Articles about Biotech

Allen Institute’s big new bet: $400M effort aims to go from mapping the brain to treating disease

The Allen Institute is launching a $400 million initiative, the Brain Health Accelerator, to develop gene therapies for neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, and ALS. It marks the first time the Seattle research organization, founded by Paul Allen in 2003, has made treating disease its goal. Read More

Eli Lilly to acquire Seattle-area biotech in $1.5 billion bet on next-generation shingles vaccine

Eli Lilly agreed to acquire Bothell, Wash.-based Curevo Vaccine for up to $1.5 billion in cash. The deal centers on a next-generation shingles vaccine that reduced side effects by more than half in a Phase 2 study. Read More

The mother of all treatments: Mitera lands $1.75M to unlock the immune-tolerance secrets of pregnancy

Mitera Biosciences is emerging from stealth with a mission to develop new drugs for autoimmune diseases and organ transplant rejection. Read More

‘Scientist-as-a-Service’: Seattle startup Pauling.AI aims to shrink drug discovery timelines by months

The company’s technology can complete tasks in a matter of weeks that previously required three to six months, said founder and CEO Javier Tordable. Read More

Athira Pharma recovers from Alzheimer’s failure with breast cancer pivot and $90M investment

In a remarkable pivot, Athira Pharma has a deal to test a promising breast cancer drug and landed $90 million in upfront funding from investors. Read More

Between hype and hope: Seattle biotech leaders size up AI’s real impact on drug development

Seattle biotech companies are using AI to design new medical treatments, but scientists caution the tech holds enormous promise, but needs to stay grounded in reality. Read More

‘Seattle biotech is on fire’: Industry produces three Nobel Prize winners in two years

Mary Brunkow of the Seattle-based Institute for Systems Biology, Fred Ramsdell of Sonoma Biotherapeutics, and David Baker of the UW’s Institute for Protein Design were honored for their research. Read More

Fred Hutch leaders raise $10M for new AI startup aiming to expedite drug discovery

The Seattle-based biotech company aims to make new drug discovery faster and cheaper by using AI to simulate the results from hypothetical lab tests. Read More

Frazier Life Sciences raises $1.3 billion for latest fund

Frazier Life Sciences announced Thursday that it raised $1.3 billion for its 12th fund — its largest to date —… Read More

What’s at stake for Washington’s flagship research institutions in the legal battle over NIH funding

The fight now unfolding over the Trump administration’s sudden limit on National Institutes of Health grant funding could have deep… Read More

Trump’s push to freeze funding leaves researchers anxious about delayed scientific breakthroughs

When Luca Foschini, head of Seattle’s Sage Bionetworks, described the impact of the Trump administration’s efforts to freeze federal grants… Read More

Seattle biotech startup Tune Therapeutics lands $175M to support clinical research

Tune Therapeutics, a biotech company with headquarters in Seattle and Durham, N.C., raised $175 million in one of the largest… Read More

Seattle’s Sonoma Biotherapeutics receives $45M milestone payment

Sonoma Biotherapeutics on Wednesday announced that it received a $45 million payment from Regeneron Pharmaceuticals for meeting a significant milestone… Read More

NASA engineer working on construction robot

Mars Society gains foothold in AI, robotics and biotechnology to clear a path to space

The Mars Society says it’s making progress on launching a startup incubator in the Seattle area, with artificial intelligence and… Read More

Protein design startup Outpace lands $144M to test treatments that target solid tumors

Outpace Bio, a Seattle startup using artificial intelligence to design proteins that are incorporated into cancer therapies targeting solid tumors,… Read More

Aurion Biotech gets FDA approval to speed development of vision restoring treatment

Seattle’s Aurion Biotech announced Wednesday that it received special designations from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that should speed… Read More

From Expedia to Scispot: A startup founder’s journey to build data infrastructure for biotech

Satya Singh, a Seattle-area technology and startup leader who was previously a data platform executive at Expedia, co-founded Scispot, a data… Read More

A-Alpha Bio lands $14.5M from Department of Defense to prep for future biological threats

A-Alpha Bio will receive $14.5 million from the Department of Defense (DOD) to expand a project with a national lab… Read More

New study for early detection of Alzheimer’s shows promising results

A new test for the early detection of Alzheimer’s Disease — potentially even before symptoms are present — show that… Read More

AI2 Incubator spinout Modulus sells cell therapy tech assets to Boston’s Ginkgo Bioworks

The news: Modulus Therapeutics, a Seattle-based cellular therapy company spun out of the Allen Institute of Artificial Intelligence (AI2) Incubator,… Read More

Sonoma Bio celebrates new Seattle waterfront R&D center for autoimmune disease research

Sonoma Biotherapeutics on Monday hosted a ribbon cutting ceremony at its new research and development center and office space on… Read More

Phase Genomics gets $1.5M grant from Gates Foundation to fight cow burp methane

Seattle biotech startup Phase Genomics is receiving $1.5 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to fund research into… Read More

Pfizer to close Seagen manufacturing plant in Seattle area following $43B acquisition

Pharma giant Pfizer, fresh off its $43 billion acquisition of Seagen, said it will shut down construction on a new… Read More

Healionics lands $5.5M to complete human trial of artificial blood vessel for dialysis patients

Healionics, a Seattle-based medical technology company, raised $5.5 million in new financing aimed at helping the company complete an ongoing… Read More

AstraZeneca completes $1.1B acquisition of Univ. of Washington biotech spinout Icosavax

Biotech giant AstraZeneca has completed its $1.1 billion acquisition of Icosavax, a Seattle-based spinout from the University of Washington’s Institute for… Read More

Pfizer wins regulatory approval for its $43B acquisition of Seattle-area biotech giant Seagen

Pfizer’s plan to acquire Seagen for $43 billion has cleared the necessary regulatory hurdles, the pharma titan announced Tuesday. The… Read More

New website helps engineers find biomedical challenges that crown winning algorithms

There are lots of tasks in biomedicine that are more accurately and efficiently accomplished by a computer than a person… Read More

Washington startups receive $25K grants aimed at boosting state’s life sciences sector

A group of 20 early-stage life sciences startups in Washington each received $25,000 grants, part of an effort to fuel… Read More

Biotech company Absci lays off 30 employees, about 15% of staff

Publicly traded biotech company Absci is laying off 30 employees, or approximately 15% of its workforce.

A-Alpha Bio, a biotech startup that measures and predicts protein interactions, raises $22.4M

Seattle biotech startup A-Alpha Bio raised $22.4 million to boost development of its machine learning platform that analyzes protein-protein interactions.… Read More