Danish drugmaker Genmab A/S said the phase 3 trial of its medicine Arzerra failed to meet its main goal in treating a type of blood cancer.
The company was studying whether adding Arzerra to bendamustine was better for patients with indolent B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma who had stopped responding to Roche Holding AG's Rituxan, which is also known as rituximab.
Indolent B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma is a cancer of the white blood cells that grows and spreads slowly.
Bendamustine is marketed as Treanda by Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. in the U.S.
The study, known as Complement A+B, showed that the combination failed to perform better in stopping cancer from growing when compared to bendamustine alone.
Arzerra, or ofatumumab, along with Rituxan and Roche's Gazyva, belong to a class of drugs that target the CD20 molecule found on the surface of white blood cells.
The drug is approved in the U.S. and Europe for treating chronic lymphocytic leukemia, a cancer of the blood and bone marrow.
Swiss drugmaker Novartis AG said in January that it would withdraw Arzerra from the commercial market outside of the U.S. due to lower demand for the drug in those regions.
