Kronos, Idorsia plan layoffs; PTC shelves ALS drug
Today, a brief rundown of news involving Kronos Bio, Idorsia and PTC Therapeutics, as well as updates from Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Soleno Therapeutics that you may have missed.
Kronos Bio will lay off 83% of its workforce by year’s end and its CEO, Norbert Bischofberger, will step down effective Dec. 3, the company said Wednesday. Deborah Knobelman, the company’s chief operating officer and CFO appointed earlier this year, will become interim CEO. Kronos, which studies how to activate and deactivate genes to treat cancer and inflammatory disorders, had 97 employees as of Jan. 1, 2023, but layoffs reduced that number to 62 employees as of March 11 this year. A spokesperson didn’t respond to a question about how many employees will remain after this round of layoffs. In November, Kronos halted work on its lead candidate in ovarian cancer because the “benefit-risk profile [did] not warrant further clinical evaluation” and announced it would begin a strategic review. — Jonathan Gardner
Idorsia is in discussions to sell global rights to its blood pressure drug aprocitentan — sold in the U.S. as Tryvio — to an undisclosed buyer. In return for agreeing to exclusive talks, Idorsia will receive a $35 million fee from the unnamed company, money that extends the biotech’s runway into 2025. But to reach profitability, Idorsia has concluded it also needs to trim costs, and is considering cutting as many as 270 positions globally. The jobs potentially affected are mainly in R&D and support roles, Idorsia said, but some staff may be offered the opportunity to continue working on aprocitentan should a sale agreement be reached. — Ned Pagliarulo
PTC Therapeutics is shelving a drug that just failed as a treatment for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. According to the company, high-level results showed the drug didn’t meet the main objective of the roughly 300-person trial, nor did it hit secondary goals focused on effectiveness. Analysts hadn’t ascribed much, if any, value to this program, which may help explain why PTC shares were down only 2% in after-hours trading Tuesday. On Wednesday, the company announced plans to sell a priority review voucher, which it just won with U.S. approval of Kebilidi, to an unnamed buyer for $150 million. — Jacob Bell
Acadia Pharmaceuticals has purchased exclusive worldwide rights to an experimental medicine from Saniona, a Denmark-based company. The medicine is meant to regulate a brain-calming chemical, and Acadia plans to start in 2026 a mid-stage study testing it in patients with essential tremor. Announced Tuesday, the deal is heavily backloaded, with Acadia shelling out $28 million upfront while offering as much as $582 million in potential milestone payments. Saniona may also receive tiered royalties on net sales of any resulting products. — Jacob Bell
Soleno Therapeutics has to wait another three months before it learns whether the Food and Drug Administration will grant an approval of its drug for Prader-Wili syndrome, a rare disease characterized by feelings of intense hunger and developmental delays. The agency set a new decision deadline of March 27, 2025, extending its review to allow for assessment of new information provided by Soleno. — Ned Pagliarulo
By March 23, the FDA will decide whether to approve Alnylam Pharmaceutical’s drug for a cardiac form of transthyretin amyloidosis known as ATTR-CM for short. If cleared, Alnylam’s drug would compete with Pfizer’s tafamidis and BridgeBio Pharma’s recently OK’d Attruby, and give physicians three treatment options for a deadly condition thought to affect tens of thousands of people in the U.S. and Europe. The FDA does not currently plan to hold an advisory committee to further vet Alnylam’s application, the company said Monday. — Ned Pagliarulo
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