GSK has announced that the first batch of its candidate Ebola vaccine is being shipped to west Africa and is expected to arrive in Liberia later today Friday 23 January. The shipment, containing an initial 300 vials of the candidate vaccine, is the first to arrive in one of the main Ebola affected countries and will be used to start the first large-scale efficacy trial of experimental Ebola vaccines in the coming weeks.

Roche (SIX: RO, ROG; OTCQX: RHHBY) has agreed to acquire Trophos, a privately held biotechnology company based in Marseille, France. Trophos's proprietary screening platform generated olesoxime (TRO19622), which is being developed for SMA - a rare and debilitating genetic neuromuscular disease that is most commonly diagnosed in children.

Novartis Pharmaceuticals has announced the establishment of a joint investment company with Qualcomm Ventures to target early stage companies who offer technologies, products or services that "go beyond the pill" to benefit physicians and patients.

Roche (SIX: RO, ROG; OTCQX: RHHBY) and Foundation Medicine, Inc. (NASDAQ: FMI) announced today that they will enter into a broad strategic collaboration to further advance FMI's market-leading position in molecular information and genomic analysis while providing Roche a unique opportunity to optimize the identification and development of novel treatment options for cancer patients.

AstraZeneca today announced that MedImmune, its global biologics research and development arm, has entered into a licensing agreement with Omnis Pharmaceuticals (Omnis), a privately-held biotechnology company focused on the development of oncolytic viruses.

Pfizer Inc. has acquired a controlling interest in Redvax GmbH, a spin-off from Redbiotec AG, a privately held Swiss biopharmaceutical company, based in Zurich-Schlieren. This transaction provides access to a preclinical human cytomegalovirus (CMV) vaccine candidate, as well as intellectual property and a technology platform related to a second, undisclosed vaccine program.

Novartis announced today that it has signed collaboration and licensing agreements with Intellia Therapeutics for the discovery and development of new medicines using CRISPR genome editing technology and Caribou Biosciences for the development of drug discovery tools. Intellia and Caribou are two of the leading biotechnology companies developing this novel technology.