Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
GSK, Alphabet Plan To Tap Into Body's Electrical Signals To Treat Illnesses
The Wall Street Journal: Glaxo, Alphabet Plan $700 Million Bioelectric Treatment Venture
GlaxoSmithKline PLC and Google-parent Alphabet Inc. have teamed up to develop what they call bioelectronic medicines, or treatments that use miniature electronic devices to modify how electrical impulses are transmitted around the nervous system. The U.K pharmaceutical company said it had signed an agreement with Verily Life Sciences LLC, formerly Google Life Sciences, to create Galvani Bioelectronics. It said the pair would spend up to £540 million ($700 million) over seven years on the venture, provided they succeeded in hitting various milestones along the way. Glaxo will control 55% of the new company with Verily holding the rest. (Roland, 8/1)
Stat: Google Spinoff Teams With Pharma Giant To Treat Disease By Zapping Nerves
Google’s life science spinoff, Verily, is jumping into a new field: Miniaturizing devices that can modify the electrical signals transmitted by nerves throughout the body, with the goal of treating a wide variety of illnesses. Verily announced Monday morning that it’s teaming up with pharma giant GSK on a joint venture dubbed Galvani Bioelectronics. The two companies have pledged to invest a combined total of more than $700 million in the venture over the next seven years. (Simon, 8/1)
In other pharmaceutical news —
Boston Globe: Seres Therapeutics Stock Plunges On Disappointing Drug Trial Results
Shares of Seres Therapeutics Inc. lost almost 70 percent of their value Friday after the six-year-old Cambridge biotech company reported disappointing test data for its lead experimental drug. Seres, which has amassed a library of bacteria from the human microbiome to use as a drugmaking platform, raised about $134 million in an initial public offering last year to develop a class of “healthy gut” drugs to treat infections and metabolic disorders. (Weisman, 7/29)
