company failed to give stockholders a “meaningful chance to review material information” about the offer, according to documents filed in the U.S. District Court in Delaware. The lawsuit also seeks a temporary restraining order on the deal.

Alzheimer's drug bapineuzumab fails late-stage trial (San Francisco Business Times)

A closely watched Alzheimer's drug trial failed a late-stage test, Pfizer Inc. said Monday. The trial is the first of four with bapineuzumab by Pfizer partner Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy R&D LLC of South San Francisco. The trial of the intravenous drug focused on patients with mild-to-moderate Alzheimer's disease who carry a specific genotype called ApoE4.

Cerulean Pharma launches ovarian cancer trial (Boston Business Journal)
Cerulean Pharma Inc., a privately held developer of cancer drugs delivered by tiny nanoparticles, has launched a Phase 2 study of its lead drug candidate in ovarian cancer patients who are resistant to some other drugs. The ovarian cancer study is targeting patients whose cancer has advanced despite treatment with standard platinum therapy.


Chronic-pain drug developer Relmada raises $3 million (Philadelphia Business Journal)
Relmada Therapeutics raised $3 million in a private stock sale, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission Monday. The Blue Bell, Pa., clinical-stage pharmaceutical company is specializing in developing prescription products used to manage chronic pain.

Cancer drug combo of Nexavar and Tarceva fails late-stage trial (San Francisco Business Times)
Nexavar, the blockbuster cancer drug from Bayer HealthCare and Onyx Pharmaceuticals Inc., failed a late-stage trial that looked at combining the drug with the Genentech-developed Tarceva in patients with advanced liver cancer. Onyx and Bayer said in a press release Monday that combining Nexavar and Tarceva tablets in the 720-patient, Phase III trial did not improve overall survival of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma, or HCC. The trial compared the combination therapy to Nexavar alone.

Jeffrey Boily.

Up Close: Jeffrey Boily, CEO of the Center for Animal Health Innovation (Kansas City Business Journal)
Jeffrey Boily is CEO of the Center for Animal Health Innovation, an Olathe research advocate the Kansas Bioscience Authoritycreated last year to help academic and private-enterprise researchers identify the most promising animal health breakthroughs and turn them into saleable products. (Kansas City Business Journal subscription required.)

Integra Group bought by Ohio-based NAMSA (Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal)
The Integra Group, a medical research firm with about 50 employees, has been sold to North American Science Associates Inc. for an undisclosed amount. Northwood, Ohio-based NAMSA has about 550 employees, including those from Integra. The company provides testing and consulting services to medical-device makers.

Halo signs license agreement with University of North Dakota (Los Angeles Business)
Halo Healthcare Inc. has signed a definitive license agreement with the University of North Dakota to develop biomarkers for the early detection of breast cancer.

OneWorld Health's Ponni Subbiah.

Pfizer veteran to lead nonprofit drug developer OneWorld Health (San Francisco Business Times)
OneWorld Health named Dr. Ponni Subbiah as its first global program leader, responsible for the South San Francisco nonprofit's drug development portfolio. Subbiah is a 15-year veteran of Pfizer Inc., where she most recently was vice president of global access within the world's largest drugmaker's emerging markets business unit. She will join OneWorld Health on Aug. 1.

BioHealth Innovation adds staff, space in quest to help Maryland companies win more funding (Baltimore Business Journal)
BioHealth Innovation Inc. is adding staff and office space to expand its operations in central Maryland. The Rockville-based organization has created a new position, director of innovation programs, to lead the organization’s effort to help Maryland companies get a greater share of federal funding intended for near-commercialization projects.

Arizona biotech leader Jeff Morhet dies in plane crash in Colorado (Phoenix Business Journal)
Jeff Morhet, 43, who was active in Arizona’s biotechnology industry, died in a plane crash July 21. He was flying his CJ-6A airplane with his oldest son Jack, 9, when the plane crashed and both were killed.

St. Pete medical device company wins $4M patent infringement verdict (Tampa Bay Business Journal)
A St. Petersburg medical device company won a $4 million jury verdict in a patent case where the Ohio Willow Wood Co. was found to have willfully broken patents on 13 different products. Since the infringement was willful, the judge has an option to increase the jury’s verdict to as much as $12 million to ALPS South LLC.


KV Pharma receives another delisting notice (St. Louis Business Journal)
KV Pharmaceutical Co. officials said the company has been notified by the New York Stock Exchange that it is below listing standard criteria due to the company’s average market capitalization being less than $50 million over a 30-day trading period and its stockholder’s equity being less than $50 million.

Alzheimer's drug bapineuzumab fails late-stage trial

A closely watched Alzheimer's drug trial failed a late-stage test, Pfizer Inc. said Monday. The trial is the first of four with bapineuzumab by Pfizer partner Janssen Alzheimer Immunotherapy R&D LLC of South San Francisco. The trial of the intravenous drug focused on patients with mild-to-moderate Alzheimer's disease who carry a specific genotype called ApoE4.

