TIDES USA 2026 runs May 11–14 at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston. The conference is the year's primary US gathering for peptide, oligonucleotide, and mRNA therapeutics, with six concurrent scientific tracks covering CMC strategy, GMP capacity, biocatalytic synthesis, AI-driven peptide design, and clinical development across endocrine, oncology, and rare-disease indications.
Covered here: confirmed CDMO panels with Bachem, PolyPeptide, CordenPharma, and Sun Pharma's Hyderabad PolyPeptide platform; Gilead and Novo Nordisk on the supply-side of large-scale SPPS economics; and the TIDES Tools sessions on peptide manufacturing process optimization. The meeting follows PolyPeptide's May 2026 EUR 200M credit-facility expansion and CordenPharma's Boulder $500M SPPS build, and runs concurrent with the European Congress on Obesity (ECO 2026) in Istanbul May 12–15 — the same week as Hims & Hers' May 11 Q1 print.
Stories here cover panel readouts, partnership announcements, and the manufacturing economics shaping the next phase of peptide therapeutics commercialization. See #peptide-cdmo, #manufacturing-capacity, and #bachem.
TIDES USA 2026 opens in Boston May 11-14 with a featured presentation on Chugai's LUNA18 (paluratide), an N-alkyl-rich cyclic undecapeptide oral KRAS inhibitor. The corresponding paper in Organic Process Research & Development describes a convergent 24-step liquid-phase synthesis route delivering kilogram-scale GMP material at >98.5% purity and >30% overall yield. LUNA18 binds KRAS, NRAS, and HRAS mutants plus wildtype, inhibiting the inactive-state RAS-GEF protein-protein interaction; it achieves 21-47% oral bioavailability without special formulation. The molecule is in Phase 1 monotherapy and combination-with-cetuximab dose escalation. LUNA18's chemistry is a milestone for the oral-cyclic-peptide-against-intracellular-targets thesis that Bicycle Therapeutics, Circle Pharma, and Unnatural Products are advancing through different platform architectures.
Catalent's TIDES USA 2026 presence centers on oral macromolecule delivery — the bottleneck that has kept all but a handful of peptides off the oral-route market. The contract development and manufacturing organization is showcasing its Zydis fast-dispersion platform, ZipDose 3D-printed dose-form technology, and oral macromolecule delivery systems engineered for peptides and proteins up to ~100,000 Da. The portfolio targets the post-orforglipron oral-GLP-1 reference architecture: SNAC permeation enhancers (Novo Nordisk's oral semaglutide approach), lipidation chemistry, and protective formulation matrices. Catalent's positioning aligns with the broader CDMO build-out — PolyPeptide's May EUR 200M credit facility, CordenPharma's $500M Boulder SPPS expansion — converging on Boston this week.
PolyPeptide Group AG announced that it has expanded its existing credit facility to EUR 200 million in support of growth ambitions and progress toward doubling 2023 revenue by 2028. The Swedish-Belgian peptide CDMO is one of the four large dedicated peptide manufacturers — alongside Bachem, CordenPharma, and Sun Pharma's Hyderabad PolyPeptide platform — and has previously announced a EUR 100M expansion in Malmö plus large-scale SPPS production in Braine-l'Alleud, Belgium that started in late 2024. The credit move heads into TIDES USA 2026 (May 11–14, Boston), where capacity, GMP investment, and large-scale SPPS economics will dominate the panel agenda.
Two of the year's biggest peptide-related meetings open within 24 hours of each other next week. The European Congress on Obesity 2026 runs May 12–15 in Istanbul, with Novo Nordisk presenting 52 abstracts spanning Wegovy 7.2 mg full STEP UP data, CagriSema higher-dose Phase 3 plans, Wegovy pill efficacy and tolerability, and women's-obesity / perimenopause / migraine subgroups; the 21-expert global panel will also formally propose the 10-year prospective GLP-1 cancer-prevention trial. TIDES USA 2026 runs May 11–14 in Boston with six concurrent scientific tracks across oligonucleotides, peptides, and mRNA — featuring Bachem, PolyPeptide, CordenPharma, Gilead, and Novo Nordisk on the CMC strategy and GMP capacity panels. Hims & Hers prints Q1 May 11 the same evening.
TIDES USA 2026 — the year's leading oligo, peptide, and mRNA therapeutics conference — opens May 11–14 in Boston, with six concurrent scientific tracks and 200+ presentations. Programmatic highlights include CMC strategy for complex dual and triple agonists under regulatory scrutiny, defining defensible starting materials for GLP-1 APIs, and how CDMOs are securing scarce GMP suite capacity dominated by big-pharma volume contracts. Bachem, PolyPeptide, CordenPharma, Gilead, and Novo Nordisk teams are scheduled to speak — the same week as Hims & Hers' Q1 print and within the new AJMC oral-peptides public-facing news cycle.