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The year 2024 was regarded as a reset year with lackluster deal performance in the biopharma industry. This year was predicted to witness a surge in mergers and acquisitions (M&As) deals in the sector and in the latter half of the year, the pharma giant Novartis has struck big.
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Novartis expanding cardiovascular research
Novartis buys Tourmaline Bio for $1.4 billion
Since June, the Swiss big pharma company has inked seven major deals. Its shopping spree in September is what has really cemented this trend. One of the biggest deals of last month was its $1.4 billion buyout of New York-based cardiovascular disease therapeutics company Tourmaline Bio in a bid to “diversify efforts in cardiovascular care.”
The goal of the deal was for Novartis to get its hands on Tourmaline’s candidate pacibekitug. It targets IL-6, a cytokine – small proteins that regulate the immune system – that contributes to inflammation and is implicated in the progression of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD), which is caused by plaque buildup in the walls of arteries.
By inhibiting IL-6, pacibekitug is meant to nip inflammation in the bud. No IL-6 inhibitor has been approved by regulators for ASCVD yet, and, moreover, no widely used anti-inflammatory therapy exists for patients in the first place, so, pacibekitug could widen therapeutic options.
While it may seem like Novartis bet big on this one, a report found that the ASCVD therapeutic market, which was valued at $24 billion last year, is expected to hit $30.6 billion in 10 years. So, it looks like the pharma giant wants a chunk of the potential profits, as pacibekitug is poised to complete phase 2 studies by the end of this year.
Novartis acquires Argo Biopharma’s RNAi assets to tackle heart disease
Novartis has been circling around cardiovascular therapeutics companies for a while now. This might possibly be because its breakthrough drug for heart failure Entresto’s patent expired this year. It was grappling at straws to block generics from making their way into the market. It failed to prevent Indian generics producer MSN Pharmaceuticals’ version of Entresto from debuting next year.
So, it has licensed Shanghai-based Argo Biopharma’s RNA drugs involved in a process called RNA interference to target cardiovascular diseases. RNA interference is a natural process by which RNA molecules, specifically small interfering RNAs (siRNAs), suppress the expression of certain genes.
“Long-acting siRNAs, which are designed to deeply and durably target disease-causing proteins, represent an important paradigm shift in prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases,” Shaun Coughlin, global head of Cardiovascular and Metabolism at Novartis Biomedical Research, had said in a press release announcing the deal.
The Swiss multinational will gain control of a number of Argo’s RNAi therapies, including the phase 2 candidate BW-00112 for the treatment of severe hypertriglyceridemia – a condition in which there are too many fat molecules called triglycerides in the body – mixed dyslipidemia and dyslipidemia, characterized by an abnormal levels of lipids in the bloodstream, all of which poses a significant risk of developing heart diseases. Additionally, it has grabbed another one of Argo’s siRNA candidates, which is currently undergoing Investigational New Drug (IND)-enabling studies.
While Novartis is paying Argos $160 million upfront, the latter stands to gain up to $5.2 billion in milestone payments and on top of that, royalties.
Novartis pledges $17B+ in licensing and acquisition deals, including Monte Rosa, Arvinas, and Arrowhead
The Swiss pharma giant declared plans to spend billions this year on new therapies. Up until now, it has vowed to shell out more than $17 billion in drug development since January. And cardiovascular disease research and development (R&D) isn’t its only scope of interest. Last month, it penned a pact with Massachusetts-based Monte Rosa Therapeutics to address immune-related and inflammatory conditions. Monte Rosa develops protein degraders, such as MRT-6160 designed to degrade the protein VAV1, a mechanism known to address autoimmune conditions like multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, and inflammatory bowel disease.
This adds to Novartis’ growing grip over protein degraders following its $1.01 billion licensing deal with Connecticut-based Arvinas over the latter’s preclinical molecular glue program for prostate cancer last year.
Meanwhile, the pharma giant and California-based Arrowhead Pharmaceuticals formed a partnership where it forked out $200 million upfront and a milestone value of up to $2 billion in the field of RNA interference yet again. This deal is particularly focused on treating synucleinopathies, which are a group of neurodegenerative diseases characterized by the abnormal accumulation of alpha-synuclein protein in the brain. This includes conditions like Parkinson’s disease, where alpha-synuclein buildup is a hallmark of the disease. Novartis has bagged the worldwide license for its preclinical siRNA to address the host of diseases and closed the deal yesterday.
All over the place: pharma giant Novartis takes on neurodegeneration with streategic deals
And in August, it further dipped its toes into R&D in neurology having signed a licensing agreement with Swedish neurodrug developer BioArctic, famed for creating the once-hyped Alzheimer’s disease medicine Leqembi. The research collaboration will see the two combine the big pharma’s proposed undisclosed antibody with BioArctic’s platform technology BrainTransporter designed to allow antibodies to surpass the blood brain barrier to make drug delivery more efficient, to generate a drug candidate for patients affected by severe neurological conditions.
With the aim of promoting drug uptake in the brain, Novartis’ head of Neurodegeneration Research Sophie Parmentier Batteur said in a press release, “Our focus is to pioneer innovative therapies that improve treatment outcomes by impacting disease progression, to provide meaningful therapies for patients with severe neurological conditions.”
By the looks of it, it’s hard to pin down what Novartis’ key focus is on. Rather, it wears many hats in the drug discovery and development world as it specializes in neurological disorders, immune-related and autoimmune conditions, cardiovascular diseases, eye disorders, rare diseases, and even cancer therapeutics. In fact, it pioneered radioligand therapy, with the first of its kind, Pluvicto, receiving the green light from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for prostate cancer in 2022.
Indeed, Novartis has a lot of medicines and research programs up its sleeve, and it has the capacity to be involved in several projects as it has more than 75,800 employees, according to Forbes. It even had a major stake in the generics space until 2023 when Sandoz spun out of it.
Since its inception nearly three decades ago after the Swiss pharma Ciba Geigy merged with Sandoz, which cost around 10,000 jobs at the time, Novartis moved away from agriculture and food to healthcare. Some of its notable medicines include Ritalin, a breakthrough in care for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), the aforementioned Entresto, and the CDK4/6 inhibitor Kisqali, which has continued to rack up FDA approvals for breast cancer since 2017.
It’s also no stranger to controversy; from layoffs – having plotted to let go of 58 employees last month in New Jersey – patent disputes, to even a data manipulation scandal concerning its gene therapy Zolgensma for spinal muscular atrophy, which the FDA condemned, however, did not impose sanctions on the company three years ago. The gene therapy was already deemed exorbitantly priced, as it wears a $2.1 million price tag.
Now, valued at $278.4 billion, according to a report by Macrotrends, it sure looks like the Basel-based giant has plenty to spend on. What its next move will be is unpredictable considering its vast portfolio, so keeping an eye on the trend will be the best way to work out the big pharma’s strategy.
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