Despite IRA, Lilly’s Ricks finds path to value in Dice’s small molecules

Despite Lilly CEO David Ricks’ belief that small molecules’ prospects have generally dimmed under the Inflation Reduction Act, the pharma evidently sees sufficient value in Dice’s pipeline to acquire the biotech for $2.4 billion. Its path is likely carved from gaining oral therapeutics that may deliver sales relatively quickly in the pharma’s hands.

The deal is also a valuable plug for DNA-encoded libraries, a technology that enables creation and screening of diverse compound sets that are orders of magnitude larger than those used in more established methods. ...