Novartis can’t catch a break. The company said a Phase 2 study in ALS failed for the program known as VHB937, or lifonebart. The drug is a TREM2 stabilizer and activator, and it failed both its primary and secondary endpoints. Novartis notified patients of the failure in a “community update” note dated Aug. 25, though the trial is still listed as “active, not recruiting” on the federal clinical trials database. 

The ALS failure marks the fourth major clinical setback for Novartis within the past three weeks. The company has faced three deaths in trials of its autoimmune CAR-T, a shocking Phase 3 cardiovascular flop, and a pivotal failure for a neuromuscular treatment candidate from its $12 billion acquisition of Avidity Biosciences. Novartis plans to share full details of the study at a medical conference in December. 

It’s also another miss for the TREM2 class of molecules. Thought to mediate signaling in immune cells and to be associated with forms of neurodegeneration, TREM2-targeting drugs have yet to receive FDA approval. Alector’s AbbVie-allied drug failed a Phase 2 Alzheimer’s test in 2024. Denali and Takeda also ran into issues with TREM2. So has Vigil Neuroscience. Sanofi is hoping a different TREM2 from Vigil will pan out, though.

In a brand reboot, Novo Nordisk shortened its name and adopted a new culture strategy after a series of setbacks this year. The Danish drugmaker will instead be known as “Novo” as part of a shift dubbed “The Novo Way,” according to a press release. Its legal name will still be Novo Nordisk. The rebrand comes as Novo has faced a handful of pipeline failures, including the scrapping of two late-stage clinical trials of its heart drug, an IL-6 inhibitor called ziltivekimab, and a previous Phase 3 failure in July. 

The failures haven’t stopped Novo from swinging deals, however. The drugmaker deepened its ties with Anthropic this week, aiming to address drug discovery challenges with AI. The partnership includes testing Claude Science — the bioscience-tailored version of Anthropic’s AI system — for some R&D workflows. Novo also partnered with Orbis Medicines, a Lilly-backed biotech, to create macrocycles for cardiometabolic diseases in a deal worth up to $1.4 billion. 

A study published Wednesday in Nature details how a team of researchers from Stanford bred rodents that lack a cortex and hippocampus and then replaced those missing brain cells with human ones. The altered mice, a scientific first, provided insights that would not be possible in even the most sophisticated lab-dish model, said Sergiu Pasca, who helped lead the research and has been a pioneer in the organoid field.

By allowing human neurons to integrate into a living brain, researchers can begin to understand the function of those cells, compared to watching them in a lab dish, Pasca said. Read more about the groundbreaking research here. 

Another couple biotechs backed up onto the Nasdaq this week with reverse mergers. This time, the cardio and endocrine biotech Marea Therapeutics is taking over Lisata Therapeutics’ spot, while preclinical I&I startup North Immunology is merging with Aethlon Medical. Marea’s deal comes with $225 million, and North Immunology’s merger brings $180 million. Kyle LaHucik has the details here. 

Notably, Kyle tracked 21 reverse merger combinations so far in 2026, with total financing for the deals exceeding $5B. Additionally, almost half of this year's reverse mergers have involved I&I-focused companies. 

Looking for next-generation bispecific antibodies, Roche is turning to the private biotech Dualitas Therapeutics. Roche paid $36.5 million upfront and up to $1 billion total to find new I&I treatment candidates. The duo has set an undisclosed timeframe for screening the combinations, though Dualitas has developed an internal pipeline of three preclinical candidates based on an initial screen of about 10,000 bispecific pairings. Read more here.