AstraZeneca In Talks To License Summit Therapeutics’ Experimental Lung Cancer Drug: Report

AstraZeneca PLC (AZN) and Summit Therapeutics Inc (SMMT) are reportedly discussing a $15 billion partnership to license the latter’s lung-cancer drug.

The companies have been holding talks regarding a potential partnership over Summit’s Ivonescimab treatment, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

While the terms of the partnership agreement are still being negotiated, it could include an upfront payment worth several billion dollars and milestone payments, the report said, while noting that the talks could not culminate in a deal as well.

Summit has also held talks with other pharmaceutical firms, the report said.

Shares of SMMT were trading 5% higher in morning trade following the news, while AZN stock was down by about 2%.

Summit, a biopharmaceutical oncology company, said in late May that its global late-stage study evaluating Ivonescimab met the progression-free survival (PFS) primary endpoint but failed to achieve a statistically significant benefit in overall survival.

In the late-stage study evaluating Ivonescimab plus platinum-doublet chemotherapy compared to placebo plus platinum-doublet chemotherapy in patients with a type of lung cancer, the former demonstrated a statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in progression-free survival.

Progression-free survival (PFS) essentially measures how long a patient lives with their disease without it getting worse.

Ivonescimab in combination with chemotherapy also showed a positive trend in overall survival in the primary analysis, but without achieving a statistically significant benefit. Overall survival reflects the extent to which a treatment can extend a patient’s lifespan.

However, there are no current FDA-approved regimens that have demonstrated a statistically significant overall survival benefit in this patient setting, the company said.

Summit then said that it intends to file a Biologics License Application (BLA) with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration seeking approval for Ivonescimab plus chemotherapy based on the results of the trial. However, the firm noted that the FDA had said that a statistically significant overall survival benefit is necessary to support marketing authorization, which will weigh into its consideration of the timeline for filing the application.

Ivonescimab is an investigational therapy not presently approved by any regulatory authority other than China’s National Medical Products Administration. It was engineered by Chinese biopharmaceutical company Akeso Inc., and out-licensed to Summit for development and commercialization in regions including the United States and Europe in late 2022.

On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around Summit is trending in the ‘bullish’ territory while sentiment around AZN is in the ‘bearish’ territory.

SMMT stock is up by about 35% this year, while AZN stock is up by about 7%.

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