Idrx Inc. launched with a $122 million oversubscribed series A round to boost precision drug combinations in cancer, with a first focus on non-PDGFR-driven gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST). The Plymouth, Mass.-based firm aims to develop a pairing, potentially with add-ons, powerful enough to handle existing mutations and those that turn up during treatment. Combo therapy attacks “not just the driver mutations, but also the key secondary mutations,” co-founder and CEO Ben Auspitz told BioWorld, and thereby “block every escape route the cancer has.”
The recent win in Japan by Otsuka Holdings Co. Ltd. subsidiary Taiho Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. with oral heat shock protein 90 inhibitor Jeselhy (pimitespib) put gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) at center stage. Jeselhy was cleared for GIST cases that have progressed after chemotherapy. A handful of companies line the runway with candidates meant to defeat the resistance that GIST often develops to approved tyrosine kinase inhibitors.
Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has given Otsuka Holdings Co. Ltd. subsidiary Taiho Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. the green light for its oral heat shock protein 90 (HSP90) inhibitor Jeselhy (pimitespib) to treat gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) that have progressed after chemotherapy. The company will soon commercialize the drug in Japan.
Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has given Otsuka Holdings Co. Ltd. subsidiary Taiho Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. the green light for its oral heat shock protein 90 (HSP90) inhibitor Jeselhy (pimitespib) to treat gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) that have progressed after chemotherapy. The company will soon commercialize the drug in Japan.
Shares of Deciphera Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:DCPH) plunged $27.18, or 75.5%, to close at $8.82 on top-line results from the phase III study called Intrigue with Qinlock (ripretinib) in gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) previously treated with kinase inhibitor Gleevec (imatinib, Novartis AG).
Theseus Pharmaceuticals Inc., a startup developing new tyrosine kinase inhibitors to overcome treatment-resistant cancer mutations, has raised $100 million in a series B financing led by Foresite Capital. Co-founded at the health care investment firm Orbimed with former Ariad Pharmaceuticals Inc. scientists who pioneered the development of pan-variant kinase inhibitors, the company's lead candidate is THE-630, a next-generation pan-variant KIT inhibitor for the potential treatment of refractory gastrointestinal stromal tumors.
Only hours after Blueprint Medicines Corp. disclosed an FDA complete response letter for avapritinib in fourth-line gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST), Deciphera Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s kinase inhibitor, ripretinib, won the agency’s approval for the same indication, well ahead of its Aug. 13 PDUFA date.
The phase III failure of Blueprint Medicines Corp.’s avapritinib to meet its primary endpoint of improving progression-free survival (PFS) in patients with locally advanced unresectable or metastatic gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST) pummeled the company stock on Tuesday but boosted shares and hopes at Deciphera Pharmaceuticals Inc.
