Cancer Drugs to watch:

<!--StartFragment --> Pharmaceuticals
Cancer Drugs To Watch
Matthew Herper and Robert Langreth, 05.03.05, 11:30 AM ET

NEW YORK - The race is on for new medicines to fight cancer. Here is a watch list of the most promising experimental drugs. Click on the drug names in the table below for more information, including sales forecasts and novelty ratings. Bookmark this page as it will be updated often.

Drug	Maker	Indications	Development Stage
BAY-43-9006 (updated)	Onyx Pharmaceuticals (nasdaq: ONXX - news - people ), Bayer (nyse: BAY - news - people )	Advanced kidney cancer	Awaiting regulatory submission
BMS-354825	Bristol-Myers Squibb (nyse: BMY - news - people )	Leukemia	Mid-stage trial
CP-675,206	Pfizer (nyse: PFE - news - people ), Abgenix (nasdaq: ABGX - news - people )	Melanoma	Mid-stage trial
Lapatinib	GlaxoSmithKline (nyse: GSK - news - people )	Breast cancer, bladder cancer	Late-stage trial
MDX-010	Medarex (nasdaq: MEDX - news - people ), Bristol-Myers Squibb	Melanoma	Late-stage trial
Panitumumab	Abgenix, Amgen (nasdaq: AMGN - news - people )	Colon cancer, other tumors	Late-stage trial
PTK-787 (updated)	Novartis (nyse: NVS - news - people ), Schering (nyse: SHR - news - people )	Colon cancer	Late-stage trial
Provenge	Dendreon (nasdaq: DNDN - news - people )	Prostate cancer	Late-stage trial
Revlimid (updated)	Celgene (nasdaq: CELG - news - people )	Myelodysplastic syndromes	Late-stage trial
Sutent (updated)	Pfizer	Stomach cancer	Late-stage trial
Telcyta	Telik (nasdaq: TELK - news - people )	Ovarian cancer	Late-stage trial

Sales ratings based on analyst reports and editor judgment. Novelty ratings based on editor judgment.
 

This Year's Cancer Debutantes
Matthew Herper, 05.11.05, 6:00 AM ET


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< script language=JavaScript src="http://www.forbes.com/scripts/popit.js">< /script><!--CUSTOM BOX drugwatch_asco-->NEW YORK - On Friday, more than 25,000 doctors, nurses, patient advocates and drug company employees will converge on Orlando, Fla., for the year's biggest cancer conference, the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, or ASCO. All eyes in the pharmaceutical industry will be watching as participants present research that could boost the sales of current medicines and introduce the next generation of cancer blockbusters.

Click here for a slide show of ASCO drugs to watch.

Cancer drugs are big business, bringing in $24 billion annually worldwide, according to drug data firm IMS Health. That makes them the third best-selling class of drugs, after cholesterol-lowering agents and ulcer meds. Profit margins for cancer drugs are among the highest in the industry because they only have to be marketed to a small number of doctors, even as prices for newer agents eclipse $20,000 per patient.

But there is no argument that anti-cancer research has been a boon for patients. This year in the United States, approximately 1.4 million new cancer cases will be diagnosed and 570,000 people will lose their lives to some form of the disease. Some 30% of those deaths will be traceable to tobacco use.

During their lifetime, one in three women and every second man will be diagnosed with some type of cancer. Thanks to new medicines, the prognosis is improving somewhat. Some 64% of cancer patients survive for at least five years, and the National Cancer Institute estimates that there are 9.8 million cancer survivors in the U.S. today.

We already know that a few winners are going to be presented at this year's ASCO. The biggest corporate presence will be Genentech (nyse: DNA - news - people ), the South San Francisco biotech that has built itself into a cancer-fighting giant. Genentech has already revealed that in separate studies, its Avastin delayed the progress of both lung and breast cancer. The full data from both of those studies will be presented at ASCO, as will another study showing that the company's Herceptin prevents breast cancer tumors with certain genetic defects from returning after surgery.

