Concert Pharmaceuticals Inc. CEO Roger Tung said determining who leads isn’t easy in the phase III race that pits his firm against Eli Lilly and Co. and Pfizer Inc. in alopecia areata. That’s because neither of the other companies has “been very direct about the timelines they’re on,” he told BioWorld. “We’ve been pretty clear that our goal is to have an NDA filing in early 2023.”
As the March 27 PDUFA date nears for idecabtagene vicleucel (ide-cel, also known as BB-2121), the B-cell maturation antigen (BCMA)-directed chimeric antigen receptor CAR T-cell therapy from Bristol Myers Squibb Co. and Bluebird Bio Inc., investors are looking with increased favor on the approach.
Amunix Pharmaceuticals Inc. CEO Angie You told BioWorld that her firm has already done most of the optimization with its unique T-cell engager platform, so that the effort now is mostly “about cranking out more INDs.”
Having rung the bell in phase II last summer, Ovid Therapeutics Inc. and Takeda Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. signed a pact giving the latter global rights to develop and commercialize soticlestat, a first-in-class inhibitor of cholesterol 24-hydroxylase for the treatment of developmental and epileptic encephalopathies including Dravet syndrome (DS) and Lennox-Gastaut syndrome (LGS).
San Diego-based Neurocrine Biosciences Inc.’s good-and-bad top-line phase II data with d-amino acid oxidase inhibitor luvadaxistat, also known NBI-1065844 and TAK-831, in schizophrenia likely came as little surprise to many, given earlier experience in the general pathway.
As expected, the FDA’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) looked favorably upon the latest COVID-19 entry: Ad26.COV2.S, a one-shot product that emerged from the same Johnson & Johnson (J&J) platform, AdVac, that let the firm devise an Ebola vaccine cleared in Europe last year.
Briefing documents released by the FDA related to the Vaccines and Related Products Advisory Committee meeting slated for Friday suggest that the COVID-19 vaccine from Johnson & Johnson (J&J) will sail smoothly to an emergency use authorization.
Astrazeneca plc officials, during the firm’s Feb. 11 conference call on fourth-quarter earnings, highlighted the oral selective estrogen receptor degrader (SERD) camizestrant in breast cancer (BC), which Cristian Massacesi, head of late-stage oncology development, said bears “best-in-class potential, in terms of providing superior clinical benefit at a well-tolerated dose” of 75 mg once per day.
Although progressive familial intrahepatic cholestasis (PFIC) tends to draw more hoopla in the race, and Mirum Pharmaceuticals Inc. looks due to beat Albireo Pharma Inc. to market in Alagille syndrome (ALGS), the most revenue likely lies in a third rare pediatric liver disease where the firms compete: biliary atresia (BA). Mirum, of Foster City, Calif., completed its rolling NDA several weeks ago for maralixibat – an inhibitor of the apical sodium-dependent bile acid transporter designed to drive more excretion of bile acids as a way of lowering their level systemically – in cholestatic pruritus in patients with ALGS one year of age and older.
As developers continue their race in the anti-CD47 space, Gilead Sciences Inc. remains high profile with magrolimab, which has reached phase III development for myelodysplastic syndromes. Meanwhile, Alx Oncology Inc., of Burlingame, Calif., is emerging with potentially the first drug targeting the CD47-SIRPa axis to treat solid tumors as well as hematologic malignancies.
