ApexOnco

3 days ago | oncologypipeline.com | Madeleine Armstrong

“We need all the capital we can get our hands on," the company states. The RAS inhibitor specialist Revolution Medicines was already well funded, but a deal with Royalty Pharma, announced on Tuesday, has given the group a total $4bn pot to draw on. The company’s stock initially slumped 2%, likely on fears that the agreement could make a buyout less likely, but rallied to close flat by the end of the day.

3 days ago | oncologypipeline.com | Madeleine Armstrong

Syndax and Kura have been vying in menin inhibition for some time, and now the FDA has set up a new clash between the companies, with the PDUFA dates for their assets only around a month apart. The big day for Syndax’s contender, Revuforj, will come before that of Kura’s Kyowa Kirin-partnered project, ziftomenib, despite the fact that Syndax only made its announcement on Tuesday, while Kura’s splash came over three weeks ago.

4 days ago | oncologypipeline.com | Madeleine Armstrong

The companies have trumped Gilead’s Trodelvy with a lung cancer approval. AstraZeneca and Daiichi’s Datroway U-turn in non-small cell lung cancer has paid off: the TROP2-targeting ADC has just gained US accelerated approval for second-line EGFR-mutated disease. This is a narrower niche than the second-line non-squamous market the partners had once been aiming for, but it’s a good result given the thumbs up was largely based on an uncontrolled phase 2 trial, Tropion-Lung05.

5 days ago | oncologypipeline.com | Madeleine Armstrong

The group is aiming for accelerated approval with the upcoming Alpacca trial. After ArriVent last year signalled its intent in a new non-small cell cancer genetic subtype, EGFR PACC mutations, the company is pushing into phase 3 here with its EGFR inhibitor firmonertinib. The upcoming front-line Alpacca study could support an FDA accelerated approval based on overall response rate, ArriVent said during an investor call on Monday.

5 days ago | oncologypipeline.com | Madeleine Armstrong

Zanzalintinib prevails in all comers, but full data will show if the win was driven by a subgroup. Exelixis, facing questions about its Cabometyx successor zanzalintinib, claimed a win on Sunday in the phase 3 Stellar-303 trial in relapsed colorectal cancer. The company will hope that this scotches doubts about whether the project works in patients with liver metastases, though this question still remains unclear.