👋 Hey, let’s get into it. Merck is not flirting with AI anymore. It just put a ring on it.

The pharma giant inked a deal worth up to $1 billion with Google Cloud to overhaul basically everything, from R&D to manufacturing to commercial ops, using agentic AI. Not just tools, actual embedded engineers working alongside Merck teams to rewire how decisions get made.

The timing is not random. Merck is heading into one of the most important launch cycles in its history, and it wants AI driving the car, not just riding shotgun.

Big Pharma is not asking if AI matters anymore. It’s asking how fast it can deploy it everywhere.

💰 AbbVie Plants a $1.4B Flag in North Carolina
AbbVie is going big in the Southeast, committing $1.4 billion to build a 185-acre manufacturing campus in Durham, North Carolina. The site will support production across immunology, oncology, and neuroscience, marking the company’s largest single-site investment to date. More than 730 jobs are expected, with initial operations focused on small-volume parenteral manufacturing. The move reinforces North Carolina’s status as a pharma manufacturing hotspot and signals AbbVie’s long-term confidence in U.S.-based production as supply chains and policy pressures continue to evolve.

🛑 GLP-1 Access Plan Hits a Wall
A major effort to expand access to weight-loss drugs just hit a speed bump. CMS has indefinitely paused its BALANCE pilot after heavyweights like CVS and UnitedHealth declined to participate, citing structural concerns. The program was designed to lower costs for GLP-1 therapies through direct negotiations, but without payer buy-in, the model struggles to function. Analysts estimate the delay could shave hundreds of millions off peak sales projections, with worst-case scenarios climbing into the billions if broader adoption stalls. Novo and Lilly shares declined on the news.

🦠 Merck Lands New HIV Contender
Merck just secured FDA approval for Idvynso, a once-daily oral HIV regimen combining doravirine and its next-gen asset islatravir. The approval marks islatravir’s first commercial debut and positions it as a foundational piece of Merck’s future HIV portfolio. The therapy targets patients already virologically suppressed and looking to switch regimens, offering a streamlined alternative with fewer drugs. With long-acting and simplified HIV treatments becoming the new battleground, Merck is clearly positioning itself to stay competitive.

💉 Moderna Scores EU Win After U.S. Setback
Moderna finally caught a regulatory break, landing EU approval for its combined flu and COVID-19 vaccine, branded mCOMBRIAX (really rolls off the tongue 🙃). The shot targets adults 50 and older and spans all EU member states plus select neighboring countries. The win comes after the company withdrew its U.S. application last year following FDA pushback, leaving its domestic timeline uncertain. While questions remain stateside, the European nod gives Moderna a much-needed commercial foothold and validates its combination vaccine strategy.

💰 Amneal Bets $1.1B on Biosimilars
Amneal is acquiring Kashiv BioSciences for up to $1.1 billion, betting big on what it calls the “golden era” of biosimilars.

❌ Merck’s Kidney Cancer Combo Misses
Welireg failed to improve survival outcomes in first-line kidney cancer, surprising investors after earlier positive trial momentum.

🏭 Samsung Bio’s Growth Meets Labor Risk
Samsung Biologics posted 257% revenue growth but faces potential disruption as union workers move closer to a strike.

🧬 Autoimmune CAR-T Edges Closer
Kyverna delivered strong registrational data for its CAR-T in stiff person syndrome, eyeing the first ever CAR-T FDA approval in autoimmune disease.

🧠 Roche Targets Rare Neuro Disease
Enspryng cut relapse risk by 68% in MOGAD, putting Roche on track for a potential first-in-class approval.

🐦‍⬛ Moderna Pushes Bird Flu Vaccine Forward
Moderna dosed the first patients in a Phase 3 bird flu vaccine trial, pushing ahead despite losing U.S. government funding.

🎯 AstraZeneca Expands Rare Disease Push
Ultomiris hit a key endpoint in kidney disease, moving closer to a fifth indication and potential accelerated approval.

✌️ Lilly Walks Away From RIPK1 Deal
Lilly terminated its partnership with Rigel, adding another setback for the struggling RIPK1 inhibitor class.

If you ask researchers, cancer funding has felt like a rollercoaster lately.

If you ask the National Cancer Institute, everything is… fine.

