By Puyaan Singh
Sept 3 (Reuters) – AbbVie said on Thursday its therapy for a type of blood cancer has improved patients’ response rate to treatment and reduced the risk of disease progression or death, meeting the main goals of a late-stage trial.
As biosimilars chip away at sales of its arthritis treatment Humira, once its top-selling drug, the company is turning to acquisitions and other disease areas such as neuroscience and oncology to drive growth.
The therapy, etentamig, showed an objective response rate of 74% in patients with refractory multiple myeloma, higher than the 45.7% recorded by standard treatments chosen by the trial investigator. ORR is the percentage of patients in a clinical trial whose cancer shrinks or disappears after treatment.
Etentamig also increased survival without progression of the disease, and reduced the risk of the cancer worsening or death by 60% compared to other treatments in the 393-patient trial.
“For AbbVie, the data add credibility to oncology but do not change the investment debate,” said Citi analyst Geoffrey Meacham. Commercial execution for newer drugs Skyrizi and Rinvoq remains paramount, while investors are increasingly focused on “whether additional transactions can deepen AbbVie’s 2030s growth profile.”
The trial included patients who received a median of three prior lines of treatment with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer that has returned after a period of remission or has stopped responding to treatment.
After 12 months, 87.9% of patients receiving etentamig were still alive, compared to 72% of patients receiving standard treatments.
Etentamig engages T-cells, which protect from infections and fight cancer, by targeting two proteins.
Meachem said etentamig looks most differentiated as an additional post-CAR-T cell therapy, rather than a replacement for Johnson & Johnson’s Carvykti or Gilead’s anito-cel. “CAR-T offers deep responses and a treatment holiday, while etentamig offers immediate availability, monthly administration and broader treatment-center access.”
(Reporting by Puyaan Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Shilpi Majumdar)
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