Carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) was one of the first oncoproteins discovered a half century ago. The protein is expressed in a subset of most epithelial cancers, including non-small-cell lung cancer, colorectal, pancreas, breast, gastric and medullary thyroid cancers. Globeimmune Inc. estimates that CEA is overexpressed in approximately 500,000 new cancer cases in the U.S. each year.

Every drug company wants to get the best price for its drugs, but that's easier said than done, especially in the current environment with payers pushing back at high drug prices and pitting companies against each other to compete on price.

CGRP stands for calcitonin gene-related peptide but it might double for "could get really profitable" if drug companies targeting CGRP and its associated receptor are successful.

It wasn't the perfect second quarter, but we'll take it. You'll recall, U.S. investments in private companies tracked by BioWorld in the first quarter of the year started off like gangbusters, more than doubling the funding in the year-ago quarter. IPOs, on the other hand, left something to be desired.

The hemophilia drug market is well established with multiple drugs designed to replace the underlying deficiency: factor VIII for hemophilia A and factor IX for hemophilia B.

Those forward-looking disclosures management reads at the beginning of presentations and the risk factors listed in their SEC filings are often viewed by investors as standard lawyer-speak to cover the company from potential lawsuits should something bad happen.

Investors wanting to buy into the high-growth biotech industry without purchasing shares of individual companies have had limited choices of exchange traded funds (ETFs).

"Personalized medicine," "precision medicine," "pharmacogenomics" or whatever you want to call it, it's pretty clear the industry is moving in the direction of having drugs to treat patients based on their genetic makeup.

Biotechs often set up subsidiaries to house assets for tax reasons or to house programs unrelated to their core mission that might get spun off, but Moderna Therapeutics Inc. has a new twist, establishing "venture companies" focused on specific diseases.

Through the first four months of the year, BioWorld Snapshots tracked 24 IPOs by drug companies on U.S. and international exchanges compared to 36 in the same time period last year.