
Imbruvica boost for Pharmacyclics
pharmafile | January 8, 2014 | News story | Sales and Marketing | Janssen, Pharmacyclics, imbruvica
Pharmacyclics and Janssen Biotech have received a huge boost as a late-stage trial of their first-in-class, oral blood cancer drug Imbruvica was stopped early after its effectiveness was proved.
The Phase III RESONATE study pitched Imbruvica (ibrutinib) head to head against GlaxoSmithKline and Genmab’s Arzerra (ofatumumab) in patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) or small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL).
An independent data monitoring committee recommended it should be halted, based on ‘statistically significant improvement’ in progression free survival (the trial’s primary endpoint) and overall survival (a secondary endpoint).
Janssen and Pharmacyclics entered a collaboration and licence agreement in December 2011 on Imbruvica: the committee said that the drug should now be offered to patients in the Arzerra arm of RESONATE.
It is the second major boost for the companies in the last couple of months: in November the FDA approved the drug to treat mantle cell lymphoma: Pharmacyclics has told the FDA about the RESONATE decision, with Janssen informing the European Medicines Agency.
The firms “anticipate providing a comprehensive RESONATE study report to them within the coming months”.
However, this is not such good news for GSK and Genmab, who last year submitted Arzerra to the FDA and to European authorities as a first-line treatment for CLL. Arzerra was licenced by GSK three years ago in a $2.1 billion deal.
RESONATE enrolled 391 patients at 70 sites in ten countries who had received at least one prior therapy, and randomised them to receive 420 mg of Imbruvica – which inhibits a protein called Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) – once-daily or intravenous doses of Arzerra, over 24 weeks.
“The results seen at the interim analysis of the RESONATE trial are robust and consistent,” said Fong Clow, Pharmacyclics’ senior vice president of biometrics.
A detailed data analysis from RESONATE is to be presented at an upcoming oncology conference, the company insists.
Adam Hill
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