IHS Global Insight Perspective | |
Significance | Drug majors such as Pfizer, Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS), Celgene (all U.S.), and Eisai (Japan) were among the firms to publicise positive clinical results at the latest American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) summit. |
Implications | Of the drug results, BMS's ipilimumab showed commercial potential in an area where success has been hard to come by recently. Pfizer showcased ten developmental candidates across a range of cancer therapy sectors. |
Outlook | The ASCO 2010 summit's line up reflects the emphasis on expanding presence in known areas such as non-small-cell lung cancer,melanoma, breast cancer, and chronic myeloid leukaemia. |
Big Pharma Shines in ASCO Presentations
Global pharmaceutical majors such as Pfizer, Bristol Myers-Squibb (BMS), Celgene (all U.S.), Roche (Switzerland), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK; U.K.), and Eisai (Japan) all intensified their presence at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO)'s annual meeting in Chicago, giving updates on key experimental drugs across oncology therapeutic segments.
Pfizer made data presentations involving ten candidates. These include:
- Crizotinib (PF-02341066) which is an oral anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) inhibitor in ALK-positive patients with non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC).
- PF-00299804 for NSCLC. Metastatic squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck, combined with figitumumab in patients with advanced solid tumours.
- Bosutinib in patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) following resistance or intolerance to imatinib (Roche's Gleevec/Glivec).
- Sunitinib for pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours and a comparative study in combination with docetaxel versus docetaxel alone for first-line treatment of advanced breast cancer.
- Figitumumab in combination with paclitaxel and carboplatin, versus carboplatin in patients with NSCLC.
- Axitinib as a first-line therapy for metastatic renal cell carcinoma.
- Temsirolimus study in children with high-grade glioma, neuroblastoma, and rhabdomyosarcoma.
- CDX-110 in combination with temozolomide in patients with glioblastoma.
- Tremelimumab in combination with gemcitabine in patients with chemotherapy-naive metastatic pancreatic cancer, and first-line melanoma patients who continue tremelimumab in spite of early disease progression.
BMS announced results of its experimental skin cancer drug ipilimumab in a study which showed the drug increased median survival of ten months, adding four months on average to patients with advanced melanoma. The drug was compared to vaccine treatment gp100 in the study, which involved 676 patients who had previous treatment.
Eisai also showcased positive clinical results for its cancer drug, eribulin, for advanced breast cancer. The Phase III study known as Embrace showed that the treatment increased the survival rate in women with advanced breast cancer by an average of 2.5 more months when compared to women receiving other types of chemotherapy. The drug already has priority status in the United States, Eisai said.
Celgene's Revlimid (lenalidomide) showed encouraging results in two clinical studies as a maintenance therapy following stem-cell transplantation reducing the risk of disease progression by more than 50%. In the Intergroupe Francophone du Myelome clinical study, the firm said that experimental candidate IFM200502 demonstrated that patients with multiple myeloma receiving continuous lenalidomide following a first-line autologous stem-cell transplant (ASCT) had a 68% 3-year progression-free survival rate compared to 34% for patients that received placebo following ASCT. The three-year overall survival after randomisation (four years after diagnosis) was 88% for patients that received Revlimid, and 80% for patients that received placebo.
Revlimid is approved in combination with dexamethasone for the treatment of patients with multiple myeloma who have received at least one prior therapy and in combination with dexamethasone for the treatment of patients whose disease has progressed after one therapy in Australia and New Zealand. It is also approved in the United States, Canada, and several Latin American countries, as well as Malaysia and Israel, for transfusion-dependent anaemia due to low- or intermediate-1-risk myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) associated with a deletion 5q cytogenetic abnormality, with or without additional cytogenetic abnormalities.
Outlook and Implications
The Pfizer snapshot for this year's ASCO annual meet reflects the significance in the oncology calendar. The pharma major had a mixed bag of existing drugs, such as sunitinib (brand name Sutent), Torisel (temsirolimus), with which the firm is looking to expand the franchise with the addition of new indications. The firm's line up of new candidates includes encouraging results for crizotinib in patients with NSCLC where the medication showed tumour shrinkage.
The Eisai study on eribulin provides the firm with a potential strong upside in the very competitive breast cancer drugs market. The candidate's priority review application was bolstered with the prospect of being a single agent providing an extension of survival rate in patients who have received prior treatments. The firm is exploring development of a range of indications involving eribulin including a monotherapy and a combination with bevacizumab (Roche's Herceptin) targeting earlier stages of breast cancer as well as other cancers such as lung and bladder cancer (source: Pharma Times). The commercial potential of the experimental drug appears to be gathering momentum with the results of the latest trials as the firm pursues marketing authorisation in Europe and other countries.
Celgene's Revlimid results consolidate its indication as a maintenance therapy, and the firm is inching towards expanding the drug franchise in the immediate term. BMS's ipilimumab results will add a new dimension to the company's new product portfolio prospects. The four-month survival extension is considered a "major advance" in the skin cancer treatment segment, in which experimental medications have not found much success to date. Whilst there are still some concerns over the side effects of the experimental drug, the study results indicate a wider commercial potential for the drug once approved.