To focus on cancer & psychiatric drugs and skin-related products
A day after Sun Pharma Advanced Research Company (Sparc) announced a licensing deal with Sun Pharmaceutical on an ophthalmology product, the company said it expects to seal a deal on its prospective epilepsy product also this year.
Sparc is in advanced discussions to licence out and commercialise Elepsia XR in the US by the second-half of the financial year 2015-2016, Sparc management said at an interaction to give the company’s road ahead on research.
The product reduces the pill burden for a person with epilepsy (many of them take about six pills a day), the company said.
But even as some prospective medicines progressed in their clinical development, Sparc Chief Executive Anil Raghavan said that they had reorganised the company’s portfolio, even deprioritising or narrowing its focus on certain products.
This was for reasons combining commercial viability of the product, its research prospects and regulatory requirements, he said.
The company’s key areas of focus would be on oncology (cancer drugs), dermatology (skin-related products), ophthalmology (eye products) and central nervous system (psychiatric drugs), he indicated.
The deprioritised programmes included SUN-L731, Venlafaxine ER 300mg, SUN-597 (nasal/inhalation), Latanoprost + Timolol in the European Union and Baclofen GRS for alcohol dependence in EU.
However, Sparc was evaluating the development of SUN-L731 and SUN-597 for India and other emerging markets, while the Latanoprost combination was being evaluated for the emerging markets, the company said.
Sparc is promoted by Sun Pharma chief Dilip Shanghvi. And the promoter and promoter group together hold over 67 per cent in Sparc.
Last month, Sparc board gave its go-ahead for a rights issue to raise up to Rs. 250 crore.
Sun deal
On Tuesday, Sparc said it had licensed out Xelpros (Latanoprost BAK-free eye drops), used to treat glaucoma, to a subsidiary of Sun Pharma for the US market.
The deal that marked Sun’s entry into ophthalmology included an up-front payment of $3 million to Sparc, besides other milestone payments and so on, totalling to $16 million from Sun Pharma.
Sparc was also eligible for certain royalties and additional milestone payments linked to the sales performance of Xelpros, the company said.
Replying to an analyst query, Raghavan indicated that Sparc was open to manufacturing arrangements (besides Sun Pharma) depending on the requirement of the product.
Other products
Other products moving ahead in terms of clinical development in the last two quarters of this financial year are: oncology product PICN (Paclitaxel Injection Concentrate for Nanodispersion) targeting breast cancer would undertake bio-equivalence studies; another cancer product targeting Imatinib-resistant leukemia would go in for an investigational new drug filing; and so would ophthalmology drug Brimonidine, used in the second-line treatment of glaucoma.
Sparc said it had a technology platform for abuse deterrent formulations of opioids, a huge concern in the US, where it is a public health priority. Business Line
