Following up on last week’s post, it appears that the H1N1 flu vaccine is effective in older children, ages 10 to 17, based on preliminary results of an ongoing trial. This week, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, announced that early results of clinical studies of the vaccine “look promising.” Read more »

Reading the news sometimes gives me a disorienting sense of déjà vu. I know I wrote that last week, but it’s true again for a different reason. Today, French heavyweight sanofi aventis (Paris) announced that it was acquiring a majority stake in Shantha Biotechnics (Hyderabad, India). This new development follows a now-familiar pattern. Read more »

As my colleague Maribel Rios discussed in her blog this week, the recent outbreak of swine flu gives us pause to consider our pandemic preparedness. The events of this past week also makes us more aware of the interrelationships and complexity of global public health, giving rise to an even broader question, has the pharmaceutical industry as a whole met its responsibility in effectuating global public health? Read more »

Pfizer’s pending $68-billion merger with Wyeth has raised the question on possible suitors in another merger among the pharmaceutical majors. A recent article in the New York Times gained the input of Wall Street analysts, who speculate that Merck, Sanofi-Aventis, and Johnson & Johnson may be next in line to seek acquisitions among their Big Pharma brethen or in select biotechnology companies. Read more »

Innovator companies are constantly looking for ways to compete with generic-drug manufacturers. The former have tried to improve or reformulate their products and to extend patent protection. But sufficiently big innovator companies have another option: they can buy their generic competitors. Read more »

Pharmaceutical Technology focuses much of its attention on the companies that manufacture the world’s drugs. We’ve noticed many stories on the wires lately that describe how the current economic situation is hurting drugmakers. But several press releases I saw today reminded me that patients are experiencing difficult times, too. Read more »

Last week’s post highlighted pharma deals that haven’t been working out due to rejected bids and stalled negotiations. On a more positive note, the past several months have also seen some successful acquisitions. This past week produced updates to some of Big Pharma’s pending pacts. Read more »

The past several months have seen many successful merger and acquisition announcements come and go, but for some companies, this has hardly been a summer of love. Several of Big Pharma’s big offers have been rejected, and some of these stories are still playing out. Only time will tell what the future holds for these proposed deals and sometimes troubled partnerships. Read more »