Editor’s Briefing: November 4, 2026

In Short. Sanofi has stopped testing an experimental pill it licensed from Nurix Therapeutics, so Nurix will lose future payments tied to that drug. United Therapeutics and BioCryst Pharmaceuticals reported higher quarterly sales.

Sanofi stops work on a Nurix drug

PROTEIN DEGRADERS are drugs that tag a chosen protein inside cells so that the cell's own disposal machinery destroys it. Nurix Therapeutics, a firm in Brisbane, California, designs such drugs and licenses some of them to larger companies. On Tuesday afternoon it told the Securities and Exchange Commission that Sanofi, a French drug maker, had decided to end the first trial in people of SAR448272, an oral degrader of STAT6, a protein that relays signals in allergic types of inflammation, and to end the program altogether (Nurix filing). That trial was in phase 1, the first and smallest stage of human testing. The filing gives no reason for Sanofi's decision. As a result, Nurix no longer expects any of the development, regulatory or sales milestone payments, or royalties, that it could have earned from this drug. It remains eligible for payments on other programs licensed under the same collaboration, if Sanofi chooses to develop them into clinical candidates.

United Therapeutics reports higher quarterly sales

United Therapeutics, based in Silver Spring, Maryland, sells medicines for pulmonary arterial hypertension, a disease in which high blood pressure in the arteries of the lungs strains the heart. On Wednesday morning it reported results for the quarter to September 30th (United Therapeutics release). Revenue was $832.5m, up 4% from $799.5m a year earlier. Sales of Tyvaso DPI, a dry-powder inhaled form of its main drug, rose to $378.5m from $336.2m. Sales of the older nebulized form, which patients breathe in as a mist, fell to $125.3m from $141.8m, and the company said it believes competing therapies hurt sales of both forms and of Remodulin, an infused version. Orenitram, a pill, rose to $145.0m from $131.1m. Net income fell to $258.6m from $338.7m, partly because research spending more than doubled after it bought Thymmune Therapeutics. The company also settled a lawsuit with Sandoz in October, alongside a settlement with Liquidia Technologies.

BioCryst reports higher sales of its swelling medicine

Hereditary angioedema (HAE) is a rare inherited disease that causes repeated attacks of swelling in the skin, gut and throat. BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, of Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, sells ORLADEYO, a daily pill that helps prevent such attacks. On Wednesday it reported results for the quarter to September 30th (BioCryst release). Total revenue was $180.3m, 13% higher than a year earlier, and ORLADEYO brought in $174.8m. Part of the growth came from CareMed, its new sole specialty pharmacy, which built an initial stock of the drug. The firm began selling ORLADEYO as oral pellets for children aged 2 to 11 in August, and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the pellets for patients aged 12 and older in October. It has stopped developing STAR-0310, an early eczema drug, to focus on rare diseases. Pivotal results for navenibart, a long-acting HAE injection, are due in the third quarter of 2027, and first patient data for BCX17725, a drug for Netherton syndrome, a rare inherited skin disorder, are expected by the end of 2026.