Dive Brief:
- Addex Therapeutics has inked a licensing and collaboration deal with Indivior PLC for treatments for addiction.
- Addex will receive an upfront payment of $5 million, plus $4 million in research funding over two years. Addex is also eligible for $330 million in milestone payments and double-digit royalties.
- The deal centers around Addex’s positive allosteric modulator (PAM) ADX71441, which targets the GABA receptor.
Dive Insight:
Indivior is looking to add to its pipeline of addiction treatments. The U.K. company makes the heroin addiction treatment Suboxone (buprenorphine/naloxone), and its many forms. The company’s revenues grew 4% to $828 million in the first nine months of 2017 due to strong market growth in the U.S.
For Indivior, new therapies are important; the company had more than $1 billion erased from their market capitalization when a court invalidated its patents for the Suboxone Film, allowing generics to flood the U.S. market. The company said in its third quarter earnings that generic competition has been putting pressure on its revenues.
The U.S., in particular, has been plagued by deaths from people abusing prescription and illegal opioids. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of deaths due to opioid overdose has quadrupled since 1999, with 91 Americans dying everyday.
While ADX71441 is still preclinical, the drug is considered a next generation therapy.
A variety of companies have been on the hunt for new treatments to help people beat addiction. Meanwhile, another faction of companies is working on ways to curb the abuse potential of painkillers like opioids. Previous attempts to make opioids abuse-resistant have resulted in addicts finding new ways to abuse the drugs.