Eli Lilly rolls snake eyes as it axes two early-stage drugs, including a $40M cancer therapy from FosunFosun

01 Nov 2022
endpts.com
AntibodyCell Therapy
Two of Eli Lilly’s modest bets came up flat on Tuesday, as the company scrapped a pair of early-stage programs from its pipeline. As part of its third quarter update Tuesday morning, the Big Pharma revealed it had removed a Phase I drug licensed from Fosun Pharma as well as a Phase II chronic pain and migraine candidate. Though neither were likely to be major sellers or pipeline stars, the moves signal how the big players regularly trim the pipeline if they feel it necessary to do so. It was not immediately clear why Lilly chose to axe these two programs. Endpoints News has reached out for comment and will update this story accordingly. The first program Lilly ditched is a BCL2 inhibitorBCL2 inhibitor that had been undergoing Phase I studies for a variety of blood cancers, according to the federal government’s clinical trial database. The drug, dubbed LOXO-338, was being examined as a monotherapy and would have progressed to a combination cohort had safety and efficacy been confirmed. Researchers expected to enroll more than 300 patients, as of the trial’s most recent update on Oct. 12. Started in August 2021, the study was supposed to observe patients’ response rates over the course of two years and report data in 2024. But with Lilly dropping the program, it’s not clear what will happen to patients who have already taken the experimental drug. Lilly licensed LOXO-338 from Fosun Pharma in October 2020, nabbing the rights to the drug everywhere but China for $40 million. On top of that, Fosun had been eligible for up to $400 million in milestones and mid-to-high single-digit royalty payments on any approvals. The other drug Lilly abandoned is a PACAP38-targeting antibody, known as LY3451838. According to previous SEC filings, researchers had been testing the drug in a Phase II study for chronic pain since November 2020. But in August, Lilly updated the indication to migraines. Per the trial database, the Phase II trial was completed this past September. Lilly did not issue a press release detailing the study results. With earnings season in full swing, Lilly isn’t the only Big Pharma company to cull programs from its pipeline. Last month, Roche chopped a Phase II eye disease candidate after a biotech tossed a similar drug the day before, and Novartis indefinitely postponed plans to submit an FDA pitch for its PD-1 drug. GSK made a broad retreat from NY-ESO as a cancer target when it pulled out of two cell therapy 2.0 alliances , while AbbVie discarded an autoimmune drug, the product of a 10-year discovery partnership.
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