European Lifestars Awards - Celebrating Life Science Leaders’ Post

Big congrats to the winners of Endpoints News 11 Awards, the most promising Biotech startups of 2024 🥇; Lifordi Immunotherapeutics, Inc. Mirador Therapeutics Formation Bio Xaira Therapeutics MediLink Therapeutics Iambic Therapeutics Ascidian Therapeutics Capstan Therapeutics Seaport Therapeutics Metsera Cardurion Pharmaceuticals We look forward to watching each of the 11 companies contribute to a healthier future for patients around the world! Follow the link in the comments for a detailed profile of each company #biotech #awards #masonharding

Interview of our CEO. His insights of chemically defined medium and CGT industry!

Interview of our CEO! His insights of chemically defined medium and CGT industry!

In the October edition of LifeLines, we highlighted member companies driving the latest advancements in AI and drug discovery, including BigHat Biosciences, Genesis Therapeutics, insitro and more. Read the story here: https://bit.ly/40y9yIH

𝗖𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘂𝗺 𝗧𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗽𝗲𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗰𝘀 𝗳𝗶𝗹𝗲𝘀 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗜𝗣𝗢 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗠𝗦 𝗱𝗿𝘂𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝗣𝗵𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗜𝗜 Clinical-stage biotech Contineum Therapeutics, which until recently went by the name Pipeline Therapeutics, on Friday revealed plans to go public under the Nasdaq ticker $CTNM. The biotech’s drug PIPE-307 is being studied in patients with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis, or RRMS. It’s in Phase II, fitting the profile of IPO that investors have been seeking after two dismal years of new entrants to the market. Carmine Stengone. https://lnkd.in/e2Y_q8wS

Fascinating keynote panel by Miguel Forte from Kiji Therapeutics, Tara Sadeghi from Cellenkos, Inc. Seth Ettenberg from BlueRock Therapeutics and Katy Newton from Achilles Therapeutics plc talking about key considerations for ensuring commercial sustainability! #adtherapies24

Delighted to have joined the OnHelix 2024 panel session on "New Horizons for Therapeutic Modalities". We explored a range of topics, and here are the main points I took away: 🤝 Multi-modality synergies 🤝 On the panel, we all agreed on the need for a diverse and comprehensive toolkit of different modalities, as there is no silver bullet. I would go one step further and say that different modalities can and should be combined to achieve greater impact. Think of mRNA (mRNA-4157 from Moderna) + antibody (Keytruda from Merck) for resected melanoma treatment. mRNA-4157 is a personalized neoantigen therapy that encodes up to 34 neoantigens derived from the patient's tumor mutational profile. When administered, these neoantigens are processed and presented by the body’s cells, triggering a tailored immune response specifically against the tumor. Keytruda works by enhancing the immune system's ability to detect and attack cancer cells by blocking the PD-1/PD-L1 pathway, which tumors use to evade immune detection. The synergistic action has shown promising results, with the combination therapy showing an 18-month recurrence-free survival 17% higher than monotherapy (see link in the comments below). 📈 More data doesn't mean better AI 📈 The cost of generating data in life sciences is dropping thanks to automation, making vast amounts of data available for both discovery and process automation. This treasure trove of data can be used to train AI/ML models to understand multifactorial diseases, develop advanced therapeutics, and optimize manufacturing processes to achieve better quality and economics. However, data accuracy, completeness, and standardization remain critical issues. The integration of data from disparate sources, each using different data standards and lacking semantic consistency, poses significant challenges. I came across a paper where the authors describe in detail how integrating different data sources with poor consistency actually decreases model accuracy to such an extent that it's not worth combining these sources if they are not aligned (see link in the comments below). 🕑 Move fast, break things...sort of 🕗 While cell and gene therapy manufacturing costs are rightly prioritized, the impact of development time on the overall economics of therapeutic development is equally significant. This issue was a focal point of the panel discussion, where panelists shared firsthand experiences and underscored the sluggishness of the design-build-test-learn cycle for CGT therapeutic development. Certainly, there isn't a single dominant cause of the slowdown; rather, several bottlenecks combine to delay progress and drive up costs. But if you had to choose one, which major bottleneck do you face most frequently in the discovery phase of new CGT? #ONHelix24 #CGT #mRNA

Be sure to sign up on the below link for some lively discussion and interesting insights for tomorrow's webinar on Life Science virtual start-ups!

🚀 💹 Here's the latest Biotech fundraising updates from March 24..... ▶ Total number of investments: 10 ▶ Total sum invested: $1.819 Billion FogPharma [Series E] $145M Nocion Therapeutics, Inc. [Series B] $62M Sionna Therapeutics [Series C] $182M Alumis [Series C] $259M Tubulis GmbH [Series B2] $139M Engrail Therapeutics [Series B] $157M Clasp Therapeutics [Series A] $150M Capstan Therapeutics [Series B] $175M Mirador Therapeutics [Series A] $400M Avenzo Therapeutics [Series A] $150M Quality over quantity seems to be the strategy. The total number of investments isn't out of the ordinary but the amounts invested is significant. 73% more money invested compared to the month of February and 61% more than in January. Lots of reasons to be optimistic 🤑 💰

While we have witnessed digital capabilities navigating the pharma through evolving landscape, the question in the realm of CGT remains - how much closer are we to demonstrating value using the universal language of data? Join senior leader from Sumitomo Pharma America, Microvascular Therapeutics, Mustang Bio and Bayer next month, to explore their visions on key trends shaping the future of CGT clinical development: https://bit.ly/3OkH4Ly