The recent success of Vertex in acute pain merely highlights the agonizingly slow process elsewhere, particularly in chronic pain indications.

April had four VC rounds of $100m or more, including Allogene's $300m to develop CAR-T therapies licensed from Pfizer. Innovent Biologics raised $150m, BenevolentAI brought in $115m and Constellation garnered $100m last month.

Private Company Edition: Martin Mackay and two other former Alexion executives co-founded the rare disease start-up in January with a $37m Series A to kick things off. Also, Innovent raises $150m in venture cash, Tmunity adds $35m and Third Rock launches Cedilla.