December 2009 Volume 5, Issue 12
Volume 5, Issue 12 | December 2009
December 2009
In this Issue
Global News

Takeda, Amylin ink weighty deal
Companies in $1 billion-plus agreement to co-develop and commercialize compounds for obesity
Sanofi-aventis boosts oncology pipeline in deals with Oncodesign, Micromet
Deals aimed at boosting the French drug company’s pipeline and profile in cancer therapy market
Three’s a crowd
Lundbeck acquires French CMO and principal supplier Elaiapharm
Say ‘yes’ to nosocomial
MorphoSys and Daiichi Sankyo forge alliance to develop novel antibody therapies against hospital-acquired infections
Cross-pond collaboration
U.K., U.S. biotech trade groups join forces to promote industryResearch & Development

Shining a light on cancer
Two years into oncology research agreement, GE and Lilly develop technology to visualize and map complex biomarker networks
Tempting fate
Fate Therapeutics unveils creation of small-molecule program for commercial-scale reprogramming
Unbreak that heart
Gladstone and Stanford collaborate on developing IPS cells to repair damaged heart muscle
Partnering up for mutual gain
Quintiles forms strategic alliances with AstraZeneca and Eisai in back-to-back deals, following up on an earlier Allergan deal
Venturing into vaccines
TapImmune taps Crucell’s cell line for vaccine development
SurModics and NuPathe partner on long-acting Parkinson’s treatment
SurModics Inc., a provider of drug delivery and surface modification technologies to the healthcare industry, and NuPathe Inc., a neuroscience-focused specialty pharmaceutical company, announced in November that they signed a license agreement for NP201, the first long-acting treatment available in broadly acceptable dose form that maintains the potential to provide sustained relief from Parkinson’s disease without motor response complications.Genomics & Proteomics

SuperGen CLIMBs on board with GSK
Companies will collaborate on development of novel epigenetic therapeutics
Show me the way
Dutch firm InteRNA Technologies and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute collaborate on the role of microRNAs in cancer pathways
The ‘Scout’ rounds up some business
Kinaxo secures deals with Roche, Bayer Vital and Janssen in October around its novel phosphoproteomics platform, PhosphoScout
1000 x 1000 human genomes in five years
Huntington’s disease project to sequence an unprecedented 100 human genomes in first six months
Partners in proteomics
Belgian firm Eurogentec expands its reach into the proteomics space with AnaSpec acquisitionInformatics

Peta-flogging HIV
Blazingly fast IBM-designed supercomputer is helping Los Alamos researchers focus on promising HIV vaccine targets
Perfect union
Thermo Fisher Watson LIMS and Symyx Notebook integrated to reduce bioanalytical workflow error and improve efficiency and reporting
Sifting through genes
Eurofins MWG Operon selects Geospiza's GeneSifter to automate DNA sequencing data analysis
In pursuit of the paperless clinical trial
IntraLinks announces Adobe-based paperless solution for clinical trial processCommentary

Drug discovery paradigm could shift with cancer center involvement
Collaborations between data and computation-driven systems biology companies and forward-thinking oncology clinics are poised to change the face of cancer drug development and cancer itself.Patent News

Supreme Court ponders what is patentable in Bilski case
Is Bilski important? Some estimates say as many as 200,000 patents could be invalidated if Bilski is held to strictly apply to all method patents. For the biotech industry, the decision has significant ramifications for the patentability of many inventions, particularly diagnostics and personalized medicine.Editor's Focus

‘Twas the year of the M&A boom …
‘Twas the end of 2009, and in the ddn newsroom, the editors and writers gathered to reflect on Big Pharma’s M&A boom.Automation & Instrumentation

Handy for growth
BD plans to acquire HandyLab to boost its molecular diagnostics offering
Nanoscale technology deal a tight fit
Agilent Technologies and Stanford University ink nanoscale collaboration deal
Epic developments are in the works
Corning and PerkinElmer collaborate on development of label-free detection technologies
Shedding labels
Caliper Life Sciences, SRU Biosystems to offer label-free services for cell-based and biochemical assays
Label-free: The way to be?
SBS hosts symposium on label-free technologiesNew Products

Streamlined integration of pipetting with heating and shaking
Hamilton Robotics has introduced the MICROLAB NIMBUS Heater/Shaker Package, an integrated system that incorporates high-speed automated pipetting with orbital plate shaking and heating.
Sample preparation reagent provides reverse transcription-ready RNA in five minutes
Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc. has launched the iScript RT-qPCR Sample Preparation Reagent for rapid isolation of total RNA and enabling reverse transcription and real-time PCR to be performed directly from cell lysates.

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