The Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute (Gates MRI) is a non-profit medical research organization dedicated to the development and effective use of products like drugs, vaccines and monoclonal antibodies to address substantial global health concerns, for which investment incentives are limited, including malaria, tuberculosis, diarrheal diseases, and diseases that impact maternal, newborn, and child health.This week, our guest is Dr Claire Wagner, head of corporate strategy an...

This week, we are taking a look at an important subject, and that is women working as CEOs, or other senior roles, in the biotech space. Kate Yen is the CEO of oncology biotech Auron Therapeutics, and she has spent her entire career in science. Auron is working on the next generation of targeted cancer therapies by identifying and inhibiting the oncogenic cell states of cancer. Auron’s AURIGIN platform uses AI and machine learning to compare normal cell states with cancerous cell st...

Sitryx Therapeutics is a private UK biopharma company founded in 2018. It is a leader in the field of immunometabolism, an area of immunology that looks to rebalance the immune system to achieve sustained disease remission in autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. Sitryx already has big pharma validation following a deal with Eli Lilly in 2020 worth in excess of $1 billion and is focused on advancing its pipeline of potentially first- and best-in-class therapies, which could address a wid...

LinkGevity, founded by two sisters, is developing anti-necrotic technologies, especially for application in kidney disease.Carina Kern is the CEO of the company, while Serena Kern-Libera is the chief operating officer. After reading an article about how space-travel is especially damaging to the kidneys, they applied for a place on the inaugural NASA Space-H Accelerator program, and how medicine can support human deep-space missions.LinkGevity was selected for the program, which is in its ina...

Today, gene therapy is at an exciting inflection point as the industry moves beyond the first generation of these therapies. However, challenges and barriers remain in bringing gene therapies to market, particularly as they expand into more prevalent diseases. Spur Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biotech company dedicated to developing next generation gene therapies for people living with chronic, debilitating diseases. Its lead candidate, FLT201, is an AAV gene therapy for Gaucher...

Antibody-drug conjugates have been an area of great interest in the oncology space in recent years, with a record rate of FDA approvals and dealmaking activity. However balancing efficacy and off-site toxicity has remained a challenge.Some biopharma companies are investing in what they hope will be the next-generation approach to ADCs – bispecific ADCs. More than a dozen early-stage clinical trials are evaluating whether adding a second targeting functionality can improve the preciseness...

Telomeres are structures made from DNA sequences and proteins, and they are found at the ends of chromosomes. In effect, they cap and protect the end of a chromosome. Telomerase is an enzyme that adds DNA to the ends of chromosomes, and it is reactivated in most cancers. Most human tumors not only express telomerase but also have very short telomeres. This makes telomerase a prime target for cancer therapies. MAIA Biotechnology is focused on the pioneering approach of telomere targeting ...

C4 Therapeutics (C4T) is a leader in the targeted protein degradation (TPD) field, with two oncology drug candidates currently in clinical trials and collaborations with pharma companies like Merck, Biogen and Roche. The clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company is dedicated to creating a new generation of medicines using its TORPEDO platform to design and optimize small-molecule medicines to address difficult-to-treat diseases. TORPEDO can design molecular glues and heterobifunction...

Estonia is working on becoming the first country to implement personalized health at scale through the Estonian National Biobank.The biobank uses genetic data to create a picture of the Estonian population, leading to the potential adaptation of public health systems. The Estonian Biobank has samples from 20% of the adult population; in comparison, UK biobanks only represent 0.7% of the population. With so much data, Estonia can determine risk factors for cancer, cardiovascular disease, ...

Inflammation appears to affect almost every part of the human body as we age, including cancer, type-2 diabetes, obesity, and neurodegenerative disorders.NLRP3 inflammasome-induced inflammation is at the root of nearly all disease pathologies including fibrotic, dermatological, rheumatological diseases as well as neurological disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease.Halia Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company pioneering a novel class of small molecule medications designed to...

Tumor infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy uses a person’s own immune cells to fight advanced melanoma, offering new hope for patients who have limited treatment options. This week, we have a conversation with Brian Gastman, EVP of medical affairs at Iovance Biotherapeutics, about TILs and the company’s pipeline.Iovance recently submitted a marketing authorization application to the European Medicines Agency for lifileucel, a TIL cell therapy, for the treatment of adult patients with un...

The development of combination vaccines could represent a significant advancement in the fight against infectious diseases. With the potential to streamline the vaccination process and provide broader protection, these vaccines could greatly improve public health preparedness.Moderna is harnessing the power of its mRNA platform to develop vaccines that target multiple respiratory viruses at once, including COVID-19, RSV, and influenza. The breakthrough technology enables the immune system to ...

