Well, they say you learn more from your failures than your successes. We’ll see if that statement applies to Cambridge-based Aveo Oncology after an FDA advisory panel voted against its experimental kidney cancer drug. Shares of Aveo fell by nearly 50 percent following the setback; the drug is Aveo’s first shot at commercial success after more than a decade of R&D. The company was founded back in 2002 and went public in 2010.
In other innovation news…
---Cambridge-based Atlas Venture has raised a new $265 million fund after several years of reinventing itself as a leaner firm. The news comes amid a contraction in the VC industry, though Boston-area firms Spark Capital, Third Rock Ventures, and Battery Ventures have all raised new funds this year.
---Our deal of the week is a $200 million R&D commitment from pharma giant Celgene to Watertown-based Forma Therapeutics, which is working on drugs for cancer and neurological diseases. Celgene has partnerships with a number of other Boston-area biotechs including Agios Pharmaceuticals and Epizyme.
---And finally, who says cleantech is dead? Battery maker A123 Systems, which filed for bankruptcy last fall, has launched a new incubator for energy-storage startups. Its goal, apparently, is to seed new ventures that might eventually succeed where A123 could not.
