Past Issues
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Regeneron doubles a $2B bet most of biotech had written off
A big pharma company just walked back to a table that everyone else had abandoned, doubling its check to $4 billion. Meanwhile, the RNAi king admitted it needs an AI co-pilot, Germany scared off $2 billion in pharma investment with a single reform bill, and China's biotech sector stopped being a sideshow at ASCO and started running the main stage.
Lilly just paid $1.9B for a gene fix that never touches your DNA
Two of the world's five largest pharma companies have now written billion-dollar checks for the same RNA editing platform nobody was talking about two years ago. Meanwhile, Legend Biotech showed it can build cancer-killing cells inside a patient's body with a single injection, and CRISPR just cleared its biggest clinical hurdle yet. Buckle up.
No drug has beaten Gleevec in over two decades. GSK thinks that's about to change.
A cancer drug that's reigned unchallenged since its approval for advanced GIST in 2002 might finally have a worthy opponent, and GSK committed up to $1.15 billion just to get in the ring. Meanwhile, two multibillion-dollar deals are reshaping the autoimmune and muscular dystrophy landscapes.
A lung cancer drug just cut the risk of death by 34%. The catch? It's complicated.
ASCO 2026 is delivering the kind of data that makes oncologists spill their coffee. A bispecific antibody outperformed the king of immunotherapy in lung cancer, a pancreatic cancer drug doubled survival for the first time ever, and BioNTech decided to burn its pandemic empire to the ground. Buckle up.
Analysts called this CAR-T data 'nutty.' Lilly's $3.2B bet is paying off.
ASCO 2026 is delivering the goods. Eli Lilly's in vivo CAR-T therapy just posted a perfect 18-for-18 response rate, a pair of pharma giants made opposite bets on how to dethrone Keytruda, and Gilead finally showed the world the data behind its $3.15 billion acquisition. It's a big week, so let's get into it.
BMS just wrote a $600M check for 13 drugs that don't exist yet
Bristol Myers Squibb is betting up to $15.2 billion on a portfolio of preclinical drugs from China's Hengrui Medicine. Meanwhile, BMS also showed up to ASCO with data that doubled survival in blood cancer patients, two biotechs raised half a billion in a single IPO day, and AstraZeneca is trying to get drugs approved after failing their own trials. It's a lot.
Pfizer just ordered 12 mystery drugs from a Chinese biotech for $10 billion
Pfizer dropped $650 million upfront on a dozen unnamed cancer drugs from a Chinese biotech most Americans have never heard of, right as Congress pushes to restrict exactly these kinds of deals. Meanwhile, the "undruggable" protein behind pancreatic cancer just got drugged, and ASCO 2026 is delivering fireworks across oncology.
A cancer so rare most doctors never see it just got its second-ever drug
The FDA just approved a new weapon against a blood cancer that kills most patients within a year, and it works completely differently from the only other option. Meanwhile, GSK might have cracked the code on curing hepatitis B, and a tiny Korean biotech is putting up liver disease numbers that should make Novo Nordisk nervous.
A company that didn't exist 3 years ago just got $1.3B without selling a share
A clinical-stage biotech with zero approved drugs just landed one of the largest non-dilutive financings in the industry's history, and the structure is as interesting as the number. Meanwhile, Congress is eyeing legislation that could choke off pharma's hottest pipeline source, and the FDA finally killed the most hated rule in dermatology.
Eli Lilly just bought three vaccine companies in one day. Here's why.
The company that turned a diabetes drug into the obesity revolution just dropped $3.8 billion on vaccines it's never made before. Meanwhile, the FDA is quietly reinventing how it watches clinical trials, inspects factories, and thinks about AI, all in the same week.
India's biggest pharma company just bet $11.75B on a stock nobody wanted
An Indian generics giant just wrote the largest overseas check in Indian pharma history, buying a company that had zero Buy ratings on Wall Street. Meanwhile, the FDA approved a drug 25 years in the making, and Eli Lilly keeps converting its GLP-1 cash into billion-dollar bets on the future of medicine.
The FDA just said gene therapies for 12 patients don't need trials built for 12 million
The FDA dropped a framework that could fundamentally rewire the economics of ultra-rare gene therapy, and it's the kind of regulatory shift that doesn't come around often. Meanwhile, Regeneron finally crashed the radiopharma party, Lilly bet $202 million on making viruses obsolete, and a migraine startup raised $290 million without testing a single drug in humans.
Europe just greenlit a Wegovy you can swallow
A needle-free version of the world's most famous weight-loss drug just cleared a major regulatory hurdle in Europe, and it's not the only approval making waves this week. From a cancer vaccine cracking one of oncology's toughest codes to the first new blood pressure mechanism in over a decade, today's issue is stacked.
A weekly shot just matched bariatric surgery. The obesity race has a new king.
Eli Lilly dropped Phase 3 data so good it makes gastric bypass look like the hard way. Meanwhile, Google's AI drug lab just raised more than most biotechs are worth, and a Chinese-made guided missile just supercharged the best-selling cancer drug on Earth.
A pig kidney kept a man alive for 271 days. Now the FDA wants more.
A gene-edited pig kidney just set a durability record that could reshape transplant medicine for 90,000 Americans on the waitlist. Meanwhile, pharma is pouring hundreds of billions into U.S. factories, UCB dropped $2 billion on a company that didn't exist two years ago, and an algorithm went shopping for a cancer drug.
Pharma lost 16 straight courts. The Supreme Court just made it 17.
The drug industry's three-year legal crusade against Medicare price negotiation is officially dead, and the strategic fallout is just beginning. Meanwhile, a pig kidney kept a man alive for nine months, and a biotech timed its IPO with the precision of a Hollywood press tour.
U.S. biotech signed $18.3B in Chinese drug deals. Now the industry is at war.
The American biotech industry is in the middle of a full-blown identity crisis over China, and the numbers behind the tension are jaw-dropping. Plus: a drug target left for dead gets a second life, two companies race to cure a decades-old disease, and a biotech sells itself for seven cents on the dollar.
Regeneron's melanoma miss reshapes its strategy. Then it went shopping.
Regeneron had quite a week: its biggest cancer trial failed by a heartbreaking statistical margin, and on the same day it dropped $2.3 billion on a technology that doesn't have a single clinical candidate yet. Meanwhile, the FDA flip-flopped on Moderna's flu vaccine, an AI-designed drug actually worked in humans, and a 107-year-old Italian family just made the wildest bet in its history.
Regeneron paid $40M for a seat at biotech's $4.3B radiopharma table
Regeneron just entered the radiopharmaceutical arms race with one of the most cleverly structured deals in recent memory, putting down $40 million on a partnership worth up to $4.3 billion. Meanwhile, the White House is reshaping biotech from every angle: triple-digit tariffs on foreign-made drugs, a 15-year leash on Lilly's new diet pill, and magic mushrooms as federal healthcare policy.
The FDA just approved a drug that picks the lock cancer uses to cheat death
A new blood cancer drug just became the first BCL-2 inhibitor approved for mantle cell lymphoma, offering a take-home pill for patients who've burned through every other option. Meanwhile, U.S. biotechs are quietly packing their clinical trials and shipping them overseas, and Biogen is charging into Phase 3 with an Alzheimer's drug that technically failed its big test.
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