invoX Pharma Ltd.

The LaNova deal comes shortly after Sino Biopharm let go of another antibody-focused platform, F-star Therapeutics.\n The PD-1xVEGF dealmaking wave that has captivated Western pharma companies is now surging within China.Tuesday, Sino Biopharmaceutical said it will pay up to $951 million to acquire Chinese compatriot LaNova Medicines, which has ongoing partnerships with Merck & Co. and AstraZeneca. Sino Biopharma is buying the remaining 95.09% stake it doesn’t already hold in LaNova after investing about $20 million to obtain a 4.91% interest in November. As the Shanghai biotech has about $450 million cash on its balance sheet, the net payment is about $501 million, according to a securities filing (PDF)LaNova became more widely known in November after Merck agreed to pay $588 million upfront and up to $2.7 billion in milestones for the biotech’s PD-1xVEGF bispecific antibody, LM-299, as a potential follow-on to the New Jersey pharma’s megablockbuster cancer drug Keytruda.Then fueling the PD-(L)1xVEGF fanfare, Pfizer  inked a $1.25 billion-upfront deal to license 3SBio’s PD-1xVEGF candidate SSGJ-707, and Bristol Myers Squibb pledged $3.5 billion upfront to co-develop and co-commercialize a PD-L11xVEGF bispecific by BioNTech. In all three transactions, the assets originated from Chinese companies.In a securities filing to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, Sino Biopharm highlighted LaNova’s antibody platforms, with focuses on the tumor microenvironment, targeted antibodies, antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) and T-cell engagers. Besides LM-299, LaNova in 2023 licensed a GPRC5D-targeting ADC coded LM-305 to AstraZeneca in a deal potentially worth $600 million.The antibody specialist also comes with a CCR8 antibody that’s undergoing a phase 2 registrational trial in China, plus a Claudin 18.2 ADC that’s in phase 3 development in the country, Sino Biopharm noted in its filing. Sino Biopharm already holds Chinese rights to the CCR8 asset as part of its previous 4.91% equity investment (PDF) in LaNova.Other clinical candidates in LaNova’s pipeline include an anti-SIRPa antibody, a CTLA-4 tumor microenvironment-specific antibody, and two 4-1BB bispecifics separately targeting NaPi2b and CEACAM5, according to the company’s website.The LaNova deal comes shortly after Sino Biopharm let go of another antibody-focused platform, F-star Therapeutics. The U.K. biotech announced three months ago that it has become a private, independent company, about two years after Sino Biopharm subsidiary invoX Pharma bought the firm in a protracted acquisition scrutinized by U.S. foreign investment authorities. The Sino Biopharm-LaNova transaction can be viewed as another milestone in China’s biotech development history. While Chinese biotechs have been picked up in full-on acquisitions by foreign pharmas, such as AstraZeneca-Gracell Biotechnologies and BioNTech-Bioetheus, very few, if any, Chinese pharmas have bought out innovative domestic biotechs in the past.As one of the largest drugmakers in China, Sino Biopharm recorded 28.9 billion Chinese yuan (about $4 billion) in total 2024 revenue, with about 37% from oncology medicines. 

The antibody-focused biotech is breaking free from invoX Pharma, a U.K.-based subsidiary of Sino Biopharmaceutical.\n After a drawn-out acquisition that closed in 2023, U.K. biotech F-star Therapeutics is charting its own path as a private, independent company.The antibody-focused biotech is breaking free from invoX Pharma, a U.K.-based subsidiary of Sino Biopharmaceutical, as announced in a LinkedIn post by F-star.“We are pleased to announce that F-star Therapeutics has entered a new chapter in our history and become a private, independent company, fully owned and operated by the existing management team,” the post reads.The biotech will continue to use its bispecific platform to discover next-gen therapeutics, the company said in the post. No further details were shared.In March 2023, invoX wrapped up the acquisition of Nasdaq-listed F-star for an aggregate cash consideration of $161 million. The Sino subsidiary initially extended an offer in mid-2022, but involvement from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States delayed the deal from closing until the next year.Fierce Biotech has reached out to invoX for comment on the split.As for F-star, the company is no stranger to M&A. In 2020, the biotech merged with Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals, giving F-star its former Nasdaq listing. The biotech has also previously entered partnerships with several pharmas, including Takeda, Johnson & Johnson, and Merck KGaA.As of publication, F-star has wiped its website of any information regarding an internal pipeline.

UK antibody developer F-star Therapeutics has become a private, independent biotech. The surprise move — announced via F-star’s LinkedIn page on Thursday — comes two years after a drawn-out $161 million M&A exit to invoX, a European unit of China-based Sino Biopharmaceutical. That deal went through reviews by the US’ Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS. The review caused months of delays before invoX completed the acquisition in March 2023. The LinkedIn post offered few details, other than to say that the company is now owned by F-star’s management team. “We are pleased to announce that F-star Therapeutics has entered a new chapter in our history and become a private, independent company, fully owned and operated by the existing management team,” F-star wrote. F-star declined to comment on the terms of the deal or make an executive available for an interview. The biotech is led by Ryan Fiehler. Spokespeople for invoX and Sino Biopharmaceutical didn’t respond to an email inquiry from Endpoints News . F-star said in the post that it plans to continue discovering bispecific antibodies and working with partners. The company previously disclosed partnerships with Merck KGaA, Denali Therapeutics, J&J and Takeda . Those partnerships are still listed on the biotech’s website. As of the fall, according to an internet archive of the biotech’s website, F-star had three bispecific antibodies in the clinic, plus a second-generation STING agonist in Phase 1. InvoX restructured last year. It has an AI oncology partnership with Insilico Medicine.