Daily Snap - 13. November 2025

Author

Joachim Eeckhout
November 13, 2025

 

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Good morning! In what’s become my favorite (or perhaps most depressing) plot twist of 2025, another struggling biotech has pivoted from clinical trials to crypto wallets. Leap Therapeutics just rebranded as Cypherpunk Technologies (kudos on the name), swapping its cancer antibody program for a $50 million stash of Zcash, a cryptocurrency that’s been gaining over 80% in value over the last month. The move follows a $58.8 million investment from Winklevoss Capital, whose co-founders are two brothers behind the cryptocurrency exchange Gemini. Leap isn’t alone in the exodus. Over the last months MEI Pharma, Conduit Pharmaceuticals, Propanc Biopharma and MAIA Biotechnology have all made similar leaps from lab coats to digital tokens. When they said diversify your revenues, I’m pretty sure this isn’t what investors had in mind.

Enjoy today’s read!

—Joachim E.

PRESENTED BY AXOL BIOSCIENCE 

Why are drug developers turning to iPSCs?

 

Late-stage drug failures are costly and all too common. The solution? Human iPSC models.

They offer better human relevance than traditional models, scale from individual patients to large populations, and reflect real demographic diversity. This makes them powerful tools for patient stratification, trial design, and de-risking drug development.

👉 Want to explore how iPSCs are transforming research and drug discovery? 

SNIPPETS

What’s happening in biotech today?

🧬 Transcription hackers: Oxford-based Scripta Therapeutics has launched from stealth with a $12 million seed round to advance a biology-first drug discovery platform focused on transcription factors, key regulators of gene expression often overlooked in traditional approaches. Scripta uses AI, imaging, and patient-derived models to map disease biology and identify novel therapeutic targets. Initially targeting neurodegeneration, the platform seeks to develop disease-modifying treatments by rewiring disrupted gene networks rather than targeting individual molecules.

👁️ Light view: Modulight Biotherapeutics has secured $12.2 million in seed funding to advance its optogenetic platform targeting neurological disorders, with a focus on trigeminal pain as its initial clinical indication. Led by Jibe Ventures and LocalGlobe, the round supports development of the company’s proprietary eOPN3 technology, an inhibitory opsin licensed from the Weizmann Institute of Science, that uses red light to selectively inhibit neuron activity at specific synapses. The approach aims to treat conditions like chronic pain, epilepsy, and movement disorders by disrupting pathological neural circuits. Modulight plans to complete IND-enabling studies by 2027 and move toward FDA submission thereafter.

💨Drug vanish: Bayer has discontinued development of four early-stage cancer drug candidates, including VVD-130850, a STAT3 inhibitor acquired through its $1.5 billion purchase of Vividion Therapeutics in 2021. The decision, made jointly with Vividion, followed an evaluation of safety, pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, and drug activity data. Also terminated were two diacylglycerol kinase (DGK) inhibitors, BAY 2862789 and BAY 2965501, developed in collaboration with the German Cancer Research Center, and BAY 3375968 (lanerkitug), an anti-CCR8 antibody tested with Keytruda. Bayer cited a routine pipeline reevaluation and plans to refocus resources on high-potential areas such as genitourinary, gastrointestinal, and lung cancers.

✂️Quarter cut: Metagenomi is laying off 25% of its workforce, including CEO and co-founder Brian Thomas, Ph.D., as it refocuses on advancing its preclinical hemophilia A program, MGX-001. The gene-editing biotech cited promising nonhuman primate data showing curative factor VIII activity as the basis for prioritizing MGX-001, which uses the MG29-1 nuclease for targeted genome integration. President and COO Jian Irish, Ph.D., will assume the CEO role, while Thomas remains on the board. The restructuring aims to extend the company's $184.1 million cash runway into Q4 2027 and support ongoing efforts in secreted protein disorders and a cardiometabolic collaboration with Ionis.

💔Breakup: AbbVie is ending its 11-year, $1.75 billion research collaboration with Alphabet’s Calico Labs, originally formed in 2014 to develop therapies targeting age-related diseases like neurodegeneration. The decision, revealed in an internal email, follows a strategic shift by AbbVie toward injectables and genetic medicines and will result in layoffs for about 100 project-affiliated employees. The partnership included the development of assets like fosigotifator, which recently failed in a phase 2/3 ALS trial, and ABBV-CLS-628, an investigational antibody for kidney disease that remains in a phase 2 trial. The future of these shared assets is uncertain, and neither company has publicly commented.

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