AstraZeneca chases biosimilar Avastin drug with Japanese group

By Ben Hirschler
LONDON, July 24 (Reuters) - AstraZeneca AZN.L is dipping
its toe in the biosimilars market, as a way to make future
cancer drug cocktails more affordable, by linking with a
Japanese group to develop a copy of Roche's ROG.VX blockbuster
medicine Avastin.
Its new 50/50 joint venture with Fujifilm Kyowa Kirin
Biologics (FKB) will work on a copycat version of Avastin, which
is currently used in a range of solid tumours and also has
potential to be given alongside new immunotherapy treatments.
FKB -- itself a tie-up between Fujifilm 4901.T and Kyowa
Hakko Kirin 4151.T -- commenced a Phase I clinical trial of
its copy of Avastin, called FKB238, in Europe last November.
Under the terms of the agreement, FKB will transfer the
rights to FKB238 to the new joint venture and will receive a
lump-sum payment of $45 million in return.
An AstraZeneca spokeswoman said the move did not reflect a
shift away from the British company's focus on innovative
products but rather was a way to develop a product that could be
used in affordable drug cocktails.
"This supports our combination-focused strategy in oncology
to help explore potential new treatment options, whilst keeping
the cost of new therapies low enough to enable access for
patients and payers," she said.
Immunotherapy drugs, which harness the immune system to
fight tumours, represent a significant advance in cancer
treatment but many experts believe their greatest promise lies
in combining them with drugs that work in different ways.
Roche, the world's biggest maker of cancer drugs, is already
exploring such combinations using Avastin.
AstraZeneca could now do something similar by combining
FKB238 with its leading experimental immunotherapy drug MEDI3476
and others in the pipeline.
The arrival of so-called biosimilars represents a threat to
companies such as Roche that make their money by selling complex
biotech medicines, although the rollout of these products will
take time.
Roche said on Thursday it expected the first biosimilar
copies of its cancer medicines Rituxan and Herceptin to hit the
market in late 2017, with competition to Avastin coming later,
since it has longer patent protection. ID:nL5N1030F6
Because biotech drugs are made from living cells it is
impossible to manufacture exact copies, as happens with simple
chemical medicines, so regulators have come up with the notion
of approving products that are similar enough to do the job.