Pharmaceutical companies Alexion and AstraZeneca, agreed to acquire the preclinical gene therapy programs of Pfizer, a pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation, for $1bn. “Today’s announcement represents another major step forward in Alexion and AstraZeneca’s ambition to be an industry leader in genomic medicine, which has potential to be transformative and even curative for patients with devastating diseases. We look forward to continuing our work to develop enhanced platforms and technologies with broad therapeutic application while integrating best-in-class expertise to accelerate promising therapeutics into the clinic," Marc Dunoyer, Alexion CEO.