The BioCentury Show

On the latest episode of The BioCentury Show, Editor in Chief Simone Fishburn speaks with Bahija Jallal, CEO of Immunocore and the former president of Medimmune. While some biotechs are circumspect about gathering data during clinical trials that might not support the product in question, Jallal sees it as part of the obligation to patients and the field to learn as much as possible, as efficiently as possible. And that strategy has informed how the company will take its TCR technology into earlier lines of treatment and new indications.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/655504#biopharma #pharma #biotech #lifescience #RandD #DrugDevelopment #CEO00:00 - Introduction04:18 - Getting a New Modality to Market17:15 - Infectious Pipeline22:04 - Autoimmune Pipeline27:24 - Leading in Challenging Times

Vertex’s approach to research, defined over a decade ago to beat the dismal odds of success in biotech, remains core to its strategy, even as the industry evolves and technologies expand. While that strategy, which EVP and CSO David Altshuler calls “serial innovation,” has seen the company launch eight drugs since 2011 and jump market cap tiers on the success of its cystic fibrosis portfolio, it’s now being tested in other areas as Vertex expands to pain, renal disease, Type I diabetes, and more. In conversation with Editor in Chief Simone Fishburn on The BioCentury Show, Altshuler discussed the rising interest in causal biology and the role of AI, noting that the fundamentals of picking targets and programs have not changed.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/655408#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience#RandD #DrugDevelopment #AI00:00 - Introduction02:12 - Causal Biology08:48 - AI in R&D, at Vertex16:35 - Academia-Industry Interface22:00 - Cell Therapy for Diabetes25:35 - Gene Therapy for DMD

Since the annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco in early January, biotech has seen a notable surge in enthusiasm, Zahid Moneer, senior managing director of investment banking at BNP Paribas, told The BioCentury Show.Moneer, who is more upbeat than many in today’s biopharma sector, sees capital raises from million-dollar seed rounds to nine-digit series A, B, and C rounds driving significant growth alongside M&A activity. In the interview, he also also highlights the growing role of private equity firms in biopharma and the trend of pharmas engaging earlier with biotechs and investors looking to deploy capital into those companiesView full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/655216#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #financing #privateequity #IPO00:00 - Introduction00:37 - Investment Climate05:06 - Pharma M&A Activity15:25 - Private Equity's Role21:44 - Biotech Financing

Biotechs need to get used to the new normal, says SR One CEO and Managing Partner Simeon George, and that will require significant adjustments to the business model. This new normal comes from an extended tough capital environment against a backdrop of political uncertainty, but while biotechs face a different set of factors than they have in the past, there are still first principles of value creation that should guide them.George, who co-founded SR One management in 2020 following its spinout from GSK, spoke on The BioCentury Show with Editor in Chief Simone Fishburn about the challenges facing biotechs and how VCs are navigating through the complexity of the moment. He also discussed SR One’s strategy and philosophy of investing.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/65514200:00 - Introduction01:31 - Meeting the Moment04:45 - Company Valuations13:54 - China Strategy, NewCos22:08 - Building Successful Biotechs#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #CEO #financing #newco

Clinical trials will be launched in the next year or two to test predictions about causal biology made by artificial intelligence models, Vik Bajaj, co-founder and CEO of Foresite Labs and managing director of Foresite Capital Management, believes. Foresite teamed up with Arch Venture Partners last year on a $1 billion venture round to fund Xaira Therapeutics, which aims to reinvent the R&D process via AI-driven protein design and biological discovery technologies.Bajaj, who serves as interim president of Xaira, discussed the potential for artificial intelligence to accelerate biomedical progress in an interview with Washington Editor Steve Usdin on The BioCentury Show.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/654977#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #AI #RandD #drugdiscovery00:00 - Introduction01:18 - AI & Biotech12:19 - Getting the Data Right19:06 - Healthcare Delivery30:47 - Making It Real

All presidential transitions with a change of party come with disruption and threats as well as opportunities. But this one, in particular with regard to the implications for FDA, is different from all those Steve Usdin has been covering in his 30-year tenure as Washington editor at BioCentury.In particular, this is an inflection point for the agency that currently serves as the global gold standard for drug regulation, said Usdin on a special edition of The BioCentury Show covering the ramifications for the biopharma industry of the second Trump administration. Usdin has recently outlined the threats and opportunities that the new era presents, and he elaborated further on those in a discussion with Editor in Chief Simone Fishburn.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/654798#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #politics #policy #fda #ftc #biosecure #ira00:00 - Introduction05:06 - Inflection Point at FDA14:10 - Changes at the FTC16:43 - China, Biosecure21:30 - The IRA

Rep. Jake Auchincloss (D-Mass.), an influential voice in Congress on life sciences issues, gained stature last week when he was appointed to serve on the Energy & Commerce Committee, giving him a seat at the table for debates over legislation affecting FDA, CMS and NIH and a host of issues of critical importance to the biopharma industry.In an interview with Washington Editor Steve Usdin on The BioCentury Show, Auchincloss outlined his priorities for the 119th Congress, from pushing “muscular” PBM reform over the congressional finish line to finding bipartisan support for refining the IRA's orphan drug exemption and advancing methods to evaluate the social value of medicines.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/654659#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #politics #policy #law 00:00 - Introduction01:08 - New Congress & RFK Jr.10:09 - China & Biotech16:36 - Assessing Drugs’ Value

Specialist public investors are doing their best to hold up the sector, but biotech still has to wash out many of the lower quality companies that were funded during the boom and ended up driving the generalists away, said MPM Bioimpact's Chris Bardon on The BioCentury Show. Bardon said the market hasn’t yet found the footing that will see an opening of the IPO window and a swing of positive sentiment. But although markets aren’t yet out of the woods, she said M&A will remain robust for years, fueled by obesity drug revenues.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/654649#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #financing #investing00:00 - Introduction01:30 - Market Sentiment06:19 - IPO Window12:04 - M&A Outlook19:51 - The Obesity Landscape

Leading biotech companies through the turbulence of the past few years and the uncertainty of the next ones takes not just resilience, but an ability to grapple with the CEO’s paradox, according to Climb Bio CEO Aoife Brennan. This paradox requires preparing for repeated setbacks while planning optimistically, a duality that has been the story of biotech since the outbreak of the pandemic, said Brennan. In conversation with Editor in Chief Simone Fishburn on The BioCentury Show, Brennan discusses how CEOs are managing through uncertainty, and why "boring" naked mAbs are the smart move in one field.View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/654451#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience00:00 - Introduction00:59 - State of Play for Biotech04:34 - How to Choose a CEO Job18:49 - New Era of Discipline26:51 - Building a Team

With new governments both side of the pond, capital markets picking up, and some geopolitical overhang, there’s a mixed feast for biotech, with a net trend to the positive, says Sidley Austin’s Robert Darwin, who specializes in global M&A and private equity for life sciences and healthcare companies and investors. In conversation with Editor in Chief Simone Fishburn on The BioCentury Show, Darwin, who is based in London, discussed the consequences for biotech of the changing forces as we enter 2025: the new Labour government’s recently announced budget, the incoming Trump administration, the improving outlook for the markets, and the ongoing — if not mounting — tensions between the U.S. and China. Across each of these is a considerable amount of uncertainty, but the pluses and minuses add up to net positive outlook, he believes.This episode of The BioCentury Show was sponsored by Cytiva. View full story: https://www.biocentury.com/article/654182#biotech #biopharma #pharma #lifescience #deals00:00 – Introduction01:49 – U.K.’s Place in Global Biotech09:41 – Trump & Biotech17:32 – Deals in 202531:57 – Private Equity in Biotech