Nanobiotix climbs on anticipated cancer radiotherapy launch

While industrial production fell 0.3 percent in January, export prices climbed 0.2 percent. The good news outweighed the bad news for investors who gave U.S. stock indices their second week of gains. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 each gained 2.3 percent, and the Nasdaq Composite Index rose 2.9 percent. Biotech continued to outperform the general indices. The Burrill Biotech Select Index gained 5.3 percent for the week and is up 15.9 percent year to date.

Shares of cancer nanomedicine-focused biotech Nanobiotix more than tripled in three days to end up 151 percent after it announced that it would be launching its first product earlier than expected. The company uses its proprietary nanotechnology platform to develop products that selectively increase the efficacy of radiotherapy in the tumor cell while preserving the surrounding healthy tissue.

Ventrus Biosciences fell 62.9 percent after announcing that its cream for anal fissure pain failed to meet primary and secondary endpoints in a second late-stage study. The first study yielded positive results for the cream. The specialty pharma had expected to use the study to submit a new drug application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Based on the results of the second study, it will request a meeting with regulators to plan the next steps.

Mallinckrodt, a global specialty drugmaker spun out of Covidien in 2013, is acquiring Cadence Pharmaceuticals for $1.3 billion, picking up a profitable pain management drug and expanding access to the hospital market.

European universities, institutes, and companies backed by $117 million (€85 million) from the Innovative Medicines Initiative are collaborating to establish a new anti-bacterial drug discovery platform.     

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved BioMarin Pharmaceutical's Vimizim, the first FDA-approved treatment for a rare, autosomal recessive lysosomal storage disease known as Morquio A syndrome.