June 20, 2011 - IMM@BUCT

Indeed, in addition to the BMS-Exelixispartnership, several big pharma-biotechdeals—between Pfizer and Rigel Pharmaceuticals,AstraZeneca and Targacept, andMerck & Co. and Aveo Pharmaceuticals—have fallen by the wayside in the past year.The biotech partners who suddenlyfind themselves with a drug program backin-house face several challenges: how toconvince investors that the deal was terminatedfor strategic, rather than scientific,reasons; how to maintain a drug developmentprogram at the same pace and withthe same breadth as they did with the backingof a big pharma firm; and where to findthe money to continue the program in anefficient and expeditious way.“One of the things you have to be carefulabout as a biotech is that there’s a timestamp on value,” says J. Donald deBethizy,president and CEO of Targacept, which inthe past few months has had drug candidatesreturned by GlaxoSmithKline andAstraZeneca. If a biotech firm can’t movea compound forward quickly enough, orhas to shelve it due to lack of resources, hesays, “there’s a risk that the need for it willgo away, or that somebody else will discoverthe same thing and do it faster.”the reins. The antibody was in the midstof Phase II trials, making it “a much morevaluable program today,” Ezickson says.“And as a company, we are also in a muchbetter place in terms of our ability to movethis forward.”Whereas Aveo learned the clinical ropeswith Schering-Plough’s funding, Rigel benefitedfrom a partner that could take on aproject that was beyond its capacity. Rigellicensed its inhaled syk inhibitor programfor asthma and allergy to Pfizer in 2005largely because it didn’t have the capabilityto develop the compound, explains Raul R.Rodriguez, the company’s president andchief operating officer. To be successfullyand safely delivered to the lung, the compoundneeded to be formulated as a saltYET BIOTECH EXECUTIVES point outthat they are getting back a more advancedcompound, developed largely on big pharma’sdime. Furthermore, their companieshave likely matured significantly since signingthe partnership, which for some firmsmay have been their first significant deal.For example, when Aveo partnered withSchering-Plough in 2007 for the antihepatocytegrowth factor antibody AV-299, it wasthe first time a big pharma firm had sweptup one of Aveo’s internally discovered molecules.At the time, the antibody was still inpreclinical studies, and the deal was structuredso that Schering-Plough footed the billwhile the biotech pushed the drug throughclinical trials to treat lung cancer.Since then, “the world has changedsignificantly for us,” says Elan Ezickson,Aveo’s chief business officer. The companyhas gone public and has formed otherpartnerships that have brought in significantpayments. It also gained experiencefrom putting AV-299, along with anothercompound in its pipeline, through the earlystages of clinical development.Thus when Merck, which bought Schering-Ploughin 2009, returned the rightsto AV-299 last October after a revamp ofits portfolio, Aveo was happy to take backSPOT BREAKTHROUGHS SOONERWITH FREESLATE HIGH THROUGHPUT RESEARCH SOLUTIONSDiscovery is all about making knowledge-based decisions fast. That’swhy Freeslate delivers automated platforms and reactors for microscaleexperimentation combined with powerful data management tools toenable dramatic gains in your R&D productivity and innovation. See whatyou’re missing at www.freeslate.com/breakthroughsWWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG 17 JUNE 20, 2011