Inside This Issue: Multiple Sclerosis
Top News Alerts: Product Updates, Deals & Financings
Featured Topic: Epilepsy Pipeline Update 2010 Conference
Featured Company: Peptimmune
Subscribe now to access over 30 articles covering developments in drugs, devices and diagnostics for the brain and nervous system.
Market Highlights: March Brings Surprises, Both Good and Bad
After a three year struggle, the FDA approved Somaxon’s (SOMX) Silenor for insomnia. The drug, which is a patented low dose of an approved antidepressant, had been previously rejected twice for efficacy issues (see story, page 7). Medtronic (MDT) got a recommendation for approval of their deep brain stimulation device for epilepsy by the FDA advisory committee. The mainstream press had propagated reports that the FDA had deemed their pivotal trial a failure. In fact, this was one of two interpretations the FDA made available to the committee and represented inclusion of seizures triggered by the device in a single patient which were resolved after further calibration (see story, page 6). Medivation’s (MDV) reported that a six month Phase III study of dimebon for Alzheimer’s showed no evidence of efficacy (see story, page 4). The results were inexplicable after a Phase II with essentially the same design showed stellar results on all five endpoints...
Multiple Sclerosis: Disease Modifying Oral Treatments on the Way
Multiple sclerosis (MS) was first described by French neurologist and pathologist Jean Martin Charcot in 1868. It is an idiopathic demyelinating syndrome that affects the white matter in the central nervous system. It is hypothesized to have an auto-immune origin and MS lesions, known as scars (sclerosis means hardening) or plaques are infiltrated with lymphocytes, plasma cells, and macrophages. The T cells release cytokines that are thought to directly and indirectly promote the destruction of myelin, leading to a loss of nerve function. There is no known cure for MS. Treatments focus on symptomatic relief, prevention of new attacks and efforts to stave off disability. This article outlines MS subtypes, treatments as well as promising treatments in development...
Peptimmune: Betting on Multiple Sclerosis
Peptimmune is a small company in Cambridge, MA that was spun out of Genzyme in 2002. It has 20 employees, nearly all of them in research and development. So far, the company has raised over $86 million in four funding rounds from MPM Capital, New Enterprise Associates, Hunt BioVentures, SVB Capital, Boston Medical Investors, and Genzyme Corporation. It hopes to close a Series E round soon to fund Phase II development of their lead for multiple sclerosis. In addition to the challenge of completing a successful Phase II, Peptimmune will, in all likelihood, be facing competition from the new oral MS medications currently under FDA consideration...
Companies Covered In This Issue Include: Pfizer, Vivus, Shire, Cannabis Science, PTC Therapeutics, Neurogen, CombinatoRx, Medivation, Neuralieve, Abbott, GlaxoSmithKline, Isis, NeuroSearch, Insys, Dainippon, Cytokinetics, Life Technologies, Allergan, Progenics, Arena, Icagen, Medtronic, Acura, Enteromedics, Nabi, King, Actavis, Somaxon, EmSense, Beohringer, Lupin Pharmaceuticals, Clinical Data, Transcept, Vernalis, Aiko Biotechnology, Collegium Pharma, Titan Pharma, Cephalon, Depomedn, Reata, Bioness, Zafgen, Archimedes, to-BBB, Archimedes, Chelsea Therapeutics, Neurocrine, Xenoport, Genetix, Genzyme, Brainscope, Eisai, Rhythm Pharma, Pico-Tesla Magnetic Therapies, Emkinetics, Neurotech Pharma, Accera, Pharmatrophix, Horizon Therapeutics, Elcelyx, Sequent Medical, Reckitt Benckiser, Neuropharm Group, Leap Medical, Biovail, Cortex, Reverse Medical, Peptimmune, Bayhill, BioMS, Nuon, Eli Lilly, Bayer, Merck, Adeona, Acorda, Biogen Idec, Opexa, GW Pharma, CogniFit, St. Jude Medical, Takeda, AstraZeneca, Johnson and Johnson, Elan
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