Keytruda (pembrolizumab) was the main bright spot for Merck as it weathered blows from the NotPetya cyber attack, new competition and pricing pressures in hepatitis C.
Prospects for GlaxoSmithKline’s new shingle vaccine Shingrix have been raised after US advisors recommended that it should be used instead of rival Zostavax from Merck & Co.
After initially setting out to test two vaccines on 28,000 volunteers during West Africa's deadly Ebola epidemic, a U.S.-Liberia research team had to dramatically reduce its aspirations when the outbreak started coming to an end. But the investigators have now published results showing the shots from GlaxoSmithKline and Merck elicited antibody responses that lasted one year after vaccination.
Shares in KalVista Pharmaceuticals have surged on news of a deal with Merck & Co potentially worth more than $750 million. Under the deal, Merck, which is known as MSD outside of the US and Canada, is paying KalVista $37 million upfront and taking a 9.9 percent stake in the firm in return for access to its experimental diabetic macular oedema drug KVD001.
Merck took a dominant position in frontline lung cancer with the approval of a combination of Keytruda and chemo. And it isn’t just waiting around to see if any combination of a PD-(L)1 with a CTLA4 can come along and knock it off its market-leading perch.
Merck (NYSE:MRK), known as MSD outside of the United States and Canada, announced its strategic decision to discontinue the development of the investigational combination regimens MK-3682B (grazoprevir/ruzasvir/ uprifosbuvir) and MK-3682C (ruzasvir/uprifosbuvir) for the treatment of chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection.
Just a few months after Merck’s monster May for Keytruda, which featured three FDA approvals, the New Jersey drugmaker is back with another green light.
Merck, today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved KEYTRUDA® (pembrolizumab), the company’s anti-PD-1 (programmed death receptor-1) therapy, for the treatment of patients with recurrent locally advanced or metastatic gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) adenocarcinoma whose tumors express PD-L1 [Combined Positive Score (CPS) ≥1] as determined by an FDA-approved test, with disease progression on or after two or more prior lines of therapy including fluoropyrimidine- and platinum-containing chemotherapy and if appropriate, HER2/neu-targeted therapy.
Merck & Co. has agreed to acquire Rigontec for up to €464 million (about $554 million), in a deal that will expand the cancer immunotherapy franchise of the Keytruda® (pembrolizumab) developer with a three-year-old Bonn University spinout whose technology targets the retinoic acid-inducible gene I (RIG-I) pathway.
Germany's Merck KGaA is looking to sell its $1 billion consumer healthcare unit after a group-wide strategic review.
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