👋 Hey, let’s get into it. STAT News and the White House threw hands this week, and it wasn’t even a UFC fight on the South Lawn.

The drama started when STAT dropped a report revealing that a request had been made in April for a 79-year-old man to receive access to Eli Lilly's experimental obesity drug, retatrutide, through the FDA's compassionate use program. STAT then speculated that the mystery patient might be President Trump, who was 79 at the time.

The White House pushed back hard on X, calling the reporter an "idiot" and an "unserious gossip columnist" while denying the claim outright.

Welcome to biopharma in 2026.

💰 AbbVie Buys Apogee Therapeutics for $10.9B to Bolster Eczema Franchise
AbbVie is spending $10.9 billion to acquire Apogee Therapeutics and gain control of zumilokibart, a late-stage eczema drug that has analysts buzzing. The anti-IL-13 antibody has produced phase 2 data suggesting efficacy comparable to or better than Dupixent and Lilly's Ebglyss while requiring injections only every three to six months. Guggenheim recently doubled its peak sales estimate to $5.2 billion. For AbbVie, the deal adds another potential blockbuster alongside Skyrizi and Rinvoq as competition across immunology continues to intensify.

🤝 Eli Lilly Expands Abbisko Partnership in Deal Worth Up to $1.9B
Lilly is doubling down on China's biotech ecosystem. The pharma giant expanded its partnership with Shanghai-based Abbisko Therapeutics in a deal worth up to $1.9 billion. Abbisko will handle discovery and early development work across multiple undisclosed Lilly-selected targets, giving Lilly access to China's increasingly efficient drug discovery engine. The agreement highlights a growing trend across biopharma as Western companies look east not just for assets, but for research capabilities themselves.

✂️ FDA Launches Operation to Cut Phase 1 Timelines by Up to a Year
Federal health agencies unveiled Operation Trial Blazer, an initiative designed to shorten phase 1 clinical trial timelines by six to twelve months and bring more early-stage studies back to the United States. Planned changes include an expedited IND pilot program, updated guidance on dose selection and reduced reliance on animal testing. The FDA will also launch a dedicated website and support center to help sponsors navigate the process. Small biotechs may end up being the biggest winners if the reforms work as intended.

💵 Novartis Pays Up to $1.8B to Chase 'Undruggable' Cancer Targets
Novartis is betting that Antares Therapeutics can solve some of oncology's toughest puzzles. The Swiss pharma will pay $105 million upfront and up to $1.8 billion in milestones to access Antares' covalent drug discovery platform targeting historically undruggable proteins. Antares emerged from the remnants of Scorpion Therapeutics after Lilly acquired part of the company last year. Now, less than twelve months after launch, it has landed its first major pharma partnership.

🤖 Insilico Medicine Lands AI Drug Discovery Deal Worth Up to $2.5B
Insilico Medicine added another major partner this week, signing a collaboration with South Korea's SK Biopharmaceuticals worth up to $2.5 billion. The companies will use Insilico's generative AI-powered Pharma.AI platform to develop treatments for neuroimmune disorders. Insilico receives $18 million upfront while SK handles later-stage development and commercialization. AI may still generate plenty of skepticism across biotech, but it continues generating partnership announcements just fine.

💻 100+ ChatGPT Prompts to Revolutionize Your Day
Discover how you can leverage ChatGPT to boost efficiency, streamline tasks, and stay ahead in your industry. Supercharge your productivity with HubSpot's comprehensive guide.

🇨🇳 China Approves World's First CAR-T for Solid Tumors
CARsgen's satri-cel became the first CAR-T therapy approved anywhere for a solid tumor, winning approval in China for advanced gastric cancer.

📝 Nuvectis Licenses Two Late-Stage Assets in $1.4B Deal
Nuvectis acquired worldwide rights outside China to two Haisco programs, including a late-stage PNH candidate, in a deal worth up to $1.42 billion.

⏮️ FDA Reverses Course on Regenxbio Gene Therapy
Just months after rejecting the approach, the FDA now says Regenxbio's existing data may support accelerated approval for Hunter syndrome therapy Navsunli.

🇩🇪 Stada Acquires 16 Brands to Expand Consumer Health Portfolio
Fresh off its buyout, Stada acquired 16 vitamin and supplement brands from Orifarm to strengthen its European consumer healthcare business.

👎 Pfizer's New ADC from $43B Acquisition Disappoints
Pfizer's first new ADC to emerge from its $43 billion Seagen acquisition, failed to improve overall survival in a pivotal lung cancer study, marking an early setback for its ADC strategy.

🧠 Lilly Pays Up to $800M for Brain Delivery Technology
Lilly partnered with Sweden's BioArctic to access its BrainTransporter technology that could improve delivery of therapies into the brain.

