HALO Halozyme Therapeutics Incorporated

   A Wall Street Journal Roundup 
 

The latest developments in cancer research are being discussed this week at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in Chicago. The following companies are among those that have reported key cancer news:

AbbVie Inc. (ABBV) said its drug dubbed "Rova-T," which the company acquired via its recent $5.8 billion purchase of Stemcentrx, significantly shrank tumors in about 18% of patients with the difficult-to-treat lung cancer known as "small cell." The drug also had a one-year survival rate of 32% among patients whose tumors had a protein targeted by the drug. Analysts, though, labeled the results underwhelming, with one observer calling the benefits transient and not translating into long-term survival benefits. Meanwhile, a separate study of patients who received a combination of Bristol-Myers Squibb Co.'s immunotherapies Yervoy and Opdivo had a one-year survival rate of 43%. AbbVie shares fell 4.6 to $62.

Exelixis Inc. (EXEL) said its skin cancer drug cobimetinib showed encouraging results for treating colon cancer when paired with another drug in an early-stage trial. Based on the results, partner Genentech launched a late-stage trial of the drugs. In addition, the company also released new analysis of a trial of its kidney cancer drug Cabometyx, which received U.S. Food and Drug administration approval in April. The Cabometyx trial showed the treatment increased survival indicators across different types of the cancer and across patients who had tried other treatments first. Following the news, Exelisis shares rose 7.7% to $7.10.

Halozyme Therapeutics Inc. (HALO) said results from a Phase 2 trial for its pancreatic cancer treatment, known as PEGPH20, showed "similar" overall survival, 11.8 months, to the control arm, 10.9 months. The company said results may have been affected by patients in the control arm having a less aggressive form of the disease as well as a clinical hold on the drug from April to July 2014, during which time the treatment was discontinued. Halozyme shares fell 2.8% to $9.37.

Juno Therapeutics Inc. (JUNO) said its chimeric antigen receptor T cell treatment, known as CAR-T, showed 100% complete response rates in an early-stage trial of adults with certain types of blood cancers and a 93% remission rate in children and young adults. Kite Pharma Inc. (KITE) also reported positive results of its CAR-T treatment in an early stage trial. The treatments, known as immunotherapies, use the body's own immune system to fight the disease. Juno shares rose 9.4% to $48.02, while Kite added 12% to $58.52.

ProNAi Therapeutics Inc. (DNAI) said it would discontinue development of its lymphoma treatment following disappointing Phase 2 trial results. The company said that while "modest efficacy" was observed, the trial results were not robust enough to justify continued development of the drug. Shares of ProNAi fell 65% to $2.25, which is down from its initial public offering price of $17 and its all-time high of $33.75.

Vascular Biogenics Ltd. (VBLT) said a combination of its experimental immunotherapy and Genentech's Avastin, known as VB-111, significantly increased the median overall survival of patients with a common form of brain cancer. In a mid-stage study, patients that got the combo therapy had a median survival of 59 weeks, compared with 32 weeks in pooled data from previous Avastin studies. The overall survival rate for the combo therapy--Vascular's lead cancer drug candidate--was 57% at one year, compared with 24% in previous data. The Israeli drug developer also said VB-111 demonstrated significant survival benefits as a treatment for ovarian cancer in an early stage study. Vascular shares recently rose 78% to $7.06.

--Compiled by Austen Hufford, Joshua Jamerson, Peter Loftus, George Stahl, Anne Steele and Tess Stynes.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 06, 2016 12:47 ET (16:47 GMT)

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