Eli Lilly<\/a> said on Monday it would buy privately held cancer drug developer Ajax Therapeutics for up to $2.3 billion in cash, as the U.S. drugmaker looks to expand its oncology pipeline.<\/p>\nLilly has been doubling down on its search for next-generation cancer treatments with its recent dealmaking spree, acquiring companies such as Scorpion Therapeutics, Orna Therapeutics and Kelonia Therapeutics.<\/p>\n
Ajax’s lead asset, AJ1-11095, is an experimental once-daily oral treatment in early-stage testing for previously treated patients with myelofibrosis \u2014 a rare, chronic blood cancer in which scar tissue builds up in the bone marrow, disrupting normal blood cell production.<\/p>\n
Jacob Van Naarden, president of Lilly Oncology, said the company looks forward to using its expertise in blood cancer to “hopefully deliver another important new medicine to patients and hematologists.”<\/p>\n
Scotiabank analyst Louise Chen said the deal “builds on Lilly’s established capabilities in blood cancers and helps expand its future commercial products beyond obesity.”<\/p>\n
Ajax’s drug works by blocking JAK2, a signaling protein that helps drive several blood cancers. According to the company, the drug is designed to attach to JAK2 in a different way from currently available medicines, which could help it work better or for longer in patients who stop responding to older treatments.<\/p>\n
The company is also developing it for related diseases, including polycythemia vera, a disorder in which the body makes too many red blood cells.<\/p>\n
Lilly said the total deal value includes an upfront payment and subsequent payments upon the achievement of certain clinical and regulatory milestones.<\/p>\n
Choose CNBC as your preferred source on Google and never miss a moment from the most trusted name in business news.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An Eli Lilly and Company pharmaceutical manufacturing plant is pictured in Branchburg, New Jersey, on March 5, 2021.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[552,138,553,548,134,551,527,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-399999","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-biotech-and-pharmaceuticals","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-business-news","11":"tag-eli-lilly-and-co","12":"tag-health","13":"tag-health-care-industry","14":"tag-healthcare","15":"tag-new-zealand","16":"tag-newzealand","17":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=399999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=399999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=399999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=399999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}