The competitors posted promising survival data for their respective blockbuster PD-1 inhibitors—Keytruda and Opdivo—emphasizing the potential of these therapies in bladder cancer patients.
Tag Archive for: Merck
The move comes days after Merck said it would pay Daiichi Sankyo $5.5 billion to jointly develop three of its candidate cancer drugs in a deal that could be worth up to $22 billion for the Japanese firm.
The three drug candidates to be developed with Merck belong to the class known as antibody drug conjugates (ADC) and are in various stages of clinical development for the treatment of multiple solid cancer tumors.
The company’s CEO said its experimental multiple sclerosis drug can be a “blockbuster”, an industry term for annual sales that exceed $1 billion, even after concerns emerged that the drug may cause liver damage.
The blockbuster PD-1 inhibitor’s label expanded further on Monday when the FDA greenlit Keytruda as a perioperative treatment for certain patients with earlier stages of non-small cell lung cancer.
The company stated that the European Union medicines regulator recommended a marketing authorization for the company’s drug Prevymis to treat a type of infection in adult kidney transplant recipients at high risk.
The FDA’s schedule is picking up speed, with six target action dates over the next two weeks, including one for a blockbuster cancer treatment and another for a highly anticipated therapy for a rare pediatric disorder.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to recede, the top pharma companies intensified their focus into areas such as cancer and metabolic diseases to build up their pipelines, and their growth prospects, for the future.
While the shooting star Lagevrio pushed Merck’s top line to nearly $60 billion in 2022, the rest of the company’s portfolio is catching up.
Merck on Thursday reported that its blockbuster PD-1 inhibitor Keytruda (pembrolizumab) met one of its dual primary endpoints in the Phase III AMBASSADOR trial in muscle-invasive urothelial carcinoma.