Traditional behemoths such as Pfizer (nyse: PFE - news - people ) and Novartis (nyse: NVS - news - people ) may also present new data--both good and bad--on cancer-fighting pills they are developing. Aside from new targeted genetic medicines, there could be some new data on the effectiveness of old-fashioned chemotherapies such as Taxotere and Eloxatin, both of which are sold by Sanofi-Aventis (nyse: SNY - news - people ).

For small biotechs such as Ariad Pharmaceuticals (nasdaq: ARIA - news - people ), Medarex (nasdaq: MEDX - news - people ) and GTx (nasdaq: GTXI - news - people ), even small presentations at ASCO can be make-or-break moments.

But investors should tread carefully, as good news has often leaked before the meeting even begins. Typically, biotech stocks run up before the meeting, and sometimes sell off even when the news is good. Still, for long-term investors, ASCO is often the time to get a feel for what the big cancer stories will be in the coming year.

Click here for a slide show of ASCO drugs to watch.

 

 

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< script language=javascript src="http://www.forbes.com/scripts/popit.js">< /script> Sales Potential: $ Novelty: ++ This pill was originally designed to knock out a protein, called the RAF kinase, which helps cause cells to divide. But it also turns out to block proteins that spur blood vessels to grow, feeding tumors. This second set of mechanisms is thought to account for the drug's apparent success in treating kidney cancer, which has proved resistant to most cancer drugs. In a second-stage trial whose final results were announced in October 2004, the drug shrunk or stabilized tumors in 70% of 202 kidney cancer patients. By contrast, only 15% of kidney cancer patients respond to existing therapies. A final-stage trial in 800 kidney cancer patients showed the drug slowed the disease's progression. Full results will be presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology between May 13 and 17. Click here for more on BAY-43-9006.

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< script language=javascript src="http://www.forbes.com/scripts/popit.js">< /script> Sales Potential: $ Novelty: ++ Telcyta is a molecule designed to remain harmless until it comes into contact with an enzyme that is produced by certain cancer cells. This enzyme snips the drug into two parts, one of which is poisonous. As the poisonous fragment quickly disintegrates, the cancer cell is killed while healthy cells go unscathed. Telcyta has shown promise in treating several cancers. In two trials with difference chemotherapy drugs presented in June, about half of ovarian cancer patients responded. Three of 16 patients in one trial saw their cancer vanish, at least for the moment. Results of a late-stage test in ovarian cancer, where an earlier trial seemed to extend patients' lives, are expected sometime this year. Click here for more on Telcyta.

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Genentech's Triumph
Matthew Herper, 05.16.05, 6:00 AM ET



Genentech



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ORLANDO, FLA. - At least for the moment, Genentech, the original biotechnology pioneer, is undeniably on top of the cancer world. But as gigantic rivals, including Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline, try to steal its tricks, can the South San Francisco-based biotech maintain its dominance?

The 29-year-old firm has dominated this year's biggest cancer treatment conference, the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), with its drugs Herceptin, Avastin and Tarceva. All of the medicines were invented through close attention to the genetic defects in cells that lead to cancer, and tested in large clinical studies that experts praise for their rigor. Now, in quick succession, Avastin has been shown to extend life by several months in lung, breast and colon cancer, when added on top of chemotherapy. The battery of results emerged in little more than a month (see "Genentech's Wall Of Data").

"It was the most fun five weeks I might ever have in my career," says Susan Desmond-Hellmann, who heads Genentech's (nyse: DNA - news - people ) clinical trials. "It's what you live for."

Doctors are impressed, especially with Avastin, which is designed to starve tumors of blood by blocking a protein called VEGF.

"It's powerful," says Nicholas Vogelzang, head of the Nevada Cancer Institute. Adds Len Lichtenfeld, deputy medical director of the American Cancer Society: "I happen to think these results are spectacular." Says Robert Mayer, director of the center for gastrointestinal oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute: "I think it's hard to be anything but enthusiastic about the results."

