Two products fuelling Actelion’s growth spurt
pharmafile | March 2, 2007 | News story | Sales and Marketing |Â Â Â
Swiss specialist pharma company Actelion saw sales revenue rise 43% in 2006 thanks to rapid growth in its two products, Tracleer and Zavesca.
Founded 10 years ago, Actelion specialises in innovative science related to the endothelium – the single layer of cells separating every blood vessel from the blood stream.
Tracleer (bosentan) is licensed to treat pulmonary arterial hypertension, a rare but potentially fatal heart condition which has few other treatment options.
The company's other drug, Zavesca, is an enzyme replacement therapy for another rare condition, the inherited Gaucher's disease caused by a genetic fault.
Chief Executive Jean-Paul Clozel commented: "In 2006, Actelion has yet again improved its financial performance, driven by strong product sales and a careful upsizing of our infrastructure. Importantly, we are now more and more benefiting from our ongoing efforts in research, as our product pipeline rapidly expands.
"The S1P1-partnership we entered into with Roche in mid-2006 clearly demonstrates the innovation power of Actelion's research as well as our determination to maximise the medical potential and the related value creation from our compounds."
The company says its pipeline is maturing well, with 10 different chemical entities in clinical development, (five in phase III) by the end of 2007.
Jean-Paul Clozel says all the molecules focus on areas of high unmet medical need, such as an orexin receptor antagonist for sleeping disorders, where he says many patients are going untreated because of the limitations of current therapies available.
The company says spending on its R&D pipeline and company acquisitions will continue. It has just finalised the buy-out of Californian biotech CoTherix which specialises in treatments for cardiovascular disease. Ventavis (iloprost) is one of the CoTherix's key drugs, and like Tracleer, is also for pulmonary arterial hypertension, but in a complementary subset of patients.
Christian Chavy, president of business operations, said:" In 2006, we have been able to witness a further expansion of the pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) market. As the market leader, we have been, and will continue to be, committed to increasing disease awareness through a wide variety of educational efforts. Based on the strong clinical data with Tracleer in many different forms of PAH, we have been and will be able to reach out to a growing number of different specialists treating patients likely to suffer from this progressive disorder.
"We expect disease awareness to increase further with the upcoming availability of other endothelin receptor antagonists. Actelion is well positioned to benefit from the resulting market expansion, especially as the recently concluded EARLY study again showed that our dual endothelin receptor antagonist is delaying time to clinical worsening, even in the less advanced PAH patients."
A number of further indications for Tracleer are the cornerstone of the company's pipeline, plus it has some 25 active drug discovery programmes currently in progress.
The company says its discovery efforts could lead to as many as two or more compounds entering full pre-clinical testing every year.
