Business Roundup

Ube Industries will more than double nylon 6 capacity at its plant in Castellón, Spain, to 70,000 metric tons per year. The Japanese firm says nylon film is being used as an environmentally friendly replacement for polyvinylidene chloride film in packaging applications.

Anellotech has received a $1.5 million investment from a new, unidentified investor. Based in Pearl River, N.Y., Anellotech is developing aromatics from nonfood biomass with a goal of enabling biobased polystyrene and other aromatic plastics.

Kultevat, a St. Louis-based developer of dandelions that produce natural rubber, has expanded its R&D collaboration with Dutch crop innovation firm KeyGene. The two companies will build on successes in molecular breeding and hybrids, expand plantings of dandelions, and improve rubber extraction technology.

Arkema will spend $15 million to build a polyester powder coating resins facility and laboratory in Navi Mumbai, India. The company already produces alkyd, acrylic, and polyester resins at the site.

Medivir will cut about 25 early-stage research and five administrative jobs as it focuses on oncology. It will seek partners for its infectious disease candidates and for MIV-711, which is in Phase II studies for treating osteoarthritis. The Swedish firm’s technology centers on protease inhibition and nucleotide/nucleoside science.

Crescendo Biologics will work with Takeda Pharmaceutical to develop cancer therapies based on its Humabody human antibody fragments. Takeda will pay up to $36 million in upfront fees. Crescendo could receive up to $754 million more in milestone payments.

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries will help commercialize, in the U.S. and Canada, biosimilar versions of the antibody drugs Rituxan and Herceptin being developed by South Korea’s Celltrion. Teva will pay Celltrion $160 million and share profits if the drugs are approved.

Immunome, a biotech developing cancer immunotherapies, has raised $12.2 million in its first major round of funding. Immunome will use the money to develop its drug discovery engine, which is based on libraries of antibodies that bind to cancer neoantigens.