At the end of two years, 22% of non-small-cell lung cancer patients who received Avastin with their chemotherapy were alive, compared to 17% who received only chemotherapy. Before the meeting, some worried that the lung cancer data for the drug would be marred by a side effect: In earlier trials, 9% of patients had bled to death from their lungs while on Avastin treatment. But most of the bleeding occurred in patients who had a particular type of tumor, called a squamous cell tumor. By excluding patients at high risk of bleeding, the number of bleeding deaths was cut to a little more than 1% of those taking Avastin.

That won't prevent doctors from using the drug, says Roman Perez-Soler of Montefiore Medical Center in New York. "For this type of population," he says, "we are used to death from chemotherapy."

Data for use of Avastin in breast cancer and colon cancer were also presented. As in lung cancer, the drug extended the survival of at least half of the patients by several months or more. Dana-Farber's Mayer says he's encouraged that the results are similar in different kinds of tumors.

But that isn't all Genentech had to offer cancer doctors at the ASCO conference. Its Herceptin also extended the life of women with certain types of breast cancer.

"The differences that we're seeing there are among the greatest that I have seen for years and years and years," says Norman Wolmark of Pittsburgh's Allegheny General Hospital, in response to the Herceptin results. And Tarceva, a pill Genentech co-markets with OSI Pharmaceuticals (nasdaq: OSIP - news - people ), was the first drug to extend the lives of pancreatic cancer patients when added to Eli Lilly's (nyse: LLY - news - people ) Gemzar. To be sure, doctors do disagree over whether those results, though statistically significant, actually represent a meaningful increase in survival.

At some point, Herceptin, Avastin and Tarceva all looked like duds. But Desmond-Hellmann and her colleagues used clinical trials to look for hints of efficacy even when the treatments failed. Herceptin was found to work for tumors with a certain gene. When doubts emerged about Avastin and Tarceva, other clinical trials that ultimately proved the medicines' worth were already ongoing.

Now, far larger companies seem to be trying to steal from Genentech's playbook.

Pfizer (nyse: PFE - news - people ), the world's largest drug firm, may suddenly be becoming Genentech's biggest competitor in the cancer arena. Desmond-Hellmann claims she isn't worried about competition from companies whose research budgets rival Genentech's total annual spending. "I don't think it's about money," she says. "I think it's a way of doing things."

Pills from Pfizer and Bayer (nyse: BAY - news - people ) that hit not only VEGF, the Avastin target, but also other proteins in the cell, are showing incredible promise. Results from a VEGF pill being developed by Novartis (nyse: NVS - news - people ), however, were disappointing. Rivals such as Amgen (nasdaq: AMGN - news - people ) and the team of Sanofi-Aventis (nyse: SNY - news - people ) and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals (nasdaq: REGN - news - people ) are years behind.

"I haven't seen evidence that someone will have a pill that will replace Avastin," Desmond-Hellmann says.
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Cancer Drugs On The Way, But Who Pays?
Matthew Herper, 05.13.05, 4:05 PM ET

ORLANDO, FLA. - This year's annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology unveils new data on an unprecedented number of drugs targeted at the genetic quirks that cause cancer.

Some of these drugs will not help patients. But those that will help could lead to another problem: Their high cost could create an even bigger crisis for the U.S. health care system. Consider that treating one patient with one drug can easily cost tens of thousands of dollars.

"Totaling up how many dollars are involved here is quite staggering," says Leonard Saltz, an oncologist at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, who conducted trials on many big-name cancer drugs. "The fact is these are extraordinarily expensive therapies that lead to real but modest improvements, and we as a society are going to confront the cost and how to pay for it."

Drug companies, meanwhile, are racing to develop new targeted drugs that will further increase costs while prolonging the lives of cancer patients a little bit at a time.

The big winner this year may be Genentech (nyse: DNA - news - people ). Geoffrey Porges at Sanford C. Bernstein writes in a note to investors that the drug company has more presentations at ASCO this year than the rest of the biotech industry combined. The most important presentation shows studies that its Avastin drug works against certain lung and breast tumors and that Herceptin, a breast cancer drug, is effective in preventing tumors from returning. The lung cancer data are being presented Friday at a press briefing.

