Although 2020 was the best year ever for Swiss biotech financing activities, no domestic IPOs were launched by the sector. But introducing the SPAC might change that.

The company announced a $336m series C round, six months after it raised an $80m series B, to support development of an easily administered treatment ADG20.

The number of novel products launched in their first markets in 2020 hit record heights in spite of – and in part buoyed by – the pandemic, with an exceptional year for infectious diseases therapeutics and vaccines.

Contrasting first-quarter preannouncements from a DNA sequencing company and a molecular diagnostics company may, with other seasonal pressures, imply a comparatively weak first quarter for therapeutic drug companies.