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Today, a brief rundown of news involving BenevolentAI and Tasca Therapeutics, as well as updates from Eli Lilly, AbbVie, Biogen that you may have missed.
BenevolentAI co-founder Kenneth Mulvaney says he is taking the AI drug discovery specialist back to its “techbio” foundation in a restructuring announced by the firm Wednesday. Mulvaney returned to lead BenevolentAI in October, replacing then-CEO Joerg Moeller. “Reshaping BenevolentAI involved tough but necessary decisions,” Mulvaney said in a statement that outlined BenevolentAI’s next steps, which include layoffs and a plan to delist from the Euronext Amsterdam stock exchange. The company also said that, going forward, it would attempt to partner its drug candidates earlier in development to reduce its balance sheet risk. “The Board is wholly behind this strategic direction and restoration of the business to its TechBio roots,” deputy chair Peter Allen said in the statement. — Ned Pagliarulo
Tasca Therapeutics raised $52 million in a Series A round, the biotechnology startup said Tuesday. Backed by Cure Ventures and Regeneron Ventures, the company claims it has a new way to identify cancer drug candidates. The Series A will be used to fund development of its lead program, called CP-383, in Phase 1/2 studies in people with cancers of the lung, colon, head and neck, and brain. — Gwendolyn Wu
Eli Lilly’s board of directors has given the company a green light to buy back up to $15 billion worth of stock, triple the size of Lilly’s last share repurchase program. The board also authorized a 15% increase to Lilly’s dividend. “Given the strong growth profile of the company, we're ... increasing the amount of capital we plan to return to shareholders,” Lilly CFO Lucas Montarce said in a Monday statement. Lilly shares are up about 37% this year, although its stock price growth has cooled in recent months. The company plans to complete its newly authorized share buybacks within three years. — Ned Pagliarulo
An experimental drug for Parkinson’s disease has succeeded in a third late-stage clinical trial, convincing its owner, AbbVie, there’s enough evidence to file for approval. While few details were given, AbbVie said the drug, called tavapadon, was significantly better than a placebo at improving patients’ ability to do daily tasks that require muscle movement, like speaking, eating and writing. The company plans to submit an approval application sometime next year. Tavapadon was one of the assets AbbVie got last year through its nearly $9 billion acquisition of Cerevel Therapeutics. Another key asset from that deal, the schizophrenia drug emraclidine, suffered a major setback last month. — Jacob Bell