But big pharmaceutical firms aren't content to let Genentech have the huge market for new cancer drugs to itself. One major challenger is Novartis (nyse: NVS - news - people ). The company jump-started the field of gene-targeted cancer pills with Gleevec, which showed stunning successes in certain forms of leukemia and stomach cancers. The drug giant has been hoping to repeat that success with PTK-787, a pill meant to work in the same way as Genentech's Avastin. But initial results being presented at a press briefing at ASCO did not reach statistical significance in preventing colon cancer from progressing.

Novartis and partner Schering (nyse: SHR - news - people ) are still hopeful the drug will eventually prove effective.

"The development of oncology products is not often a straight line," says David Epstein, head of oncology at Novartis. "I'm still relatively optimistic about PTK."

One strategy that could goose sales and save lives is to use medicines not only to rid the body of cancer, but also to prevent it from ever coming back. But this means patients can wind up taking drugs for years.

At Friday's press briefing, data are being presented from a five-year, 8,000-patient study of Novartis' pill Femara, which is used to keep breast cancer from recurring after chemotherapy and surgery. Patients who took Femara for five years had 19% fewer breast cancer recurrences than those who took Tamoxifen, the current gold standard. All of the drugs work by affecting estrogen, which can help some breast tumors grow.

Pfizer (nyse: PFE - news - people ) and AstraZeneca (nyse: AZN - news - people ) sell similar drugs, but Matthew Ellis, director of medical oncology at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, argues that the medicines are different and that Femara may be the most potent, biochemically. The stage seems set for a marketing war between the three firms. Once a relatively small seller, Femara now has blockbuster potential despite its high price tag. The drug costs $224 per month, compared to $38 for generic Tamoxifen.

Data are also being made available on the infamous drug thalidomide, sold by Celgene (nasdaq: CELG - news - people ) as Thalomid. Though the drug was linked to birth defects in the 1950s, it has found a place as a powerful treatment for the blood cancer multiple myeloma. In a trial, 668 patients were given chemotherapy and a stem-cell transplant to replace their bone marrow. Half were also given Thalomid. After five years, 55% of patients on Thalomid had no cancer recurrence, compared to 40% of those who did not get the drug.

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So finde ich den Thread doch nie wieder!


So ging es mir mit  anderen Threads  gegen Krebs und andere Geiseln der Menschheit vorher auch schon.

Ist das Thema so uninterssant?  

 

halt bei all den netten mittelchen, welches in welcher phase der klinischen tests steckt,was bei selbigen schon einschränkendes herausgekommen ist, ob es ein ganz neuer therapieansatz ist oder nur das 17. aufgussderivat von bekannten stoffen. hat es potenzial zum blockbuster? kann man es gegen eine oder mehrere krebsarten einsetzen etc..

wenn du das noch rausfilterst kriegste grün ;->

das gute ALTE thalidomid/celgene #6 letzter abschnitt, ist übrigens auch bekannt unter dem namen: contergan....

ciao

l.


 

Genentech kauft Biogen-Werk

(Instock) Genentech (NYSE: DNA) übernimmt von Biogen Idec (Nasdaq: BIIB) eine Produktionsstätte für 408 Millionen Dollar. Ab 2006 will die Roche-Tochter dort das Medikament ?Avastin? zur Bekämpfung von Tumoren produzieren. Biogen rechnen im Zuge des Verkaufs mit zusätzlichen Kosten von 50 bis 57 Millionen Dollar, erhofft sich jedoch jährliche Einsparungen von 80 bis 100 Millionen Dollar.


[17.06.2005 10:41:47]  

Genentech (+ 1,1 Prozent auf 80,80 Euro) verdoppelt das Volumen des Aktienrückkaufprogramms auf 4 Milliarden US-Dollar. Die Frist läuft nach eigenen Angaben bis Ende Juni 2006. Das kalifornische Biotechunternehmen hatte bis Ende Mai 29 Millionen Aktien für rund 1,5 Milliarden Dollar erworben.
 

