STAT+: Pharmalittle: We’re reading about Beam suing over IP theft, a Trump rule on importing meds, and more

STAT's Pharmalittle newsletter, dated Sept. 30, 2026, rounds up biopharma news, including a Beam Therapeutics IP-theft lawsuit, a major lobbying-group leadership change, and drug-pricing policy developments.

Beam Therapeutics alleges that one of its scientists stole intellectual property and used it to co-found a Chinese company that made a deal with venture capital firms. Beam filed a lawsuit late last week accusing former scientist Zi Jun “Emma” Wang of accessing the company’s electronic laboratory notebooks late at night and on weekends, then using the information to start YolTech Therapeutics. The allegation comes amid escalating tensions between American biotech companies and their Chinese counterparts.

Eric Cantor, a former GOP House majority leader, will be the next chief executive of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, or PhRMA. As head of the brand-name drug industry’s top lobbying group, Cantor will face mounting political pressure on drug prices and an increasingly populist mood from both political parties. He starts work on Nov. 9 and arrives as the Trump administration tries to codify into law voluntary deals struck with more than two dozen companies to lower U.S. medicine prices to levels in peer countries. The roundup also references a Trump rule on importing medications, though the excerpt does not detail it.