Alliance leaders included GSK's €73.9 million investment in new partner Dong-A Pharmaceutical and Medtronic's $70 million investment in cardiovascular device company BioControl. Abbott led biopharma M&A activity with its $3.7 billion purchase of Piramal's healthcare solutions business. In devices, Endo paid $221 million up front for HealthTronics. Roughly 30 percent of the month's $953 million in biopharma fundraising came from Salix's $291 million debt deal. No public device dollars were realized in May, though 11 companies completed venture rounds. . . . [MORE . . .]

Exelixis’s long-time CEO George Scangos, PhD, is taking the the helm of Biogen Idec. The move is counterintuitive, both for the commercial stage Biogen and for Scangos, whose career has largely been focused on research and early development and free of activist shareholder pressure. . . . [MORE . . .]

Medical device makers may have more difficult time selling in Europe than they'd anticipated as concerns over the economy and costs take hold, according to one analysis. . . . [MORE . . .]

Celgene Corp. is acquiring Abraxane developer Abraxis BioScience and planning an aggressive development and marketing push for the novel nanoparticle formulation of paclitaxel, with the aim of driving the drug’s sales to $1 billion by 2015. . . . [MORE . . .]

When a significant drug application hits a snag, it can sometimes feel like the whole industry stumbles. Such is the case with AstraZeneca PLC’s motavizumab, which protects against the effects of respiratory syncytial virus and recently failed to get a timely regulatory approval. This suggests the government agency’s standards may be changing on a range of issues, from comparative effectiveness to data integrity. . . . [MORE . . .]

An analysis of acquisitions of privately held venture-backed medical device companies delivers some signs of hope as well as important warnings for medical device VCs hoping to find a lucrative exit in this difficult market. . . . [MORE . . .]

In a bid to protect its most valuable product, Lantus, Sanofi’s new diabetes division intends to provide holistic solutions in an effort to help patients better manage their disease. Will it work? . . . [MORE . . .]

The tremendous success of Intuitive Surgical over the past two decades seems clearly to argue that robotics is more than a techy's pipedream. Intuitive has already revolutionized at least one procedure - laparoscopic prostatectomy - and it figures to make significant progress in a range of others, in men's health, women's health, and cardiovascular surgery, to name just a few relevant clinical spaces. Even more impressive has been its success as a publicly traded company; for much of the middle years of this decade, Intuitive's stock was the strongest performer among all medical device public offerings. And perhaps most interesting: until recently, Intuitive was virtually the only robotics company to achieve any kind of success at all. In Vivo interviews Lonnie Smith, the CEO of the company for much of the 1990s and 2000s, to whom much of the credit should go. . . . [MORE . . .]

Endo Pharma CEO Dave Holveck is diversifying the company from its core pain franchise into seemingly unrelated fields. Critics argue that he's neglecting its core strengths and acquiring mediocre assets, but he says such moves are necessary to address marketplace shifts. . . . [MORE . . .]

Together, the global financial crisis and health care reform could combine to dramatically alter the device industry's traditional business model. The result could be a variety of different models arising from shifting relationships with physicians and hospitals, with the winners being companies that adapt most effectively to this changing environment. . . . [MORE . . .]

Drug sponsors are finding little to like about FDA’s transparency initiative - especially proposals that would allow the agency to disclose more about products still in development. But given the public interest in greater transparency - and FDA’s interest in avoiding another Avandia - industry needs to decide whether this is a fight worth having. This article was originally published in the July/August 2010 issue of The RPM Report. . . . [MORE . . .]

In Vivo briefly describes these recently founded companies: Audax Medical, Calithera Biosciences, Fluence Therapeutics, Implandata Ophthalmic Products, Metagenomix and Virometix. . . . [MORE . . .]

A preview of the emerging health care companies profiled in the current issue of Start-Up. This month's profile group, "Alzheimer's Start-Ups Face A Discovery And Clinical Crossroads," features profiles of AlzProtect, Axerion Therapeutics, Cognition Therapeutics and Galantos Pharma. "The Future of Laparoscopy: Single Incision, NOTES And Robots," features profiles of EndoControl, Ovesco Endoscopy, SurgiQuest and Virtual Incision. Plus these Start-Ups Across Health Care: Antabio, Beta-Stim, CMP Therapeutics, Elixir Medical, Kerecis, Optivia Biotechnology, Quanterix and reinnervate. . . . [MORE . . .]

Recent executive-level company changes and promotions in the biotech, pharmaceutical, and medical device industries. . . . [MORE . . .]

The dealmaking column is a survey of recent transactions, including strategic alliances, mergers & acquisitions, and financings, in the life sciences industries. Deals are listed by the following industry sectors: in vitro diagnostics, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and research/analytical instrumentation and reagents. All transactions are excerpted from Elsevier's Strategic Transactions database, providing comprehensive transaction coverage from 1991 to the present. . . . [MORE . . .]