The Aleth Briefs trace each story to its original source and show how the week unfolded.
The week in five lines
Biopharma dealmaking hit a record $170bn in H1 2026.
GSK chose Cambridge for its new R&D HQ.
Novo Nordisk‘s ziltivekimab failed its heart trial.
Johnson & Johnson offered $5.5bn to settle talc claims.
argenx agreed to buy Forte Biosciences for $2.2bn.
In this edition
Monday 27 July
argenx agreed to buy Forte Biosciences for $2.2bn, gaining a first-in-class antibody in vitiligo and coeliac disease.
The Dutch-Belgian immunology group is paying $77 a share in cash, an 86% premium to Forte’s volume-weighted price since it reported positive phase 1b vitiligo data on 9 July. It gains FB102, an anti-CD122 antibody with early proof-of-concept in vitiligo and coeliac disease, with phase 2 readouts due in H2 2026. The deal carries argenx beyond the neuromuscular and autoantibody diseases it built Vyvgart (efgartigimod) around, into two indications with no established drug.
AstraZeneca posted an overall-survival win for its Claudin 18.2 drug in gastric cancer and a rare-disease miss for Ultomiris, alongside Q2 results.
AZ said sonesitatug vedotin met the overall-survival primary endpoint in later-line CLDN18.2-positive advanced gastric cancer and a key secondary endpoint in the broader population, although PFS missed significance. Ultomiris failed on event-free survival in transplant-associated thrombotic microangiopathy. Management retained its $80bn 2030 revenue target.
Half-year Financial Report - AstraZeneca (RNS)
The FDA approved Otsuka’s Simtriyo (centanafadine), the first triple reuptake inhibitor for ADHD.
Otsuka announced the approval on 27 July for adults and children aged six and over, three days after the agency cleared it. Simtriyo blocks reuptake of norepinephrine, dopamine and serotonin, a mechanism no approved ADHD drug uses, and must clear controlled-substance scheduling before it can launch.
The FDA approved Freenome’s SimpleScreen blood test for colorectal cancer, with Abbott to sell it in the US.
The approval turns SimpleScreen from a lab service into a product Freenome can sell. Under a 2025 agreement, Abbott’s diagnostics operation will commercialise SimpleScreen from this autumn, triggering a $100m milestone for Freenome. In the >48,000-patient PREEMPT CRC study, the test detected colorectal cancer with 81% sensitivity and showed 90% specificity for advanced neoplasia. The test offers a blood-draw alternative to colonoscopy and stool testing, which many patients avoid.
Johnson & Johnson offered $5.5bn to settle ovarian-cancer talc litigation.
The proposal covers roughly 76,000 remaining ovarian-talc claims and requires participation by firms representing at least 95% of them. J&J would commit $5.5bn, with a first payment of no more than $3bn in 2027 and nothing further before 2028. It lands below the $8.9bn J&J proposed in 2023 and follows two failed attempts to route the claims through bankruptcy. A parallel case runs in the UK.
Tuesday 28 July
GSK will move its R&D HQ to Cambridge and cut £1.9bn annual cost by 2029.
The Cambridge Biomedical Campus centre replace GSK’s Stevenage site and house >1,000 scientists across oncology, respiratory, hepatology, vaccines and HIV. GSK targets £1.9bn in annual savings for £2.4bn of costs over three years, mainly through procurement, simpler processes and shifting resources from mature products. It now plans 20+ phase 3 starts in 2026, double its previous target, and booked a £1.3bn impairment, mostly on chronic-cough drug camlipixant. Q2 turnover was £8.4bn.
CMS will end subsidy holding down standalone Medicare drug-plan premiums.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) said it will close the Part D Premium Stabilization Demonstration at the end of 2026, having judged that from 2027 bids that insurers can now price plans without the support. The programme has subsidised standalone Part D plans across 2025 and 2026 to blunt premium rises, so its removal exposes enrollees to sharper increases next year.
