San Diego Life Sciences Roundup: Acadia, Zogenix, Isis, & More

deal with London’s AstraZeneca to advance five cancer drugs. AstraZeneca agreed to pay Isis $31 million almost immediately, along with unspecified milestone payments and other fees. In a three-drug deal for three neurological drugs, Weston, MA-based Biogen Idec agreed to pay Isis $30 million upfront, along with future payments that could ultimately total $600.

—San Diego’s Halozyme Therapeutics (Nasdaq: [[ticker:HALO]] said Roche has asked the European Medicines Agency for permission to use a subcutaneous formulation of rituxumab (MabThera) for Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. The drug is typically administered intravenously at infusion centers. Halozyme’s technology makes it possible, however, to administer an extended-release injection of rituxumab just under the skin. Roche’s application triggered a $4 million milestone payment to Halozyme under their collaboration agreement.

—A memorial service will be held Saturday morning in Oak Park, IL, for Fred Cutler, a longtime computer marketing executive who served for three years as director of Connect, the San Diego nonprofit for technology entrepreneurship. Cutler died of a rare and aggressive form of Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma on Dec. 2 in Madison, WI.

—San Diego’s Ligand Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: [[ticker:LGND]]) said it has begun a pivotal trial intended to confirm an earlier study that showed its specialized, high-dose formulation of melphalan helps to condition patients with multiple myeloma to autologous transplant. Ligand says its melphalan, a captisol-enabled formula that is free of propylene glycol, is a new formulation for use before multiple myeloma transplants.

—San Diego-based Verenium (Nasdaq: [[ticker:VRNM]], an industrial biotech focused on the use of catalyzing enzymes in sustainable biofuels and sustainable chemical production, said it had arranged $22.5 million in debt financing through the Athyrium Opportunities Fund. Verenium said the capital would be used to advance its product line to commercialization, improve its manufacturing prospects, and for working capital.

—San Diego’s Cytori Therapeutics (Nasdaq: [[ticker:CYTX]]) said it plans to offer shares of its common stock through an underwritten public offering. The company provided no details, however, about the timing, amount, or price of the offering. All of the shares in the offering would be sold by Cytori.

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Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.