Amid increasing revenues and an upward trend for its haematology cell therapy, Vertex Pharmaceuticals bumped up its full-year guidance during its second-quarter earnings report this week. In an otherwise sunny outlook, however, the company disclosed that it has canned two programmes for alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency (AATD) — a disease space that Vertex has yet to find a foothold in, despite several attempts.The company reported $2.65 billion in revenues for the three-month period, up 6% from the second quarter of 2023, when it brought in $2.49 billion.The revenue boost was mainly driven by Vertex’s flagship cystic fibrosis portfolio. Its triple combination Trikafta therapy brought in about $2.45 billion, the lion’s share of the firm’s second-quarter revenues. The company attributed the figure to a “strong performance… in younger age groups.” As a result, Vertex raised its full-year product revenue guidance to between $10.65 billion and $10.85 billion, adding $100 million to both ends of the previous forecasted range.Cell therapy growthVertex also attributed the guidance bump to the ongoing rollout of CRISPR-edited cell therapy Casgevy in the US, UK, EU, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain for patients with sickle cell disease (SCD) or transfusion-dependent beta thalassemia (TDT).Compared with the first quarter of the year, Vertex has quadrupled the number of patients in the process of receiving treatment: as of mid-April, about five individuals had their stem cells collected, and now 20 individuals have gone through that collection process. Additionally, the company has activated more than 35 authorised treatment centres, up from 25 last quarter. Vertex’s goal is to open 75 centres around the world. The positive growth comes in tandem with a report from Vertex on the cell therapy’s long-term benefits. At the European Hematology Association (EHA) annual meeting in June, the company revealed data demonstrating that Casgevy led to "consistent and durable" improvements in both SCD and TDT patients. About 92% of the patients in the SCD cohort were free from vaso-occlusive crises for a minimum of one year, and 94.2% of those with TDT achieved transfusion independence for 12 consecutive months.AATD setbackOne dim spot in an otherwise positive earnings report was the discontinuation of AATD candidates VX-634 and VX-668, which had each completed Phase I testing. Based on biomarker analyses, Vertex determined the “investigational small molecule AAT correctors would not deliver transformative efficacy for people with AATD.” The company has now binned at least four early-stage AATD programmes. In 2020 and 2021, Vertex ended development of VX-814 and VX-864, respectively. The former was dropped due to elevated liver enzymes, and the latter was found unlikely to produce a substantial clinical benefit.Vertex isn’t giving up on the disease, however. The company said it will take what it learned from VX-634 and VX-668 and will “continue to optimise the small molecule corrector and other approaches in the preclinical research phase.”