AstraZeneca sell two cancer drug rights for $198 million

AstraZeneca (LON:AZN) have told shareholders that they have sold two cancer drug rights for $198 million, which has seen shares spike.

Following the announcement, the firm saw its shares boosted by 1.17% to 7,723p. 20/12/19 9:50BST.

The firm updated the market on Friday by saying that it had sold the rights to drugs Arimidex and Casodex in a number of countries to Juvise Pharmaceuticals for up to $198 million.

Astra added that it had sold the commercial rights for these drugs in numerous countries which included France, Austria, Germany, Cyprus, Turkey, Morocco, Mali, and Cameroon.

Arimedex and Casodex treat mainly prostate and breast cancer, however they have recently lost their compound patent protection in the countries in which AstraZeneca sold to.

Notably, the rights to both drugs in the United States were already sold in 2017. Juvise paid $181 million upfront to AstraZeneca, and may make additional sales dependent payments up to a total of $17 million.

In 2018, Arimidex saw sales of $37 million in the countries covered by the new agreement, while Casodex sales were $24 million.

These divestments will not alter Astra’s 2019 financial guidance, it said, and any income from the upfront and future payments will be reported in Astra’s financial statements under “other operating income & expense”.

Dave Fredrickson, Executive Vice President, Oncology Business Unit, said: “Arimidex and Casodex are important established medicines and we are pleased that Juvisé Pharmaceuticals will now take on the work of making sure patients continue to have access to them. Today’s agreement is part of a broader strategy of reducing our portfolio of mature medicines to reallocate resources towards developing our pipeline of new medicines.

Deepmatter Partnership

Last week, Deepmatter Group PLC (LON:DMTR) saw their shares rally following a pharmaceutical technology collaboration with AstraZeneca.

Deepmatter joined forces with the FTSE 100 giant in a digital technology venture, designed to speed up the drug delivery process.

Michael Kossenjans, an associate director at Astra’s Discovery Sciences, Research & Development unit, said: “Our goal is to transform drug design using innovative digital technologies in combination with automation and artificial intelligence. To get potential new medicines to patients faster, we need to reduce the cycle time for lead identification and optimisation and look forward to working with DeepMatter to assess the potential of DigitalGlassware to help with this.”

It seems that following last weeks partnership, AstraZeneca have once again pulled it out of the bag today, and certainly shareholders will be impressed, as the firm continues to grow and diverse.

AstraZeneca continues to expand into China

Additionally, Astra have continued to expand into the global pharmaceuticals market. The firm noted just over a fortnight ago that it had received a marketing approval for two different drugs.

Astra told shareholders that they had joined forces with Merck & Co (NYSE:MRK) to receive marketing authorization from China’s National Medical Products Administration for their Lynparza drug.

The company said Lynparza, which is being jointly developed and commercialised by AstraZeneca and Merck, is currently approved in 65 countries, including the EU, US and Japan. China has the highest prevalence of ovarian cancer globally, with more than 52,000 new cases diagnosed in 2018.

Finally, shareholders got the icing on the cake. When Astra said that they would create a new global research and development centre n China.

There was an ensured effort from Astra to create both a research centre and am artificial intelligence innovation center both in Shanghai, and a “first-of-its-kind” healthcare industrial fund with China International Capital Corp Ltd (HKG:3908).

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