Replies to post #93665 on Biotech Values

[mcbio]

Re: ACHN

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The president did make the statement that ACH-1625 produced the greatest log drop at 5 days among HCV compounds so hopefully there is some data out there that supports his assertions
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i think this is posturing and wouldn't give this much weight. first of all telaprevir had comparable VL drop at 5 days, but you've got to look real hard - eyeball the graph in figure 2 at the 5 day mark from the following reference and you'll note about a 4 log drop

www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/115807581/HTMLSTART

also the ns5a inhibitor from BMY likely has at least that much efficacy. i say this because even though the data may not be out there at 5 days, the drug had a 3 log drop after ONE dose - so i can't imagine it won't have >4 logs at 5 days..

don't get me wrong, 1625 is clearly a potent drug - but lets call a spade a spade - day 5 data is not a standard metric and some of the competing agents jsut ahven't disclosed data at day 5 specifically

Fair points all around. I think the efficacy clearly appears to be sufficient from what we have seen so far and ACHN likely won't be able to differentiate ACH-1625 from other HCV PIs to any large degree on efficacy alone. The bigger key is likely going to be how does the safety look in a much longer study? I don't expect the remaining Phase 1b cohorts to do much in either a material positive or negative way given that they're still testing out to 5 days. And I'm not sure either really good data or less than stellar data from the ongoing QD cohort will be a big deal (certainly more likely if data is negative) given that it's not clear that QD dosing is a big advantage in the near-term.

The Phase 2 trial is supposed to start in September and test out to 28 days. I think results from that trial will be the next big clinical step for ACH-1625. For the stock itself, the big key is whether or not ACHN can land a big name partner for ACH-1625 in a lucrative deal before starting Phase 2 on its own. I am hopeful that will happen and move the stock to another level. We shall see.