Japan’s Takeda Pharmaceutical announced deals with two biotech companies, Seattle-based Immusoft and San Diego’s Poseida Therapeutics.

Takeda

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration Antimicrobial Drugs Advisory Committee (AMDAC) voted unanimously to recommend use of Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited’s maribavir (TAK-620) for the treatment of refractory cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection and disease withgenotypic resistance to ganciclovir, valganciclovir, foscarnet or cidofovir in transplant recipients.

A safety concern forced Takeda Pharmaceutical to suspend the dosing of patients in two Phase II studies of an experimental treatment for narcolepsy. The clinical trial halt came one day after the company forged a gene therapy agreement with Selecta Biosciences valued at $1.1 billion.

Japan’s Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. said on Oct. 1 that “human error” caused metal contaminants to get into Moderna Inc. Covid-19 vaccine doses, leading to a recall.

As the fraud trial of Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes headlines the pharma legal news, other court-related cases are taking place, including a ruling in the legal spat between Takeda and AbbVie over a supply agreement for the prostate cancer drug Lupron.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited’s Exkivity (mobocertinib) for the treatment of adult patients with locally advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) exon 20 insertion mutations as detected by an FDA-approved test, whose disease has progressed on or after platinum-based chemotherapy.

Heading into fall, with the Covid-19 pandemic surging again and researchers tracking new variants, there is plenty of news. BioSpace takes a look, including several research studies suggesting that some people have unusually strong immunity against Covid-19.

Japanese biopharmaceutical firm Takeda Pharmaceutical announced that the company’s drug candidate for leukemia failed to meet the primary endpoint in a late-stage study.

International biopharmaceutical firm Genevant Sciences announced a global collaboration and licensing deal with Takeda Pharmaceutical to create and commercialize new therapies that would hopefully treat two undisclosed types of rare liver diseases.

Takeda has touted the potential of the company’s Dengue vaccine for several years, and new long-term data reinforces the promise of the medication that could prevent the deadly mosquito-borne virus.