The latest updates from the US healthcare and life sciences scene. Eli Lilly partners with Nvidia to build a supercomputer for faster drug discovery; Trump secures “most-favored-nation” pricing deals with AstraZeneca and EMD Serono; former FDA vaccine chief Peter Marks joins Lilly to head infectious diseases; Organon CEO Kevin Ali steps down after a sales probe.
Lilly partners with Nvidia on AI supercomputer to speed up drug development (Reuters)
Eli Lilly announces it will be collaborating with Nvidia to build a supercomputer to help with drug discovery and shorten development cycles, getting medicines to people faster. Using the supercomputer, scientists at Lilly will be able to train AI models on millions of experiments to test potential medicines, expanding the scope of drug discovery efforts, the company said.
A number of these proprietary AI models will be available on Lilly TuneLab, a federated artificial-intelligence and machine-learning platform that allows biotech companies access to drug discovery models trained on years of its research data. The supercomputer, to be owned and operated by Lilly, is an Nvidia DGX SuperPOD with DGX B300 systems.
Merck KGaA’s EMD Serono strikes MFN deal in Trump’s fertility treatment pricing push (Fiercepharma)
Merck KGaA’s US arm EMD Serono is joining President Donald Trump’s most-favored nation drug pricing push with an agreement to sell its fertility therapies at a sharp discount through the government’s TrumpRx direct-to-consumer purchasing platform.
The company will offer its full in vitro fertilization (IVF) drug portfolio, including Gonal-f, Cetrotide and Ovidrel, to eligible patients, with an 84% discount for the use of all three therapies in a typical IVF regimen when TrumpRx goes live in 2026.
AstraZeneca makes deal with Trump to lower drug prices and avoid tariffs (The Guardian)
Donald Trump announced a deal with the British-based drugmaker AstraZeneca for a “most-favored-nation” drug-pricing model aimed at making prescription medicines more affordable and avoiding the administration’s tariff threats.
The company will sell some medicines at a discount to the government’s Medicaid health plan in exchange for tariff relief, similar to a drug-pricing pact reached last week with Pfizer.
Dr. Peter Marks, former top FDA vaccine official, joins Eli Lilly (PharmaVoice)
Dr. Peter Marks, the former top FDA vaccine official who abruptly resigned from the regulator earlier this year, has joined Eli Lilly. Lilly has named Marks the senior vice president of molecule discovery as well as the head of its infectious disease work effective in October.
Organon CEO Kevin Ali to resign after probe into contraceptive sales (Reuters)
Organon CEO Kevin Ali will resign from his role, after an internal investigation into sales of its Nexplanon contraceptive implant to wholesalers pointed to “improper” practices. An audit committee found certain US wholesalers were asked to purchase more Nexplanon than needed at the end of several quarters between 2022 and 2025.