For years, biotech's favorite conversation starter was what could go wrong. Patent cliffs. Pricing pressure. Regulatory uncertainty. This week, Evaluate reminded everyone there's still another side of the story: an enormous amount of money.

According to Evaluate's World Preview 2026 report, global pharmaceutical sales are expected to exceed $2 trillion annually by 2032. Driving much of that growth are two therapeutic juggernauts: obesity and immunology. In other words, the hottest areas in biotech today aren't cooling off anytime soon.

The biggest winner may be Eli Lilly. Evaluate forecasts tirzepatide, sold as Mounjaro and Zepbound, could generate more than $70 billion in annual sales by 2032, making it the largest drug franchise in history. Lilly's obesity pipeline doesn't stop there either. Retatrutide and eloralintide both rank among the industry's most valuable pipeline assets and could add another $10 billion in annual revenue.

Immunology isn't far behind. AbbVie's Skyrizi is projected to become the second best-selling drug in the world, topping $33 billion in annual sales. Rinvoq is also expected to remain a top revenue generator as companies continue squeezing more indications out of successful assets.

Meanwhile, the industry's M&A resurgence suddenly makes more sense. Evaluate estimates more than $500 billion in branded drug revenue faces generic competition by 2032. Pharma companies aren't spending billions because they want to. They're spending billions because they need replacements.

One other trend stands out: China. Evaluate expects Chinese assets to account for more than two-thirds of total biopharma deal value this year. What started as licensing is increasingly evolving into long-term research partnerships.

The industry's biggest question is no longer whether growth is coming. It's who captures it before the patent cliff arrives.

That's how many employees the FDA is trying to hire after losing more than 3,000 staffers during last year's DOGE-related cuts. The agency has already hired roughly 600 people and is searching for 1,600 more. You could call it workforce rebuilding. You could also call it the corporate version of texting your ex, "I've changed."

Here’s what biotech Redditors are talking about:

👏 Biotech's Oldest Assay: Measuring Executive Approval
One Reddit thread this week struck a nerve by arguing that biotech's real competitive sport isn't drug discovery, it's navigating a corporate culture where career advancement often seems to depend on constantly praising management. Commenters from startups and big pharma alike piled on with stories of executives getting credit for ideas scientists had been sharing for months, and of employees learning that disagreeing too openly can stall a promotion or get you fired. The irony is that companies often screen out “disagreeable” personalities during hiring, even though those same personalities are frequently the ones who leave and start successful companies.

🤔 Who Should Pay for Drug Innovation?
Another heated discussion focused on whether Americans subsidize global pharmaceutical innovation through higher drug prices. Some argued that U.S. patients effectively fund most industry profits while other wealthy countries negotiate lower prices. Others blamed pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs, for driving costs even higher and asked the obvious question: does anybody actually like PBMs? A few commenters countered that pricing has more to do with commercial strategy and margins than R&D costs. Unsurprisingly, Reddit solved absolutely nothing, but everyone left more confident in their own position.

🚫 Nature Retracts High-Profile PD-1 Timing Study
Nature Medicine retracted a widely discussed lung cancer study after investigators identified enough issues to undermine confidence in the results.

🍄 Psychedelic Depression Drug Delivers Strong Phase 3 Results
Definium's LSD-based depression therapy met all primary and key secondary endpoints in phase 3, sending shares up more than 30%.

🫵 Whistleblower Alleges Long-Running Xolair Kickback Scheme
A newly unsealed lawsuit accuses Genentech and Novartis of using specialty pharmacy incentives to improperly boost prescriptions for Xolair.

💊 Lilly Plans European Launch of Oral Obesity Pill
Lilly expects to launch Foundayo in Europe by early 2027, leaning heavily on telehealth and direct-to-consumer channels.

🧬 Serapha Bio Launches with $230M and a Gene Editing Program from China
Serapha Bio emerged this week with $230 million in funding and an ambitious plan to develop SERP-01, an in vivo base editing therapy for alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, a genetic disorder that can cause serious lung and liver disease. The program originated at China's YolTech Therapeutics and targets the mutation responsible for the disease's most severe form. Serapha is also absorbing publicly traded Boundless Bio through a merger that sent Boundless shares soaring 87%. The combined company will trade under the appropriately on-the-nose ticker symbol AATD.

🔎 June 25, 1911 - The Amino Acid Detective Is Born
William Howard Stein was born on this day in 1911 and would go on to help solve one of biology's biggest mysteries: how proteins are built. Alongside Stanford Moore, Stein mapped the complete amino acid sequence of ribonuclease and helped establish the connection between protein structure and function. He also helped develop the automatic amino acid analyzer, a technology that paved the way for modern chromatography and protein analysis. Every proteomics researcher owes Stein at least a small thank-you card.

Thinking back to the opening story…some people think Trump secretly received retatrutide. But we’re more amused by the idea that the White House would have to fax over a request and wait for approval. 😂

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

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