GSK Expects Cancer Drug Sales To Double By 2009
GlaxoSmithKline said yesterday that four new cancer drugs, which could achieve combined annual sales of more than $4bn (??2.3bn), will enter late-stage clinical trials next year. Glaxo is keen to expand the number of drugs it has to offer patients for whom existing treatments have failed.
Tachi Yamada, Glaxo’s head of research and development, said he expected the global cancer drugs market to almost double in value from $42bn last year to $70bn by 2009. The market is growing so rapidly because the population of developed countries is ageing and cancer is more prevalent among the old. Treatment is also evolving so drugs are taken for longer.
Sales of cancer drugs now account for only 5% of group sales. “Glaxo is currently ranked 11th in the world for cancer sales but we believe we could become one of the leading players,” Dr Yamada told a meeting of investors in New York.
Glaxo has high hopes for one new drug, Tykerb, a dual-action cancer therapy that can be taken as a pill once a day. It plans a large study of Tykerb in early-stage breast cancer. Data also suggest that it could treat cancers that have spread to the brain.
Merrill Lynch analysts said sales of eltrombopag, another of the four, could reach $2.8bn. It boosts the platelet count of chemotherapy patients and those with liver disease. The other two drugs are pazopanib, which inhibits the blood vessels that feed tumours, and casopitant, which alleviates the nausea from chemotherapy.