Pentixapharm is a clinical-stage radiopharmaceutical development company targeting a range of diseases. While it is currently owned by the Eckert & Ziegler Group, it will soon be spun off as a separate company. Pentixapharm’s clinical pipeline includes PENTIXATHER, am Yttrium-90 based therapeutic against CNS lymphoma, and PENTIXAFOR, a Gallium-68 based companion diagnostic. Additionally, PENTIXAFOR is being developed as a diagnostic tool for primary aldosteronism (PA), a significant ...

There are many questions when it comes to setting up a biotech company, and raising funds. Currently, many companies are concerned about fundraising, but there are things that can be done to maximize efforts. Does a company’s location affect fundraising? What is the best approach to successfully raise funds? What are the current trends in biotech funding?To look at questions surrounding the state of European biotech funding, and how it compares with the global scene, intellectual property, an...

While our podcast takes a brief break, Labiotech invites you to enjoy some of our favorite episodes. We will return with a brand-new episode on August 16, 2024! Have an awesome summer!Epic Bio is an epigenetic editing company, leveraging the power of CRISPR without cutting DNA.The company’s proprietary Gene Expression Modulation System (GEMS) includes the smallest Cas protein known to work in human cells, enabling in vivo or ex vivo delivery via a single viral vector. This week, we discu...

While our podcast takes a brief break, Labiotech invites you to enjoy some of our favorite episodes. We will return with a brand-new episode on August 16, 2024! Have an awesome summer!Artificial intelligence (AI) is certainly in the news constantly; however, it’s been used in drug discovery for some time.A new collaboration between artificial intelligence drug discovery company Insilico Medicine and University of Toronto biochemist and molecular geneticist Igor Stagljar will test AI-designed ...

Aurion Biotech is a US biotech with a regenerative medicine platform, developing novel therapies to restore vision to millions of people in need. This week on the podcast, we have a conversation with CEO Greg Kunst about Aurion’s pipeline, and how the company’s treatment could be the first mass-market cell therapy available.The FDA has granted the company BTD and RMAT designations for AURN001 -- the first-ever allogeneic cell therapy candidate in development to restore vision in patients...

LabGenius is a drug discovery company developing next-generation therapeutic antibodies. The company’s discovery platform, EVA, integrates several technologies drawn from the fields of artificial intelligence (AI), robotic automation and synthetic biology. LabGenius operates under a hybrid business model that involves partnering with large biotech and pharma companies while pursuing its own wholly-owned therapeutic pipeline.The company recently closed a £35 million Series B financi...

Acute on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) is a significant healthcare issue with high unmet needs for patients and clinicians, and a massive burden for healthcare systems. It cost more than $6bn in the US alone in 2021, with a drastic increase over the last 10 years. Genfit is a late-stage biopharma company taking on rare, life-threatening liver diseases with a range of therapeutic targets based on pathophysiology. The company has five assets in its portfolio, from preclinical up to phase 2....

The field of radiotherapeutics is a hot topic currently, and so who better to talk about the subject than Ken Herrmann, a radiopharmaceutical academic expert, who is Professor of Nuclear Medicine at the Universitätsklinikum Essen, in Essen Germany, and two people from the company Molecular Partners: Patrick Amstutz, who is a co-founder and the CEO, and Dani Steiner, SVP of R&D.Molecular Partners recently shared a preclinical package supporting MP0712, its radioligand candidate. Based on t...

US-based biotech company Priovant Therapeutics is dedicated to developing novel therapies for autoimmune diseases with high morbidity and few available treatment options. The company's lead asset, brepocitinib, is a dual selective inhibitor of TYK2 and JAK1. Through dual TYK2/JAK1 inhibition, brepocitinib suppresses key cytokines linked to autoimmunity—including type I IFN, type II IFN, IL6, IL12, and IL23—with a single, targeted therapy. Brepocitinib has generated positive data in ...

Heidelberg Pharma is a clinical stage biotech company developing antibody drug conjugates (ADCs).Its lead amanitin-based ADC product candidate, HDP-101, targets relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma. HDP-101 recently received orphan drug designation; it is currently in a phase I/IIa clinical trial, demonstrating first signs of clinical efficacy. The company is also expanding its therapeutic product pipeline with a further four programs across a variety of malignant hematologic and soli...

Diamyd Medical develops precision medicine therapies for the prevention and treatment of Type 1 diabetes and LADA (latent autoimmune diabetes in adults). Diamyd is an antigen-specific immunomodulatory therapeutic for the preservation of endogenous insulin production. It has been granted Orphan Drug Designation in the U.S. as well as Fast Track Designation. DIAGNODE-3, a confirmatory phase 3 trial, uses injections into a superficial lymph node can to optimize the treatment response.&...

Rare diseases affect around 1 in 2,000 people. Many of the thousands of rare diseases are difficult to diagnose. Of the known rare diseases, about 80% have genetic causes. Leukodystrophies are a group of rare genetic disorders for which there is currently no curative therapy.This week on the podcast we are discussing novel treatments of rare pediatric diseases in a conversation with Dan Williams, CEO, executive director and co-founder of Synaptix Bio. Synaptix Bio is working on developi...