Wednesday 29 July
Prime Minister Andy Burnham asked the Casey commission to set out how to deliver a National Care Service for England.
In a speech, Burnham announced Baroness Louise Casey’s Independent Commission on Adult Social Care will deliver final recommendations by summer 2027 for a service built around the person and integrated with the NHS. He said care workers should be “the best paid people in society, not the worst“. Casey has argued for a mixed market while criticising some private providers for profiteering. It is the new government’s attempt to reopen a reform successive administrations have left unresolved.
Prime Minister’s speech on social care: 29 July 2026 - Prime Minister’s Office
The FTC sued Hims & Hers, alleging it shared users’ health data with advertisers after promising to protect it.
The complaint, filed with the State of Utah and Los Angeles County in California federal court, says the telehealth company passed lists of customers identified by condition or treatment to Meta, Snap and others through tracking pixels, and locked subscribers into plans while making cancellation hard. It invokes the FTC Act and the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act. Hims & Hers, a major telehealth supplier of weight-loss drugs, called the claims baseless.
J&J took a $2.6bn option to buy in vivo CAR-T company Sail Biomedicines.
J&J will pay $785m up front, including $465m in equity, plus up to $140m in milestones, and $2.58bn more if it exercises the option. Sail, built by Flagship Pioneering, develops RNA medicines that engineer a patient’s T cells inside the body rather than in a manufacturing suite, which is designed to dramatically simplify cell therapy manufacture. Buying an option rather than the company lets J&J hold the position while the data matures.
Biogen raised its 2026 guidance as Leqembi recorded its best quarter.
Global Leqembi (lecanemab) sales, shared with Eisai, rose 15% to $184m, a third straight quarter of growth for an Alzheimer’s antibody held back since approval by its infusion schedule and brain imaging. Q2 revenue of $2.74bn beat consensus, and Biogen improved its full-year revenue outlook from a mid-single-digit decline to an increase. Newer drugs, including the Apellis-acquired Syfovre and Empaveli, now outweigh the declining multiple sclerosis business.
An FDA advisory committee voted against Capricor’s Duchenne cell therapy.
The panel voted 9 to 3 that the efficacy data did not support deramiocel for the heart-muscle damage of DMD. The vote does not bind FDA, which has a 22 August decision date, but a negative vote leaves little room to approve without more evidence.
Latigo’s non-opioid painkiller succeeded in a mid-stage trial, putting a second drug into a field Vertex has had to itself.
Published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), a phase 2b trial in 343 abdominoplasty patients found LTG-001 reduced 48-hour pain versus placebo. Latigo said the high dose delivered about 50% greater SPID48 than Vicodin, with 52% of patients opioid-free versus 22% on placebo. Vertex secured the class’s first approval with Journavx; a credible rival now complicates the market for payers and partners. Latigo, which is pursuing an IPO, plans phase 3 trials in H2 2026.
Biopharma dealmaking hit a record $170bn in the first half of 2026, on fewer but larger transactions.
BioWorld put H1 deal value at $170.1bn, 22% above the $139.4bn of H1 2025 and the highest first half in its records, with the second quarter alone a record $90.4bn. The deal count fell to 579 from 636, so the increase was driven by bigger deals. The patent cliff is a key driver, to shore up big pharma’s next decade of revenue.
Thursday 30 July
Sanofi upgraded its 2026 guidance but cleared out late-stage immunology programmes under new chief executive Belen Garijo.
Q2 sales rose 17.8% to €11.6bn, led by Dupixent up 37.6%, and Sanofi lifted full-year guidance to around 10% sales growth. Against that, Garijo discontinued the Regeneron-partnered IL-33 antibody itepekimab in COPD and chronic rhinosinusitis and the balinatunfib programmes, and impaired the Kymab-derived amlitelimab by €952m, part of write-offs of over €1bn. It was her first account of how she means to reverse a run of clinical setbacks: an R&D cleanup, more M&A and a push into China.
An FDA adcom backed Replimune’s twice-rejected melanoma drug, 10 to 3.
