Biotech, cancer, Drugs Luke Timmerman wrote: Nowhere but America makes it possible for a company to pursue its dreams for 28 years without making a profit. Even in the most optimistic times, it’s hard to explain. So how can it possibly be, in the depths of recession, that things are looking up...

How The Grinch Stole Christmas I have always been a sucker for The Grinch That Stole Christmas. Not the Jim Carrey live-action version, but the Chuck Jones cartoon, which uses all of Dr. Seuss' original artwork and concepts. A version of that story may be playing out right in front of us. I did not ...

Biotech, obesity, Life Sciences Luke Timmerman wrote: Fen-phen was the wonder drug for weight loss in the 1990s, until it was found to damage heart valves and yanked off the market. Now the folks at San Diego-based Arena Pharmaceuticals are eagerly waiting clinical trial results that will show wheth...

Biotech, Drugs, Life Sciences Stewart Lyman wrote: Seattle’s biotech community used to be among the top-ranked in the nation. But as some 2,500 layoffs have piled up in the local biotech sector since 2002, Seattle has tumbled in the rankings. We need to face up to this fact first, before we ca...

Your note on the RCP meeting got me thinking... ...recent pharma sales force reductions... ...a sudden rush to settle past off-label marketing investigations in the US at the same time as off-label promotion is to be accepted as legal by the FDA... What is going on? Fortunately, Phoni Pharm. CEO Joh...

Biotech, acquisitions, Autoimmune Luke Timmerman wrote: Pfizer rocked the business world yesterday with its $68 billion bid to acquire Madison, NJ-based Wyeth (NYSE: WYE), and the ripple effect was felt here in the Northwest. Nobody in town has a bigger stake in this deal than Seattle-based Trubion ...

Biotech, people, Hepatitis C Luke Timmerman wrote: ZymoGenetics is enduring one of the ugliest stretches in its 28-year history. Now the Seattle-based biotech company is hoping that Doug Williams, an executive who lived through both the darkest days and finest moments at Immunex in the 1990s, will b...

From Forbes.com: Wyeth Pharmaceuticals just can't seem to catch a break. The company is not only increasingly worried that it will lose a large chunk of its revenues to generic competition, it also faces the ongoing threat that its pipeline is starting to go dry. A further delay in the approval of i...

The Wall Street Journal reports that Wyeth, desperate to make money off of its Effexor XR-knockoff, Pristiq, says it will slash the antidepressant at a 20% discount compared to Effexor's price. The price slash, CNN money reports, is a result......