Good morning, everyone, how are you today? We are just fine, thank you, especially due to the clear skies and a cool breeze wafting through the Pharmalot campus. Even better, we have made it to the middle of the week, which is cause for celebration. And why not? Consider the alternatives. So please join us as we hoist a cup of stimulation and dig in for another busy day. As always, here are some tidbits. Hope your day is smashing …
Merck and Allergan have each approached Biogen about the possibility of a takeover, the Wall Street Journal reports. Biogen may appear vulnerable amid slowing sales of its multiple sclerosis franchise, plans to spin off of its hemophilia business, and a search for a new chief executive. The overtures also underscore how many big drug makers feel a need to continue relying on acquisitions to grow their product pipelines.
Pfizer agreed to pay $486 million to resolve a long-standing securities class-action lawsuit over claims it hid information that its Celebrex and Bextra painkillers may increase the risks of heart attacks and strokes. The settlement, which must still be approved by a federal appeals court, came on the eve of a trial in the 12-year-old case. The appeals court had revived the class-action lawsuit in April.
Mark Thompson, the chief executive of Concordia International, filed a lawsuit accusing a short seller of libel after the investor criticized his tenure running Biovail, another drug maker that had settled charges of accounting fraud, the Wall Street Journal reports. On a Canadian news program in April, Marc Cohodes called Biovail a “complete and utter fraud. So Thompson has a history of nonsense when he was at Biovail.”
Teva Pharmaceuticals plans to pay $500 million to buy Allergan’s Anda generic distribution business, the fourth-largest distributor in the US, MarketWatch reports.
The US Food and Drug Administration granted breakthrough therapy designation to a Novartis drug as a first-line treatment for a form of advanced breast cancer, Reuters says.
NY Attorney General Eric Schneiderman plans to announce enforcement actions against companies advertising and selling products that falsely claim to repel mosquitoes and prevent the transmission of the Zika virus.
India relaxed rules to allow clinical investigators to take part in multiple trials and permit smaller trial sites to be used for research, InPharma Technologist tells us.
After weeks of uncertainty, the UK government plans to scrap the role of minister for life sciences, according to PharmaPhorum.
India’s Competition Commission fined Lupin and two of its executives for unfair business practices regarding supplies of medicines, the Economic Times informs us.
Pfizer is laying off 151 workers by this fall as it shifts into the final stages of vaccine production at its Pearl River campus, the Journal-News reports.
Aurobindo Pharma USA broke ground on a facility in East Windsor, N.J., that will become its new US corporate headquarters, housing warehouse, distribution, and manufacturing activities, NJ.com writes.
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