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AstraZeneca Reportedly Bid About $10 Billion for Rhythm, a Back Door Into Obesity
AstraZeneca has made a non-binding offer worth about $10 billion for Rhythm Pharmaceuticals, Reuters reported Wednesday, after The Wall Street Journal reported a $124-a-share bid made last month. Reuters' sources said the proposal goes up to $134 a share once milestone payments are counted. Rhythm's stock jumped 28% on the news, giving it a market value of about $7.64 billion. Its drug, Imcivree, won an expanded FDA approval in March for a rare form of obesity caused by brain damage, the first U.S. treatment for that condition. Two sources said the deal would run through Alexion, the rare-disease unit AstraZeneca bought for $39 billion in 2021. Neither company commented.
Why it matters: Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly have made obesity one of the industry's most sought-after markets, and this would give AstraZeneca a commercial foothold there through rare genetic obesity rather than mass weight loss. It also shows CEO Pascal Soriot shopping for growth after a turbulent few months that included clinical trial setbacks.
Reuters via Yahoo Finance →Clinical & Regulatory
Madrigal's Former Clinical Development Head Sues, Alleging a Safety Coverup
Michael Charlton, Madrigal's head of clinical development from October 2024 to January 2026, filed a federal whistleblower-retaliation suit in Illinois. He says he was pushed to resign after raising safety concerns about the company's approved drug for the liver disease MASH, and he wants his job back or damages. Madrigal vigorously denies the claims. The drug in question is the company's flagship, so this one matters.
STAT →A New Startup Fixes the Sickle Cell Mutation Itself, and Three Patients Stopped Needing Transfusions
Kamau Therapeutics, co-founded by Stanford's Matthew Porteus, corrects the sickle cell mutation in patients' own stem cells, instead of raising fetal hemoglobin the way Casgevy does. All three patients treated with cells from its revised process no longer need transfusions and have had no pain crises. It's only three people, but it revives an approach Graphite Bio halted in 2022. Fuller data comes at ASH on December 14.
GEN →Deals & Money
Boehringer Pays $358 Million Upfront for Six Chinese Cancer Programs, With Up to $7 Billion More
Boehringer Ingelheim is paying Sino Biopharmaceutical $358 million upfront for six preclinical programs: antibody-drug conjugates (antibodies that carry a toxic payload to tumors) and T-cell engagers (which pull immune cells onto cancer). Up to $7 billion in milestones could follow. Sino runs early development, then Boehringer can opt in. Sanofi, GSK and AstraZeneca also licensed from Sino this year, but none of those deals topped $2 billion.
Pharmaceutical Technology →AbbVie Pays $100 Million Upfront for a Gut-Selective IBD Drug From Nxera
AbbVie is licensing worldwide rights to Nxera Pharma's NXE0033744 for inflammatory bowel disease: $100 million upfront, up to $1.37 billion in milestones, plus royalties. The small molecule switches on a receptor called EP4 mainly in the gut, aiming to calm inflammation and help the gut lining heal. It has finished Phase 1, and the deal still needs antitrust clearance. It's a different approach from today's IBD drugs.
Pharmaceutical Executive →Policy
Bernie Sanders May Hold the Pen on the FDA's Funding Law
After the Democrats' midterm win, Sanders will likely lead the Senate health committee, just as Congress must renew the FDA's user-fee law before it expires on Sept. 30. Under it, drugmakers pay fees that fund the FDA's reviews of their drugs. Sanders is one of the few lawmakers who reject the idea behind the system, and he could use the talks to press for FDA and industry reforms.
STAT →CVS Splits Its Stores From Aetna and Caremark
CVS Health will split in two by the first half of 2028. Aetna, the Caremark pharmacy benefit manager (the middleman that negotiates drug prices for health plans) and the specialty drug business stay together; about 9,000 stores and mail order become CVS Pharmacy. The CEO says regulators didn't drive it, but a Leerink analyst said it may ease state scrutiny of how much CVS owns.
BioPharma Dive →