Advertisement
UK markets closed
  • FTSE 100

    7,952.62
    +20.64 (+0.26%)
     
  • FTSE 250

    19,884.73
    +74.07 (+0.37%)
     
  • AIM

    743.26
    +1.15 (+0.15%)
     
  • GBP/EUR

    1.1690
    -0.0004 (-0.03%)
     
  • GBP/USD

    1.2616
    -0.0006 (-0.05%)
     
  • Bitcoin GBP

    55,682.14
    -397.31 (-0.71%)
     
  • CMC Crypto 200

    885.54
    0.00 (0.00%)
     
  • S&P 500

    5,254.35
    +5.86 (+0.11%)
     
  • DOW

    39,807.37
    +47.29 (+0.12%)
     
  • CRUDE OIL

    83.11
    -0.06 (-0.07%)
     
  • GOLD FUTURES

    2,254.80
    +16.40 (+0.73%)
     
  • NIKKEI 225

    40,369.44
    +201.37 (+0.50%)
     
  • HANG SENG

    16,541.42
    +148.58 (+0.91%)
     
  • DAX

    18,492.49
    +15.40 (+0.08%)
     
  • CAC 40

    8,205.81
    +1.00 (+0.01%)
     

Bristol's $1 bln Bavarian deal may signal cancer vaccine revival

By Ben Hirschler

LONDON, March 4 (Reuters) - The idea of using vaccines to fight cancer has received a shot in the arm from a $1 billion deal between Bristol-Myers Squibb and Bavarian Nordic .

The agreement gives the U.S. drugmaker an exclusive option to the Danish biotech firm's therapeutic prostate cancer vaccine Prostvac and signals that such shots may have a bright future when combined with so-called checkpoint inhibitor drugs.

Shares (Berlin: DI6.BE - news) in Bavarian Nordic surged 35 percent on Wednesday on news of the Bristol-Myers tie-up, under which it could receive up to $975 million, including an upfront payment of $60 million.

ADVERTISEMENT

Unlike traditional preventative vaccines, therapeutic ones are designed for people with established disease and the aim is to boost the patient's immune system to keep tumours at bay.

Unfortunately, they have run into problems in practice, leading to a series of failures with experimental products such as Merck KGaA's Stimuvax and GlaxoSmithKline (Other OTC: GLAXF - news) 's MAGE-A3.

The one vaccine to make it to market, Dendreon (Other OTC: DNDNQ - news) 's Provenge, has not been a commercial success.

But Bristol-Myers thinks vaccines, which trigger a response from the immune system's "foot soldiers", can play an important role when given in combination with checkpoint inhibitors, like its drug Yervoy, which take the brakes off other immune cells.

A week ago, the U.S. company and its Danish partner released early data from a study involving 30 patients showing that 20 percent of men with advanced prostate cancer remained alive 80 months after starting treatment with the most promising dose of Prostvac and Yervoy.

The idea of combining therapeutic cancer vaccines with checkpoint inhibitors has gained traction among researchers in recent months and was a talking-point at the European Society of Medical Oncology annual congress in Madrid in September.

Roche Chief Executive Severin Schwan also told Reuters last year that the Swiss group, which is the world's largest maker of cancer drugs, was exploring ways of combining its checkpoint inhibitors with cancer vaccines.

Companies including Roche, Bristol-Myers, Merck & Co and AstraZeneca (NYSE: AZN - news) are investing heavily in ways to harness the immune system against cancer as they chase an immunotherapy market that some analysts predict will eventually generate annual sales of more than $30 billion.

(Editing by Jane Merriman)