giant in March 2018 to become the U.K. government’s chief scientific adviser. To fill his spot, GSK has recruited Hal Barron, current president of R&D at Calico, the secretive aging biology firm funded by Alphabet, Barron Google’s parent company. Barron was previously chief medical officer at Roche. He will remain in San Francisco to boost GSK’s R&D business development in the city.—RYAN CROSS
BIOLOGICS
▸ Fujifilm invests more in Texas and England Fujifilm will spend $28 million to further increase biopharmaceutical capacity at its contract manufacturing plants in Texas
Process development bioreactors at Fuijfilm’s site in Redcar, England.
and England. In College Station, Texas, the Japanese company will build a new plant to produce monoclonal antibodies. In Redcar, England, Fujifilm will expand the production area and install new manufacturing equipment. In April, the company announced a $130 million investment at the two sites.—JEAN-FRANÇOIS TREMBLAY
START-UPS
▸ Provivi, NBD get investment from BASF BASF is among the investors in two chemistry-based start-ups. Along with DuPont Pioneer and venture capital firms, BASF is participating in a $31.5 million series B funding round for Provivi, which is developing pheromones for pest control. Provivi was one of C&EN’s 10 Start-Ups to Watch in 2015. Separately, BASF is leading an $8 million series B financing round in NBD Nanotechnologies, a developer of additives and coatings that modify surfaces with properties such as repellency and adhesion.—MICHAEL MCCOY
PHARMACEUTICALS
▸ Valeant sheds female libido pill Two years after paying $1 billion to acquire Sprout Pharmaceuticals, maker of the female sexual dysfunction treatment
C R E D I T: GS K ( BA R RO N ) ; FU JI FI LM ( BI OR EACTO RS )
Business Roundup ▸ FMC will sell a portion of its European herbicide business to Nufarm for $90 million. FMC is divesting the products to win European Commission approval for its purchase of much of DuPont’s crop protection business. ▸ W.R. Grace’s CEO, Fred Festa, will step down by the end of 2018. He will remain nonexecutive chair. As part of its succession plan, Grace says that Chief Operating Officer Hudson La Force will join the firm’s board.
▸ DuPont Crop Protection is partnering with Arysta LifeScience to develop seed treatments. Under the deal, DuPont will develop Arysta’s fungicide technology initially for corn and soybean seeds but ultimately for other crops. ▸ In-Part has launched as a web-based service for pairing academics with companies interested in collaborating. Companies including BP, Unilever, and GlaxoSmithKline have signed up for the algorithm-based matching service, In-Part says.
Addyi (flibanserin), Valeant Pharmaceuticals is divesting the pill to former Sprout shareholders for next to nothing. After 18 months, Valeant O will get a 6% HN royalty on sales N of the drug, N N which has had limited sales Flibanserin since winning FDA approval in August 2015. Valeant will also loan $25 million to the Sprout shareholders to support initial operating expenses. The shareholders had sued Valeant, claiming it was not sufficiently marketing Addyi.—LISA JARVIS
BIOTECHNOLOGY
▸ CRISPR-based Exonics raises funds Nine-month-old Exonics Therapeutics has received $40 million in series A funding from the Column Group, a venture capital firm. The Cambridge, Mass.-based biotech is developing CRISPR gene-editing-based therapies to restore the production of a key muscle fiber protein called dystrophin in children with Duchenne muscular dystrophy. The concept has been demonstrated in mice and isolated human cells. Exonics licenses its CRISPR technology from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, bucking the trend to license CRISPR from either the University of California, Berkeley, or the Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard.—RYAN CROSS
▸ Evonik Industries has renewed an agreement to supply active pharmaceutical ingredients and intermediates to Eli Lilly & Co. for use in human and veterinary products. Production occurs at a plant in Lafayette, Ind., that Evonik acquired from Lilly in 2010.
▸ Takeda Pharmaceutical is partnering with needle-free biologic drug delivery firm Portal Instruments to deliver Takeda’s monoclonal antibody Entyvio to people with ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease. Portal could earn up to $100 million in milestones.
▸ ChemDiv, a California-based contract research organization, will supply chemistry services to Tri-Institutional Therapeutics Discovery Institute. Tri-I TDI is a consortium of academic research institutes in New York City developing therapies in multiple areas.
▸ Boehringer Ingelheim and MiNA Therapeutics will develop treatments for fibrotic liver disease using MiNA’s small activating RNA technology. Boehringer recently signed a similar deal with RNA interference specialist Dicerna Pharmaceuticals.
NOVEMBER 13, 2017 | CEN.ACS.ORG | C&EN
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