Aug. 28 Quick Takes: Horizon shares rise as FTC suspends challenge to Amgen deal

Shares of Horizon Therapeutics plc (NASDAQ:HZNP) rose $5.48 to $112.15 on Monday after the Federal Trade Commission paused its challenge to a deal in which Amgen Inc. (NASDAQ:AMGN) would acquire the biotech for $28.7 billion. The regulator ordered that the challenge be withdrawn from adjudication until Sept. 18, giving its commissioners more time to consider proceeding; investors likely viewed the move as a step toward clearing the deal. The FTC has raised questions about whether Amgen would bundle Horizon’s drugs to stifle competition. The stock move added nearly $1.3 billion to Horizon’s market cap. Seagen Inc. (NASDAQ:SGEN), whose $43 billion acquisition by Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE) is also under scrutiny, gained 3%.

Superluminal Medicines Inc. launched with a $33 million seed round led by RA Capital Management, with participation from Insight Partners, Nvidia and Gaingels. The company’s machine learning platform, trained on proprietary data sets, generates small molecule candidates in months by modeling the range of conformations a protein target can adopt and identifying compounds that induce desired structural changes, while predicting their pharmacokinetic properties and toxicology profiles. Superluminal will initially focus on GPCR targets; CEO Cony D’Cruz, RA Capital’s Andrew Levin, and Insight Partners’ Dylan Morris are on the board...