Bristol Myers Squibb Terminates Cancer Drug Development Program With Agenus

Bristol Myers Squibb Terminates Cancer Drug Development Program With Agenus
Bristol Myers Squibb Terminates Cancer Drug Development Program With Agenus

In a regulatory filing Friday, Agenus Inc (NASDAQ:AGEN) revealed Bristol Myers Squibb & Co (NYSE:BMY) terminated a license, development, and commercialization agreement forged in 2021.

The company said that as part of a broader strategic realignment of their development pipeline, which involves other licensed products, Bristol Myers Squibb is returning AGEN1777, a TIGIT bispecific antibody, to Agenus and voluntarily terminating the BMS License Agreement, effective as of January 26, 2025.

Related: Agenus Faces Regulatory and Financial Challenges: Analyst Downgrades Stock Pending Trial Clarity.

Most recently, Roche Holdings AG's (OTC:RHHBY) TIGIT drug, tiragolumab, failed in Phase 3 SKYSCRAPER-02 study in extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer (ES-SCLC) and did not meet its co-primary endpoint of progression-free survival.

In August last year, Roche was made aware of the inadvertent disclosure of the second interim analysis of the Phase 3 SKYSCRAPER-01 study, evaluating tiragolumab plus Tecentriq (atezolizumab) versus Tecentriq alone as an initial (first-line) treatment for PD-L1-high locally advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer.

In May, Merck & Co Inc (NYSE:MRK) discontinued the vibostolimab, its TIGIT drug, and pembrolizumab coformulation arm of the Phase 3 KeyVibe-010 trial.

Results from Merck's Phase 2 KeyVibe-002 trial of vibostolimab/pembrolizumab combo, with or without docetaxel for metastatic non-small cell lung cancer with progressive disease after treatment with immunotherapy and platinum-doublet chemotherapy, did not show an improvement in median PFS compared to docetaxel alone.

Bristol Myers acquired AGEN1777 in 2021 by paying Agenus $200 million in cash.

Price Action: AGEN stock is down 7.10% at $5.23 at last check Monday.

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