Biotech Values

[microcapfun]

JAK/Incyte

>>As for never being approved in RA, I'm not sure I'll go that far unless there is a requirement that they run any registration trial versus the PFE drug.<<

Well that's something worth discussing. Pfizer's JAK inhibitor (tasocitinib) will have been on the market for about a couple years at the time when Incyte and Lilly are working out an SPA with the FDA ... I would think Incyte would be given two options. For first line (or 2nd if Pfizer gets approved only for TNF failure patients), go head to head against tasocitinib. For 2nd line (or 3rd in the TNF failure case), show that 050 can work in tasocitinib-failure patients.

I think we both agree that 050 would be unlikely to beat tasocitinib head to head, given the data reported thus far.

Would 050 work in tasocitinib-failure patients? 050 inhibits JAK1 and JAK2. Pfizer's drug inhibits JAK1, JAK2 and JAK3. So 050 doesn't inhibit anything that Pfizer's drug doesn't already inhibit. Therefore my guess is that 050 would not work very well in tasocitinib-failure patients, unless many/most of those patients failed because of JAK3-inhibition side effects - which seems unlikely, again from the data we've seen so far.

So that's why my guess is that 050 will not get to the market in RA.

I'd be interested in other opinions.

I'm certainly not an Incyte basher. I think 424 will be a blockbuster in MPDs.

micro