STAT+: Pharmalittle: Novartis R&D hub’s name change reflects strategy shift; Lilly’s Mounjaro backed by U.K. watchdog
Novartis is changing the name — and the guiding strategy — of its research and development hub in Cambridge, Mass.
Good morning, Pharmalittle family! Adam Feuerstein here, filling in for Ed. My morning coffee was brewed with Peru Cajamarca beans, sourced by Equator and lightly roasted to reveal “notes of almond, tamarind and white grape.” Honestly, I’m not getting any of those flavors, but it’s still a damn good cup of joe. Very smooth. Here’s some news for your Friday morning. …
Novartis is changing the name — and the guiding strategy — of its research and development hub in Cambridge, Mass. What was known for years as the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, or NIBR, will soon simply be known as Novartis Biomedical Research, said President Fiona Marshall during an interview at the 2023 STAT Future Summit. The new name reflects a larger shift by the Swiss pharma giant to retool its research strategy — from one driven by the pure pursuit of scientific discovery to a tighter focus on projects likely to yield commercially successful drugs. “We want the innovative research that Novartis research has always done to be taken forward through to development, and for commercial to be supporting it and … taking that all the way through to market,” Marshall said. “We want that alignment.”
Eli Lilly’s diabetes drug Mounjaro has received backing from Britain’s health care cost-effectiveness watchdog, Reuters reports. In a draft guidance, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) concluded Mounjaro would be a beneficial treatment option for an estimated 180,000 people with poorly controlled type 2 diabetes.
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