Sanofi-Aventis’s experimental diabetes drug lixisenatide, given to volunteer patients once a day, was at least as effective as Eli Lilly and Co. and Amylin Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s twice-daily medicine Byetta, a study found.
John Merriweather went from the Army at 18—he earned a Commendation Medal in Desert Storm—to a small company in Carmel where he learned all facets of the business, from warehousing to quality control to sales. Now 38, he runs his own firm.
On Feb. 4, 34-year-old Jeremy Stephenson saw 4-1/2 years of work conclude successfully when the JW Marriott complex—1,005 guest rooms in 34 stories and 104,000 square feet of meeting, banquet and exhibit space—opened downtown.
Shares of biotechnology company Endocyte Inc. rose in afternoon trading Friday, after the company slashed pricing expectations for its initial public offering.
Roche Diagnostics Corp. is expanding one of its Indianapolis manufacturing plants to keep up with growing sales of its leading brand of blood glucose monitors.
Even as some of its investments bear fruit in grand fashion, the state’s principal fund for investing in high-tech companies may get even less in the next budget than it did two years ago when its funding was cut in half.
Growing cargo and logistics business overshadows such titillating concepts as solar farm, recreation campus.
Delays getting new diabetes meters into the U.S. market appear to have tripped up Roche Diagnostics Corp. on its way to acquiring a key software vendor.
A complicated legal case about trade secrets points up a down side to the success Indiana’s research universities have had turning their research into revenue: Large legal bills can eat much of the money.
Major tours once again bypassing Indianapolis. ‘Million Dollar Quartet’ only first-time visitor.
Purdue University officials and others connected with the life sciences in Indiana say the planned $164 million Life and Health Sciences Quadrangle at the West Lafayette campus will mean high-paying jobs, retention of highly skilled scientists, and researchers who might well have left the state for either coast.
Marcadia execs French, Hawryluk reflect on massive growth of Carmel firm after sale to Roche.
Zimmer Holdings Inc. and Biomet Inc., both based in Warsaw, are among the bidders for AstraZeneca Plc’s Astra Tech, a Swedish unit that makes dental implants and medical devices, reported Bloomberg, citing two people with direct knowledge of the matter. Astra Tech may sell for $1.8 billion to $2.1 billion, according to a research note by analysts at Sanford C. Bernstein. Astra Tech, which also makes medical devices for urology and surgery, had sales last year of $535 million. It employs 2,200 and operates in 16 markets. Separately, Zimmer won a $13.5 million contract to sell orthopedic implants to the U.S. Department of Defense. The new contract is guaranteed for one year, with the possibility of four one-year renewals.
Elanco, the animal health unit of Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Co., which this month agreed to acquire Johnson & Johnson’s European animal health unit, also had its eyes on another target, according to a Reuters report. A now-abandoned joint venture between the animal health businesses of New Jersey-based Merck & Co. Inc. and France-based Sanofi-Aventis SA anticipated selling off some assets for roughly $1 billion, according to unnamed sources cited by Reuters. The news agency reported that Elanco paid roughly $300 million to Johnson & Johnson, in order to acquire 50 animal health medicines sold under the name Janssen Animal Health. Elanco is the world’s fourth-largest animal health company, with $1.4 billion in annual revenue.
How’s this for financing drug development? Even though it hadn’t brought a single product even close to the market, Carmel-based Marcadia Biotech Inc. was sitting on $37 million in cash when it agreed to sell itself in December to Switzerland-based Roche. The money piled up not from venture capitalists but through Marcadia’s research partnerships with large pharmaceutical companies, primarily with New Jersey-based Merck & Co. Inc. “Our venture-capital firms were going crazy. They never had a company that had to pay taxes,” said Fritz French, former CEO of the 11-person firm, which had attracted $15 million from investors early in its existence. French and his management team sold Marcadia for $287 million, with the possibility of reaping $250 million more if one of Marcadia’s experimental diabetes drugs makes it to market.
Elkhart General Healthcare System and Memorial Hospital and Health System of South Bend have agreed to merge. The two hospitals signed a memorandum of understanding to develop a parent organization that will operate both systems. Memorial CEO Phil Newbold will lead the combined organization. According to Newbold, the affiliation will attract more physicians to engage with the new system and help direct its future. “Together, Elkhart General and Memorial will have more than 700 highly skilled, well-trained physicians on staff. This shared medical expertise will enable us to attract even more specialized professionals to the area and produce the region’s highest quality of care,” Newbold said. Memorial Hospital boasts 526 beds. Elkhart General has 325 beds.
With economic growth in the United States sluggish, Indiana companies are joining the race to capitalize on the fast-growing Chinese economy—even as hundreds of millions of Chinese move into the middle class and adopt a Western-style thirst for goods and services.
In this installment of IBJ's Who's Who series, meet key members of the city’s banking and finance sector. They include bankers, fund managers, venture capitalists, lawyers, financial planners and others who influence the movement and availability of money in the local economy.
The Indiana University School of Medicine has licensed a pediatric psychiatrist’s patent on
an alcohol-dependency drug that the doctor discovered improves the language and social skills of autism patients. IU has licensed the patent to Indianapolis-based Confluence Pharmaceuticals Inc.
Roche Diagnostics Corp. won regulatory approval for a new HPV test, giving it a technological edge in the $300 million market for automated cervical cancer tests.
Profits flowing from earlier investments could mean more available capital, but firms continue to be selective in placing their bets.
Shares of Endocyte Inc. have doubled since the company’s initial public offering in February—even though the common wisdom is it won’t see sales from its first cancer drug until 2014.
A New York socialite is expected to plead guilty to federal charges she duped corporations—including Indianapolis-based Roche Diagnostics Corp.—out of millions of dollars.