At the center of the disconnect is NCI Director Anthony Letai, who took the stage at AACR to push back hard on what he called “misinformation” around collapsing funding. His argument hinges on a technical but important shift: instead of spreading grant money out over years, agencies are increasingly issuing large upfront, multi-year payments. That makes annual grant counts look lower, even when total dollars are hitting record highs.

Case in point: despite fewer grants awarded in 2025, the NCI actually distributed more total funding than at any point in its history.

That hasn’t stopped the anxiety. Researchers are still feeling the aftershocks of disrupted NIH grants, delayed funding cycles, and increased scrutiny on certain research areas. Early-career scientists were hit especially hard, with fewer R01 grants awarded and funding rates now expected to hover around 11%, a noticeable drop from prior years.

At the policy level, things aren’t exactly calming down. The Trump administration previously floated cuts as steep as 40% to NCI funding before backing off, and while the latest proposal spares the institute, broader NIH cuts of around 11% are back on the table. The message from leadership may be stability, but the backdrop still feels anything but.

Meanwhile, public support tells a different story. A recent survey found 93% of Democrats and 75% of Republicans favor increasing cancer research funding. Making it one of the rare bipartisan issues left standing, aside from making Taco Tuesday a national holiday of course.

So what’s really going on?

Funding isn’t disappearing, but it is changing. And in research, perception matters almost as much as reality. When labs feel uncertain, hiring slows, risk tolerance drops, and innovation can quietly stall.

The money may still be there. The confidence? That’s a different story.

That’s how much of its workforce Replimune is cutting after its FDA setback. The layoffs affect 161 employees across its Woburn and Framingham, Massachusetts sites, spanning R&D, manufacturing, and corporate roles as the company restructures.

Here’s what biotech Redditors are talking about:

🤔 Flu Shots Exit the Chat
A Reddit thread lit up after news that U.S. military personnel will no longer be required to receive annual flu shots. It sparked a full-on history lesson. Users pointed out that widespread vaccination policies date back to George Washington mandating smallpox inoculations to keep troops battle-ready. Others warned that removing mandates in close-quarter environments could backfire fast. The takeaway: vaccines in the military aren’t just policy, they’re historically tied to readiness and survival.

😂 Job Hunting Feels Like Dating Apps
One laid-off biotech worker compared today’s job market to online dating, and the internet immediately understood the assignment. Hundreds of applicants per role, constant ghosting, and the occasional rejection just to keep things interesting. Some chimed in saying they landed low-paying rejections before scoring high six-figure offers, proving how random the process can be. The takeaway: you can do everything right and still lose… until suddenly you don’t.

🚀 Flagship Launches DNA Drug Bet
Flagship’s new startup Serif is aiming to turn DNA into a whole new class of medicines with a $50 million debut.

😳 FDA Blocked at GLP-1 Facility
Regulators issued a warning after a manufacturer refused inspection access while producing semaglutide and tirzepatide products.

🌱 Glow-in-the-Dark Plants Are Here
Scientists engineered bioluminescent plants using firefly and luminous fungi genes, opening the door to electricity-free urban lighting concepts.

🧪 Synthetic Design Lab Builds Shape-Shifting Cancer Drugs
Founded by former Genentech leader Daniel Chen, Synthetic Design Lab is rethinking how cancer drugs are built. Its platform, Synthbody, engineers multi-armed antibody-drug conjugates capable of hitting multiple targets at once, adapting as tumors evolve. Early preclinical data shows more than 80x potency versus existing ADCs in some models. Instead of chasing single targets, the company is designing therapies that can keep up with cancer as it mutates, potentially unlocking broader and more durable responses.

🦠 April 23, 1984 — The Cause of AIDS Identified
HHS Secretary Margaret Heckler announced that researchers had identified the virus responsible for AIDS, marking a turning point in the global fight against the disease. While early vaccine timelines proved overly optimistic, the breakthrough enabled the first HIV blood test by 1985, dramatically improving blood safety and accelerating research efforts worldwide.

Big Tech is embedding in pharma, funding is somehow both “fine” and “chaotic,” and the job market is playing hard to get. Biotech might not be predictable, but it’s never boring.

That’s all for today. See you Tuesday for the next issue. 👋

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