Bryan Czyzewski

Roche Covets Genentech for Good Reason

You do not seem to make a clear correlation between personalized medicine and Genentech. I would posit that DNA made its mark initially in the old vanguard of biotech, but by using its initial tenets, that of developing therapeutics through the understanding biology is what will drive it through the personalized medicine era. Sequencing may become routine enough to tell that you have a certain makeup that can predispose to disease or affect treatment regimens, but its what is done with that information that makes all the difference. Not one company really came out of the genomics era using any genomics information for the design of drugs.
If the founder of google now knows he may get parkinsons, well where do you think he might put his money?

Cougar Biotechnology: Stalking Prostate Cancer

I hope Dendreon's Provenge can deliver on its promises. THe 34% increase in survival rate is very promising. My one qualm is that placebo in their phase III trials were not done with their immune adjuvant, therefore the response rate you see may not be due to the treatment process that isolated APC's receive but to the stimulatory effects of the GM-CSF. If this is the case, then the treatment could potentially be even more promising. Anything that improves time to progression and survival is a welcome treatment in HRPC. Both treatments Dendreon's and Cougar's fall short, time to progression for Provenge and no survival statistics for abiraterone.

Cougar Biotechnology: Stalking Prostate Cancer

Provenge looks great but has some drawbacks too, as does GVAX. Both require infusions with GM-CSF, an immune stimulator. Many results with immune modulation therapies can be actually attributed to the immune boost seen with adjuvant. Provenge and GVAX also seems to work well only in a subset of the HRPC patients.

Aegerion Pharmaceuticals: Capitalize on Cholesterol

Here's something I just noticed: if apoB levels are the new biomarker to follow for CHD risk assesment as the Farmington Study is leaning towards, then Isis' mipomersen and ezetimibe combo AEGR-733 both shoot it down 40 and 27 percent respectively. Now which would you rather take, an injection once a week as is necessary with Isis or a pill a day as in Aegerion's formulation.

Aegerion Pharmaceuticals: Capitalize on Cholesterol

Aegerion is trying to enter a very crowded market, true, but the combination market has some room, and this is where AEG-733 could really shine.