“Vir Biotechnology is narrowing its focus. Sitting on $1.9 billion, the infectious disease specialist has decided to stop work on its innate immunity small-molecule platform as part of its efforts to ‘judiciously allocate’ its capital.
San Francisco-based Vir was already primarily focused on biologics, making its name through work on the anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibody Xevudy and advancing a pipeline featuring other modalities including T-cell vaccines and siRNAs. But small molecules were in the mix, too, with the biotech identifying the modality as part of its plans for a multi-respiratory hepatitis B cure and response to COVID-19…
‘We are taking measures to continuously evaluate and judiciously allocate this capital to maximize value for our shareholders,’ De Backer said. ‘As part of this process and under my leadership, we made the decision to phase out our small molecule platform. This is the first step as we continue to advance our core capabilities and scientific programs.'”
2 Discontinued Drugs: unnamed multi-respiratory hepatitis B drug (small molecule), unnamed COVID-19 drug (small molecule)
2 Discontinued Research Programs
