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2019-06-21| Asia-Pacific

Weekly in Asia 20190609-0615

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CStone and Bayer Collaborates to Evaluate Combination Therapy with PD-L1 Monoclonal Antibody CS1001 and Regorafenib

On June 10th, CStone Pharmaceuticals and Bayer HealthCare announced global collaboration to evaluate PD-L1 monoclonal antibody CS1001 in combination with multi-kinase inhibitor regorafenib. Under the collaboration, the two companies will conduct a proof of concept study to assess the safety, tolerability, pharmacokinetics (PK), and anti-tumour activity of this combination therapy.

CStone’s CS1001 is currently undergoing seven clinical trials, including five pivotal trials. It demonstrated favourable tolerability profile and anti-tumour activities across different tumour types. Regorafenib (BAY 73-4506, Stivarga®), an oral multi-kinase inhibitor developed by Bayer, targets angiogenic, stromal and oncogenic receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK). It is FDA approved for metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) and metastatic gastrointestinal stromal tumours (GIST).

About CStone

Cstone Pharmaceuticals is a biopharmaceutical company devoted to the development of a new generation of innovative drugs. The company develops cancer therapeutics with a focus on immuno-oncology based combination therapies. It engages in developing model for drug development with a focus on clinical development.

About Bayer

Bayer AG produces and markets healthcare and agricultural products. The Company manufactures products that include aspirin, antibiotics, anti-infectives, cardiovascular, oncology, central nervous system drugs, diagnostics, and animal health products.

Otsuka Chemical Acquires Astellas Pharma’s Cefixime Business

Cefixime developed by Astellas Pharma is a third-generation cephalosporin antibiotic that is active against gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. It is widely prescribed throughout the world to treat various conditions, including ear infections, tonsillitis, and pneumonia. On 5 June 2019, Otsuka Chemical Co., Ltd announced its acquisition on cefixime business from Astellas Pharma. Under the agreement, Otsuka Chemical gains the right to supply the API (active pharmaceutical ingredient) to overseas licensees, as well as picking up contracts belonging to the licensing business and the trademark. This deal strengthens Otsuka’s antibiotics integrated business from organic intermediaries to API.

About Otsuka Chemical

Otsuka Chemical Co., Ltd. was founded in 1950, based in Osaka. It develops, manufactures, and sells chemical products. The company recently established glycosylation technologies with human-type oligosaccharides and is developing several drug candidates.

About Astellas Pharma

Astellas Pharma Inc. is a Japanese pharmaceutical company committed to the therapeutic fields of urology, immunology, transplantation, infectious diseases, oncology, neurology and metabolic diseases. The Company researches, develops, manufactures, and promotes its prescription drugs through subsidiaries in the US, Europe, and Asia.

Calliditas Therapeutics and Everest Medicines Enter Into an Agreement to Commercialize Autoimmune Drug in China and Singapore

The chronic autoimmune kidney disease IgA Nephropathy (IgAN) is a relatively common kidney disease that affects millions of people worldwide. It is the most common primary glomerulonephritis and accounts for about 40% of primary glomerular diseases. Most people with this disease lose kidney function gradually. IgAN is an orphan disease in the US and Europe, the prevalence is much higher in China. Sweden based Calliditas Therapeutics AB and US based Everest Medicines II Limited announced the signing of license agreement to develop and commercialize Calliditas’ drug candidate Nefecon in Greater China and Singapore for IgAN. Under the terms of the agreement, Calliditas will receive an initial upfront payment, as well as future payments linked to pre-defined development, regulatory and commercialization milestones. Everest will also pay typical royalties on net sales.

About Calliditas Therapeutics

Calliditas Therapeutics AB operates as a specialty pharmaceutical company in Stockholm, Sweden. It focuses on developing pharmaceutical products for patients with an unmet medical need in niche indications, in which the company can partially or completely participate in the commercialization.

About Everest Medicines

Everest Medicines develops and commercializes novel transformative pharmaceutical therapies for patients in mainland China and other Asian territories. The company partners with innovative companies around the world with products that address critical unmet medical needs for patients in Greater China and have a high probability of market approval.

Proteona Launches CAR T Characterization Product

CAR T, as one of the rapidly emerging immunotherapy approaches called adoptive cell transfer (ACT), is bringing a positive ground-breaking impact to the healthcare market. According to Market Study Report, the global CAR T cell therapy market is anticipated to reach over USD 2.99 Billion by 2025.

On 10 June 2019, Proteona announced the launch of its latest ESCAPE™ proteogenomics assay for Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cell characterization. ESCAPETM is an RNA sequencing technology that uses DNA-barcoded antibodies to capture proteomic and gene expression data simultaneously at single cell level. The rich information extracted can be used at all stages of the CAR T workflow, from initial cell collection to post-infusion patient monitoring. ESCAPE™ now becomes the most comprehensive tool to reveal the complex CAR T mechanisms, opening a new path for the development of safer cell therapies.

About Proteona

Proteona Pte. Ltd. is a new biomedical company based in Singapore and San Diego that is pioneering the use of DNA barcoded antibodies to provide both proteomic and genomic information from the same single cells. Proteona is a spin-off from the National University of Singapore (NUS) and the Agency for Science, Technology and Research’s (A*STAR).

Sosei Heptares to Receive USD 3million Pfizer Milestone Payment

In November 2015, Sosei Heptares and Pfizer formed a multi-target drug discovery collaboration to research and develop potential new medicines that target G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) across multiple therapeutic areas to fight a range of diseases. The first clinical candidate under this collaboration was nominated by Pfizer in May 2019.

On 10 June 2019, the two companies announced that a new clinical candidate from their multi-target drug discovery collaboration was nominated to advance into clinical development. Sosei Heptares will receive a further $3million milestone payment from Pfizer for this achievement.

About Sosei Heptares

Sosei Heptares is an international biopharmaceutical group focused on the design and development of new medicines originating from its proprietary GPCR-targeted StaR® technology and structure-based drug design platform. The company is advancing a pipeline of partnered and in-house drug candidates in multiple therapeutic areas.

About Pfizer

Founded in 1849, Pfizer Inc. is a multinational pharmaceutical corporation headquartered in New York City. The company develops and produces medicines and vaccines for a wide range of medical disciplines.

Reference:

  1. http://www.cstonepharma.com/en/html/news/2123.html
  2. https://www.otsukac.co.jp/en/topics/pdf/20190605.pdf
  3. https://www.calliditas.se/en/calliditas-therapeutics-and-everest-medicines-enter-into-an-agreement-to-develop-and-commercialize-nefecon-for-iga-nephropathy-in-greater-china-and-singapore-2871/
  4. https://www.biospectrumasia.com/news/27/13687/proteona-launches-novel-assay-for-cart-cell-characterization.html
  5. https://soseiheptares.com/news/532/129/Sosei-Heptares-to-receive-new-3-million-milestone-payment-from-Pfizer-as-it-advances-a-second-candidate-from-the-GPCR-collaboration-for-clinical-development.html

 

 

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