Revolutionierende Krebsdroge!?

NEW YORK - Pfizer has submitted Sutent, a cancer drug that Chief Executive Henry "Hank" McKinnell has described as "revolutionary", to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The drug has been closely watched both by investors in Pfizer (nyse: PFE - news - people ) and those in Onyx Pharmaceuticals (nasdaq: ONXX - news - people ) and Bayer (nyse: BAY - news - people ), which submitted their own similar medicine, sorafenib, for kidney cancer last month.Some analysts believe Sutent's sales could eclipse sorafenib's.Pfizer executives have described the drug as one of the company's most high-profile projects.

"I would just add with Sutent," said McKinnell on a conference call in April, "we're seeing enormous excitement in oncology circles, which is a good leading indicator of the importance of this revolutionary new medicine."

Sutent is being submitted for both gastrointestinal stromal tumors that have failed to respond to Gleevec, a drug from Novartis (nyse: NVS - news - people ) and for kidney cancer that has not responded to other treatments. In the first indication, a trial was stopped early because the drug was effective, as reported on Forbes.com in February. (See: "Pfizer Cancer Pill Proves Effective").

The drug has also shown promise in other cancers, particularly breast cancer. In May, it was one of the stars of the annual meeting of the American Society for Clinical Oncology. (See: "Pfizer Takes Cancer By Storm").

Sutent is one of a new generation of cancer pills that is trying to build on the success of intravenous cancer therapies such as Avastin, from Genentech (nyse: DNA - news - people )by tageting multiple genetic targets involved in tumors at once.

"While in early days, we are also greatly encouraged by the results we are seeing in breast cancer," Pfizer research chief John LaMattina told analysts in April. "Because of its unique set of properties, we will continue to study Sutent across a broad range of other cancers as well."


Forbes  

Nur ohne Beachtung und Auszeichnung! Ohne Sterne!

Der einzige den ich unter Celgene fand! CELG

Aktiensplit-Ankündigung

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Celgene Corporation

Close on 12/28/2005.

Last: 60.85	Change: 3.37		Open: 61.35	High: 61.95	Low: 59.70	Volume: 16,137,000
			Yield: n/a	P/E Ratio: 129.47	52 Wk Range: 24.70 to 63.27

All Available Price Data on Celgene Corporation.

Die genauen Daten konnte ich noch nicht ermitteln.

 

 

 

hier nicht mehr oft lesen, Geldschneider hat uns leider verlassen :(

 

---

Grüße

 

 ich habe schon gelesen, das hier ein hauen und stechen ist. Schade.

 

lieben gruß

Madame Eugenie

 

In Forbes erschien gestern ein Artikel, in dem die (angeblichen) Vorzüge von Genentech gegenüber Pfizer herausgestellt werden. Ich hab den Artikel - der zahlreiche Fehler enthält (siehe dazu auch die Sutent-Postings hier im Thread) - einmal genau analysiert.

Interessierte finden den Forbes-Artikel und meine Kommentare im Pfizer-Thread (Posting 1146):

http://www.ariva.de/board/205724/...a=&search_id=&search_full=#bottom  

Arlington (aktiencheck.de AG) - Die Analysten von Friedman, Billings, Ramsey & Co bewerten die Aktie von Celgene (ISIN US1510201049/ WKN 881244) weiterhin mit "outperform". Das Kursziel werde von 80 USD auf 85 USD erhöht.
(23.05.2007/ac/a/u)
Analyse-Datum: 23.05.2007
 

die Pipeline besteht eigentlich nur aus Nexavar  

ist vor allen Dingen in China verbreitet. Hier hat Nexavar vor kurzem die Zulassung erhalten  

ist für Leberkrebs und Nierenkrebs zugelassen. Für Lungenkrebs und Brustkrebs laufen verschiedene klinische Studien.  

die weltweiten Erlöse.  

auf 40,30 USD

und die Q1 Zahlen haben keinen Schub nach oben gegeben. Wo gehts hin mit Celgene, wer hat eine Meinung dazu?  

41,60 USD aktuell...