Biotech’s $13B deal day, ASCO’s hot targets, drug pricing threat — a BioCentury podcast

Sanofi’s Blueprint to grow immunology pipeline. Plus: PD-(L)1 x VEGF, CLDN18.2 and countering Trump’s ‘most favored nation’ plans

Dealmaking by a pair of pharmas has given the biotech industry its best day of transactions in months, tallying nearly $13 billion in guaranteed payments across two deals. On the latest BioCentury This Week podcast, BioCentury’s analysts discuss how the takeout of  Blueprint Medicines Corp. (NASDAQ:BPMC) for $9.1 billion up front gives Sanofi (Euronext:SAN; NASDAQ:SNY) a drug for a rare immunological disorder and bolsters the French pharma’s already strong presence in immunology.

The analysts also assess the $3.5 billion partnership between Biontech SE (NASDAQ:BNTX) and Bristol Myers Squibb Co. (NYSE:BMY) for an asset targeting cancer’s hottest target, PD-(L)1 x VEGF, and underwhelming data from the leading asset against the target, PD-1 x VEGF bispecific ivonescimab, from Summit Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ:SMMT) and Akeso Inc. (HKEX:9926).

Those data coincided with the kick-off of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting in Chicago, where almost a dozen companies — nearly all from China — were presenting readouts for another hot target, CLDN18.2.  Suzhou Evopoint Biosciences Co. Ltd. is among the companies; its program recently attracted  Astellas Pharma Inc. (Tokyo:4503) as a partner.  

Meanwhile, the biopharma industry is racing to counter the White House’s most favored nation drug pricing strategy. BioCentury’s Washington analyst, Steve Usdin, explains the urgency and details some of industry’s options.