Industry news

Big Pharma's market cap stars of 2014

Tracy Staton / Fierce Pharma

Who can resist a numbers match-up? Not us, obviously. Even better when the winners are a bit unexpected. Today, it's market cap, courtesy of EvaluatePharma and its annual state of the industry report.

A Pill a Day May or May Not Work. Check Your Genes

GenomeWeb

Whether or not you get the benefit of decreased colorectal cancer risk by taking aspirin may come down to the variants you have at two spots in your genome, as GenomeWeb has reported.

What drives Peter Thiel's biotech investment strategy? Trends are 'bad'

John Carroll / FierceBiotech

Diabetes research advocacy groups call for better insulin pump regulation

Stacy Lawrence / Fierce Medical Devices

The American Diabetes Association and the European Association for the Study of Diabetes have published a statement calling for the adoption of improved and harmonized safety standards for insulin pumps. The joint statement appears in the April issue of the journal Diabetes Care.

The top 15 pharma companies by 2014 revenue

Tracy Staton / Fierce Pharma

The names at the very top of our yearly list of biggest pharma companies are no surprise. Johnson & Johnson ($JNJ), Novartis ($NVS), Roche ($RHHBY) and Pfizer ($PFE) have headed up the rankings for a couple of years now, albeit in varying order. But toward the bottom of the top 10, there's been a changing of the guard.

Intensive Care Gets Friendlier with Apps, Devices

Laura Landro / Wall Street Journal

Hospitals are redesigning intensive care units to make them safer and less dehumanizing, with a new focus on engaging families and patients in decisions.

India plans adverse effects monitoring regime for medical devices

EJ Lane / Feirce Biotech

India's health ministry has plans to create the nation's first system for monitoring the adverse effects of medical devices. Up to now, health authorities have relied on data supplied by the world's developed countries.

Big Three Asia pharma markets poised to soar in 2015, reports say

EJ Lane / FeircePharmaAsia

Vaccine Development and Production Challenges Manufacturers

Jill Wechsler, BioPharm International.com

Vaccines are front-page news these days. Researchers are advancing new vaccines for Ebola and other devastating diseases, while manufacturers work with FDA to bring to market new products to combat dangerous infections and strategies to improve supplies of seasonal influenza shots. 

A Contrarian in Biotech

Antonio Regalado / MIT Technology Review

Peter Thiel was the first large investor in Facebook. Now he’s turning his investing skills to biotechnology. Peter is the co-founder of PayPal, the investor who discovered Facebook, and the author of Zero to One, a short account of the counterintuitive thinking that’s made him a godfather figure in Silicon Valley.