A couple of months after licensing the late-stage kidney disease drug sparsentan from Travere, the Swiss group has beefed up its nephrology activities by buying Mallorca-based Sanifit and Swiss outfit Inositec.

Last week, the Swiss major gave a glimpse into the next wave of innovation coming out of its labs in key areas such as osteoarthritis, pancreatic cancer and food allergy. Scrip has been taking a detailed look at the highlights.

Private Company Edition: Arbor is developing drugs based on proprietary gene editors, Acrivon is applying proteomics to precision cancer therapies, and bit.bio is producing differentiated cell products. Also, Marengo launches with $80m, Sanofi invests up to $60m in Gyroscope and Shasqi raises $50m.

The biopharma market has been highly active throughout the COVID-19 pandemic with a substantial focus on strategic alliances between 2020-H1 2021. Partnership deals present exciting liquidity and risk mitigation opportunities for early-stage companies. Small molecules still comprise the largest segment of partnered drugs, but alliances for other modalities are on the rise.