[Transfer] Biopharmaceuticals are facing difficult times, expanding tracks or key survival

[Transfer] Biopharmaceuticals are facing difficult times, expanding tracks or key survival

Source: Same freehand

The current difficult period is forcing biopharmaceutical companies to expand their tracks, and many companies try to squeeze out a penny from existing capital. This approach is not only to save funds and planning priorities, but also affects their ways to consider opportunities.

The way of different companies depends on the size of the company. Lance Minor, chief and head of life science, believes that the success of small companies depends on whether it can generate positive data and attract investors. If resources are concentrated in obtaining the next clinical data, this is a suitable way.

In contrast, for medium -sized enterprises, the use of preferential inventory to meet profit expectations or better management cash may have a small impact on the overall impact of the company and its stock price.

Although some companies have postponed their products, MINOR emphasized that expansion track does not necessarily mean deceleration. Instead, this method can be distributed by reducing the scope of clinical trials and concentrated on less indications, not at the same time for multiple disease types.

Analysts said that in the rest of this year, financing choices may still be limited.

According to J.P. Morgan's "Biopharmaceutical and Medical Technology Transactions and Risk Outlook", in the first half of 2022, all types of transaction volume was declining.

J.P. Morgan Commercial Bank Secondary Market Bank and Professional Industry Healthcare Co -Director Kathryn McDonough revealed that in the second quarter of 2022, venture capital in the field of biopharmaceuticals is still declining. However, total investment is still at a high point in 2019.

It is expected to increase financing in the later period

MCDONOUGH expects that later this year, private equity financing and finance in the later stages will rise. The reason is that although investors hold cash, they believe that the IPO market is tight, the public market returns are low, and there are fewer and fewer high -quality companies that can invest.

Based on a company that is driven by steadily reading data, the MCDONOUGH team has seen signs of rebound, but improvement will also be affected by stable macro backgrounds, positive clinical clinical, regulatory updates, and more mergers and acquisitions. She infer that in 2022, the high cash burning rate and challenging stock market may lead to the continued authorization of major projects in order to attract greater transaction clauses, although shareholders and management hopes to retain core asset development inside.

Uciane Scarlett, the person in charge of MPM, said in a discussion in the Biotech Gate digital cooperation group held in August this year that in this environment, investors will not choose a platform for clinical pre -clinical and differentiated platforms. It will be more popular with investors. All types of investors are concerned about those companies that may have the first human test data in at least 12 months.

Nuohua's strategic cooperation Dawn Bell has reiterated this. She said at the discussion that platform transactions are too rare for Novartis, and the company is looking for products.

Consider global partners

Therefore, in order to reduce risks, companies that seeks transactions must be prepared to accept unexpected clauses.

Philippe Lopes-Fernandes, Executive Vice President of Ispen CBO, warned that if the funds can reach the next inflection point, it can be done. But if (funds injection) is just to make up for the gap, then be careful not to increase the difficulty of attracting partners in the future. He said that compared with short -term cash transactions that complicate future transactions, it may be better to cooperate with global partners with less ideal terms.

Regional authorization is a good example. Lopes-Fernandes said that many biotechnology companies in China want to cooperate, but they have no channels. These biotechnology companies can quickly provide cash, but because they are difficult to verify, they may bring a lot of headaches.

Other problems will be authorized to authorize China. Johnson & Johnson's innovation department is responsible for the regional vice president of early innovation cooperation Lesley Stolz that many large biopharmaceutical companies regard China as an emerging market. When authorized to the Chinese market, these large biopharmaceutical companies will not accept other potential partners Essence In other words, by finding a suitable partner to expand the track, it is worth it even at the cost of sacrificing regional rights and interests.

Increase value through AI/ML, digital and diagnostic technology

In order to seek track expansion, many companies began to seek artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) during the discovery and development stage. Scarlett said that most companies have incorporated the calculated elements into the workflow, and AI/ML can improve the efficacy of the molecules of a long, high cost or high loss rate, such as small molecules.

From the perspective of investment, Scarlett is trying to understand how to use AI to make differentiated products. This model has not changed. Instead, the use of AI/ML technology during drug discovery can reduce the loss rate of complex molecules selected as a potential pioneer compound, and save the cost of achieving this goal.

Bell pointed out that AI and ML are just tools. The biggest reason for the failure of drugs is that we still don't understand biology. Calculating tools can help us draw conclusions faster, but not necessarily bring more success. Other companies are interested in digital therapy and diagnostic technology, and use it as a way to increase value, usually to improve the compliance or result of non -digital therapy.

Although digital choices seem to be a relatively fast and simple way for increasing the value and revenue of products, the challenge is also huge.

Bell pointed out that there are difficulties in persuading doctors and patients to use digital applications and persuasion to reimburseers. For example, many applications have no reimbursement code.

Lopes-Fernandes emphasized that for pharmaceutical companies, digital solutions must be asset-centered, and it is still on the way to development.

Platform or a single product?

The group members also discussed the relative advantages of the platform and a single product, and the debate on this has lasted for decades. A few years ago, investors preferred the platform because the platform provided the "multiple shots score" opportunity. Now, investors seem to prefer a single product company.

The platform company is facing the challenge of resource allocation, and they must allocate allocation resources for platform construction and the development of pilot compounds. Bell warns that the capital cannot be diversified too thin, and capital must be allocated to ensure that the inflection point is reached.

In order to successfully expand the track, whether it is a single asset or platform technology, the company must have strategic consciousness to use these assets to create value. At the same time, be flexible and keep pace with the times. Prosperous development or only survival is the combination of savvy leaders, differentiated science and luck. As Stolz said, if you want to stay in this industry, you must become a morbid optimist.

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