Sutro Biopharma lines up funding, targets cancer

Sutro Biopharma Inc. is ready for war. The South San Francisco biotech company closed the second tranche of a $36 million Series C venture round, it said Tuesday, and is readying the infrastructure it needs to produce highly targeted, cancer-fighting antibody-drug conjugates.

Quark, Pfizer to start new mid-stage glaucoma drug trial

Quark Pharmaceuticals Inc. and Pfizer Inc. expanded a nearly 6-year-old drug-development deal to include a mid-stage trial of their RNA interference treatment in a type of glaucoma. Fremont-based Quark said Tuesday that the deal could earn it up to $165 million more in payments from Pfizer around the experimental drug, called PF-655.

ChemoCentryx adds Pfizer's Feczko to board

ChemoCentryx Inc. said Monday it has added retired Pfizer Inc. executive Joseph Feczko to its board of directors, effective immediately. The Mountain View-based clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company (NASDAQ:CCXI) said Feczko was the senior vice president and chief medical officer of Pfizer and member of its executive leadership team with global responsibilities for all aspects of the company's medical, regulatory and safety activities. He retired in May 2009.

Nektar moving 30 research jobs to S.F.

Thirty research jobs will shift to San Francisco by July from a Nektar Therapeutics Inc. facility in Alabama, the company said Tuesday.
The move, the San Francisco-based drug developer (NASDAQ: NKTR) said, will consolidate all of its U.S. research and development work — biology, chemistry and clinical development — at its 102,283-square-foot Mission Bay location. After the move is complete, the San Francisco site will house about 230 employees.

Three more years: Pfizer, QB3 extend, expand collaboration

Pfizer Inc. is reupping a three-year, $9.5 million research collaboration with the University of California’s QB3 institute, but this time it is bringing money for startup life sciences companies to the table.
The world’s largest drug marketer and the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences, or QB3, are expected to announce Friday that they will renew and expand the deal, which has led to 22 joint projects at UC San Francisco, UC Berkeley and UC Santa Cruz. One project was licensed by Pfizer.

UCSF chancellor blows up the boxes to remake campus, UC system

(SF Business Times subscription required.)

When UCSF Chancellor Susan Desmond-Hellmann started her Twitter account last month, she had two goals: do her own micro-blogging and never tweet about eating a tuna fish sandwich for lunch.
The University of California, San Francisco’s ninth chancellor runs little risk of inanity. Some 2-1/2 years into her tenure, Desmond-Hellmann has moved comfortably into her role as UCSF’s face. But more importantly, she is tackling head-on — and with some controversy — the way things are done on her campus and within the UC system.
How those initiatives fare is anyone’s guess. A plan to rework how grant applications are assembled has faced opposition from faculty. Questions also surround an ambitious idea that Desmond-Hellmann pushed at last month’s UC Board of Regents meeting for UCSF to largely split off from the 10-campus UC system.
Regardless, even skeptics applaud Desmond-Hellmann for her bold, pragmatic attempts to deal with an unsteady financial foundation and shake up traditional structures. She is, many say, the right person for the right job at the right time.

Desmond-Hellmann: UCSF wants new structure, transparency around fund flows, IP, more

UCSF Chancellor Susan Desmond-Hellmann is proposing a new structure for her school, loosening the relationship between the healthcare-centric, graduate-level university and the University of California Office of the President.
San Francisco Business Times biotech and education reporter Ron Leuty spoke Friday with Desmond-Hellmann about her plan. Here are parts of that conversation.

Nektar's drug diversity may be its strength

When Howard Robin took over as president and CEO of Nektar Therapeutics Inc. in early 2007, the company was based in San Carlos with a high payroll and, essentially, one product in the form of the inhaled insulin drug-device Exubera.
Since Pfizer Inc. pulled Exubera later that year, Nektar (NASDAQ: NKTR) has moved to San Francisco, shed workers, cut expenses and developed several programs, ranging from breast cancer to pain.
I take a look at one of those drugs, NKTR-181, in a print edition story in the Jan. 20 issue. But the real story here is Nektar’s ongoing metamorphosis from “the inhaled insulin company” to one with the proverbial multiple shots on goal in multiple diseases.

After failed trial, Pfizer, Medivation shut down Alzheimer's drug program

Dimebon is done.
The experimental Alzheimer’s disease drug from San Francisco-based Medivation Inc. (NASDAQ: MDVN) failed a late-stage trial, the company said Monday, and Medivation and partner Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) said they will discontinue development in all diseases.
Dimebon’s demise also will shut down another ongoing study of the small, green tablet in Alzheimer’s patients.
Dimebon failed a high-profile Alzheimer’s trial in 2010 and a late-stage trial in Huntington’s disease last year.

Medivation bounces back with new drug, new lease

The second time may be a charm for Medivation in downtown San Francisco.
Nearly two years ago the San Francisco biotech terminated a 63,817-square-foot lease at 345 Spear St. following a disappointing Phase III trial for Dimebon, the Alzheimer’s drug the company was developing with Pfizer. Now Medivation has a new promising drug ­— this one a late-stage cancer drug — and a big new lease to go along with it.