Today, a brief rundown of news involving Novo and Acadia Pharmaceuticals, as well as updates from Nektar Therapeutics, Eli Lilly and Merck & Co. that you may have missed.
Novo will pay Swedish biotech Nanexa up to about 1.165 billion euros, or $1.32 billion, for rights to a drug delivery technology capable of making long-acting injectable medicines. Novo intends to use this “PharmaShell” technology on up to five development programs for obesity, Type 2 diabetes and other cardiometabolic conditions. The partners will work on formulations with “different administration-frequency profiles,” aiming specifically for medicines that can be dosed as little as once monthly or quarterly. Nanexa will receive 615 million euros in the form of up front payouts and future milestones in the deal. The company formed a similar pact with Moderna last year.
Acadia Pharmaceuticals will keep developing an experimental Alzheimer’s disease drug despite a setback in testing. According to Acadia, the drug remlifanserin “narrowly missed” statistical significance in a Phase 2 trial testing its ability to treat hallucinations and delusions in people with Alzheimer’s disease psychosis. Acadia pointed to the close call, as well as other purported benefits and a “favorable safety profile,” in deciding to continue enrollment in two ongoing Phase 3 studies. “The debate is going to be whether there is still a chance that the drug will succeed” in those studies, and “in our view there is still a chance,” wrote Stifel analyst Paul Matteis. Still, Matteis cautioned that the mid-stage trial was “very well-powered” and the efficacy findings look “quite modest.” Shares fell by double digits on Thursday.
Nektar Therapeutics has won a legal dispute with development partner Eli Lilly. Nektar sued Lilly in 2023, arguing that the big drugmaker undermined an autoimmune prospect the two collaborated on after purchasing a rival treatment in a company buyout. But while a California federal jury sided with Nektar on Thursday, it awarded the company $90 million, far less than the nearly $1 billion Nektar had been seeking. That verdict is subject to post-trial proceedings, Nektar said in a regulatory filing.
The FDA on Thursday approved a once-weekly form of insulin developed by Lilly. To be sold as Onswik, the drug has been cleared for use alongside diet and exercise to improve blood sugar control in people with Type 2 diabetes. In testing, Onswik proved just as effective as commonly used daily shots in keeping blood sugar in check. Onswik’s clearance follows the March approval of Novo’s rival weekly insulin shot Awiqli.
U.S. regulators on Thursday also again widened use of Merck & Co.’s kidney cancer drug Welireg. Acquired in a 2019 buyout, Welireg had already been cleared in a rare genetic condition, an uncommon adrenal cancer and kidney tumors and generated $470 million in first-half sales. The latest FDA nod involves use in people whose kidney cancer has relapsed after treatment with Keytruda. It comes two months after the agency endorsed Welireg in the “adjuvant” setting after surgery.
