Enzon Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Inex Pharmaceuticals Corporation announced a strategic partnership to develop and commercialize Inex’s proprietary oncology product Onco TCS.
Under the terms of the agreement, Enzon receives the exclusive North American commercialization rights for Onco TCS for all indications. The lead indication is relapsed aggressive non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL) for which Inex is in the process of submitting a “rolling” New Drug Application (NDA) to the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which is expected to be completed during the first quarter of calendar year 2004. The product is also in numerous phase II clinical trials for several other cancer indications, including first-line NHL.
Inex receives a US$12 million up-front payment and will receive up to a US$20 million payment upon Onco TCS receiving approval from the FDA. Additional development milestones and sales based bonus payments could total US$43.75 million, of which US$10 million is payable upon annual sales first reaching US$125 million and US$15 million is payable upon annual sales first reaching US$250 million. Inex will also receive a percentage of commercial sales of Onco TCS and this percentage will increase as sales reach certain predetermined thresholds.
Arthur Higgins, Enzon’s chairman and CEO, said, “This transaction is highly complementary to our R&D and manufacturing infrastructure, is an excellent fit with the therapeutic focus of our field force and most importantly, offers the potential to significantly increase Enzon’s product revenues beginning as soon as fiscal 2005.”
David Main, Inex’s president and CEO, said the agreement meets Inex’s objectives for a commercialization partnership. “It rewards our company for successfully taking Onco TCS through clinical trials and through to an NDA, it gives us a strong partner dedicated to oncology with which to share costs of commercializing Onco TCS and expanding its potential uses. It also lets us benefit from future sales with a formula for capturing an increasing share of commercial sales.”
Inex is a Canadian biopharmaceutical company developing and commercializing proprietary drugs and drug delivery systems to improve the treatment of cancer. Enzon Pharmaceuticals is a biopharmaceutical company dedicated to the discovery, development and commercialization of therapeutics to treat life-threatening diseases.