The panel found the efficacy of RP1 (vusolimogene oderparepvec) with Opdivo clinically meaningful in melanoma that has progressed on anti-PD-1 therapy, days after FDA reviewers said in briefing documents that the registrational IGNYTE trial did not prove RP1 works. The vote does not bind FDA, which has a 2 August decision date.
Alnylam cut its TTR sales outlook as Amvuttra hit a $1bn+ quarter for first time.
TTR revenue reached $1.03bn, up 89%, taking total product sales to $1.17bn, but Alnylam trimmed full-year TTR guidance by $200m to $4.2 to $4.5bn, saying early second-line demand had been inflated by pent-up switching that has now normalised. Amvuttra (vutrisiran) makes up most of Alnylam’s commercial weight.
Endpoints reported that the first round of Trump’s 100% pharmaceutical tariffs will not take effect as planned, every targeted company having dealt itself out.
The first Section 232 tariffs were due to hit an initial group of drugmakers, but all had secured Most Favoured Nation pricing and US onshoring deals setting their rate at 0%, leaving none to charge. The 100% tariff remains scheduled for the rest of the industry from 29 September, as the White House presses more firms into agreements.
A US appeals court revived claims that decongestant makers misled buyers with “maximum strength” labelling.
The Second Circuit ruled that “maximum strength“ claims over phenylephrine products can proceed. The FDA has concluded that oral phenylephrine works no better than placebo. The consolidated litigation covers roughly 100 class actions against makers and retailers including Procter & Gamble and CVS.
In re Oral Phenylephrine Marketing and Sales Practices Litigation, No. 24-3296 (2d Cir.) - US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Illumina raised its 2026 guidance after a Q2 beat.
The sequencing leader reported Q2 revenue of $1.16bn, up 9.5%, and lifted full-year guidance to $4.60 to $4.64bn and non-GAAP EPS to $5.30 to $5.40, citing NovaSeq X placements and clinical demand, a read across the entire sequencing market.
Two biotechs priced or set terms for IPOs
Apnimed priced an upsized offering of 12m shares at $16 to raise $192m, funding the launch of its sleep-apnoea pill AD109, which awaits an FDA decision, and its shares jumped on their Nasdaq debut. Braveheart Bio set terms to raise $318.8m at a valuation of up to $1.2bn, to fund phase 3 work on BHB-1893, a cardiac myosin inhibitor licensed from Jiangsu Hengrui for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Analysts attribute the revival to rotation from richly valued tech and AI stocks into healthcare.
Apnimed Announces Pricing of Upsized Initial Public Offering
Braveheart Bio, Inc. Form S-1/A - SEC EDGAR
Friday 31 July
Novo’s ziltivekimab failed in its big cardiovascular outcomes trial, shutting its expansion from obesity and diabetes.
In phase 3 ZEUS, the anti-IL-6 antibody engaged its target but failed to reduce major cardiovascular events versus placebo in >6,300 people with atherosclerotic disease, chronic kidney disease and inflammation (hazard ratio 0.99). Cardiovascular outcome trials are among the costliest and determine reimbursement breadth, so failure leaves little room for recovery. Novo’s remaining hopes rest on two trials: HERMES in heart failure and ARTEMIS after heart attack, both of which report in H1 2027.
AstraZeneca and Daiichi Sankyo won EU approval for Datroway in first-line triple-negative breast cancer.
The European Commission cleared Datroway, a TROP2 ADC, as first-line monotherapy for metastatic triple-negative breast cancer in patients ineligible for immunotherapy, moving it ahead of chemotherapy. In phase 3 TROPION-Breast02, overall survival rose to 23.7 months from 18.7 (median) and the risk of progression or death fell 43%. AZ said it is the only EU-approved TROP2 with an overall-survival benefit in this setting.
Datroway approved in the EU as only TROP2-directed medicine with overall survival benefit for 1st-line metastatic TNBC - AstraZeneca