Private Company Edition: Neogene, Escient, ESCAPE, Resolution and Attralus raised a combined $320m in venture capital rounds. Also, large Recursion round could double the size of its pipeline, Korro Bio raised $91.5m and Flagship launched Generate Biomedicines.

A new life sciences hedge fund operated by two former associates of activist investor Carl Icahn is challenging Otsuka’s takeover of cancer drug developer Astex. Also, Johnson & Johnson’s London Innovation Center announced four alliances, Celgene took another option on one of its investments and Takeda teamed up with New York research institutions to form a new discovery institute.

So long as its research goes as planned, PharmAkea's future is somewhat predictable now that the San Diego-based biopharmaceutical company has entered into a three-year, $35m funding and drug development agreement with Celgene.

Japan's Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma (MTP) has confirmed that it will spin out and merge its blood plasma fractionation operations with those of the Japanese Red Cross Society later this year.