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Oncomed trading halted after double dose of bad news
OncoMed Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ:OMED) suffered a double whammy of a failed cancer trial and partner Bayer passing up its option on two early stage compounds, vantictumab and ipafricept.
Shares in the Nasdaq-listed biopharma were halted as it said that a dosing trial of demcizumab for metastatic pancreatic cancer failed to meet either its primary endpoint of progression-free survival or even the secondary endpoint of overall survival.
Oncomed added it had discontinued the trial after the results.
“Pancreatic cancer has proven to be a uniquely challenging disease, and these data appear to reflect some of those disease and treatment complexities,” said Robert Stagg, Senior Vice President of Clinical Research and Development.
Bayer, meanwhile, has decided not to take up its option on vantictumab and ipafricept, two Wnt pathway inhibtors, even though the German group has spent US$90mln already in upfront and milestone payments.
Wnt pathways are a way the body regulates the proliferation of cells.
“While we had looked forward to collaborating with the Bayer team on the late-stage development of these biotherapeutics, we are very pleased to have worldwide rights to two promising Phase 2-ready assets,” said Paul J Hastings, OncoMed’s chief executive.
“We will be conducting an internal portfolio review and prioritization as we determine next steps for all our programs, including vantictumab and ipafricept.”
Worldwide development and commercial rights of the two inhibitors will revert back to Oncomed from June.
Story by ProactiveInvestors
Source: http://www.proactiveinvestors.com/companies/news/176232/oncomed-trading-halted-after-double-dose-of-bad-news-176232.html
