Biotech Values

[mcbio]

LGND/MRK -

In terms of differentiation, the angle you may be looking for could be in the study design using prodromal patients. Still a long shot.

I always think it makes sense to pay close attention to what the big pharma partners are doing and saying in PRs/CCs to pick up on any clues. Just listened to MRK's 3Q15 CC and, unfortunately, MK-8931 only came up at the very end of the CC during Q&A. Hopefully that's just because the data is a bit further out and not of immediate importance to MRK. Anyways, it was noted that MRK hopes for data in 2017 on mild-to-moderate patients (no specific reference so I'll just assume that means towards end of 2017). It was mentioned that they expect the trial to run to completion and so it sounded like there would be no interim look. Perhaps that's a positive clue on safety I suppose but no clear read on efficacy. There was no specific mention on the other trial (prodromal patients) so unclear to me when we can expect any data on this trial which is presumably the one that has a better shot of showing a positive signal.