Beyond Biotech - the podcast from Labiotech

Brixton Biosciences, a clinical-stage life sciences company spun out from Massachusetts General Brigham, has been awarded $2m from the NIH HEAL Initiative to support the development of non-opioid, injectable pain relief solutions. As part of the NIH's efforts to tackle the U.S. opioid crisis, the funding will advance research into safer, drug-free alternatives to opioid pain management. Brixt...

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 January 3rd, 2025! Have an awesome holiday season! On this podcast , we speak to Artiva Biotherapeutics’ CEO, Fred Aslan, M.D. The company has demonstrated the potential for efficacy and safety with natural killer (NK) cells in two cancer clinical trials....

Our guest on the podcast this week is John Cassidy, director of life sciences and healthtech investments at SoftBank Vision Fund. Softbank Vision Fund is the world’s largest technology-focused investment fund, with $166bn assets under management, and a portfolio of more than 250 companies. In the discussion, we cover investment trends within life sciences, the European health and biotech scene, as...

There is a constant risk of severe, potentially life-threatening allergic reactions for individuals with peanut allergies, which leads to significant physical, social, and emotional burdens. IgGenix, a clinical-stage immunology biotechnology company, recently announced the first patient dosed in its phase 1 trial evaluating IGNX001, a novel monoclonal antibody-based therapeutic, for peanut allergy...

ambiom is a life science commercial-advisory business development company based in the Slovakian capital of Bratislava. The company helps its corporate clients with their product strategy, in- and out-licensing efforts, including asset valuation (NPV, rNPV), M&A scouting, complex due diligence and dealmaking. ambiom also provides input on regulatory matters, support in pricing and reimbursemen...

Biological control company Oxitec recently launched Sparks, a new platform designed to rapidly scale Wolbachia replacement technology to take on dengue fever. Backed by a multi-million-dollar investment from the Gates Foundation, Sparks adds to Oxitec’s Aedes aegypti technology, called Friendly, which is taking on dengue fever in Brazil.  With mosquito-borne diseases on the rise, Oxitec’s Friendly...

Immunology is a key area in biotech and biopharma, both in terms of R&D and sales. However, according to UK-headquartered Greywolf Therapeutics, the industry has only focused on two-thirds of the puzzle. To have an immunological effect, you must activate the body’s T cells, which cells requires a chain of three key signals. The first is antigen recognition, i.e. the initial detection of a cell...

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,...

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 p...

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 advanc...

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...

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 chron...

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 tri...

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 cance...

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 addr...

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 populati...

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...

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 Me...

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,...

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, PENT...

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...

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 hu...

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...

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 --...

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 who...