By John Carroll Novartis ($NVS) CEO Joe Jimenez took a minute during a recent interview with Fortune to explain the company’s drug development strategy. Rather than go after a blockbuster indication, Novartis scientists are more focused on pathways. By pursuing a particular disease pathway with a drug designed to treat a rare disease, Novartis improves …
By Tracy Staton Novartis ($NVS) CEO Joe Jimenez (photo) has a shopping list, and he’s not afraid to share it. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Jimenez chatted about his appetite for deals with theWall Street Journal and with Reuters, saying that the drugmaker will be able to pay down debt and buy back stock, all while snapping up select …
By Tracy Staton Already beefing up operations in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Novartis now plans to double the size of that expansion to $600 million. The new office and lab complex will also get an extra 200 to 300 employees over the next five years, the Boston Globe reports. The Swiss drugmaker is aiming to work more closely with …
By John Carroll Novartis is turning to J. Craig Venter to help blaze a development shortcut that can carve weeks off the time it takes to ramp up production of a new flu vaccine. One of the bottlenecks that appeared while developing a vaccine to fight swine flu occurred as the World Health Organization identified …
By John Carroll Underscoring the rich potential of new siRNA therapeutics, Novartis has agreed to pay Quark Pharmaceuticals up to $680 million to nail the licensing rights to a new therapy for kidney-related diseases. Quark will get $10 million upfront for an option on QPI-1002, which is currently in Phase II for kidney-related conditions. If …
By Maureen Martino Novartis this week announced results from a small clinical trial of a new drug which could help improve behaviors resulting from fragile X syndrome, an inherited genetic condition that can cause retardation and autism and affects one in 5,000 children. The study involved just a few dozen subjects, and only some of those …
By John Carroll Shares of Boulder, CO-based Array BioPharma () spiked 33 percent overnight after the developer announced that it had inked a $467 million oncology pact with Novartis. The deal includes a $45 million upfront and milestone payment for ARRY-162, a back-up small molecule, as well as additional MEK inhibitors. The terms of the deal …
By Maureen Martino Novartis is touting more positive data for Gilenia (FTY720), the company’s late-stage oral multiple sclerosis drug. The data, which were presented at the American Academy of Neurology meeting, demonstrated that Gilenia prevented relapse in 62 percent of treatment-naïve patients, while relapse rates were reduced by 44 percent in those who’d already received other treatments. …
