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news.Biopharma company Anadys Pharmaceuticals is downsizing its workforce by a third and discontinuing development of its investigational hepatitis B treatment.
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The company said that it is halting further development of ANA380, a nucleotide analog for the treatment of hepatitis B virus infection, with all rights to this compound returning to LG Life Sciences. The news follows last week’s decision to drop its experimental hepatitis C drug ANA975.
As part of its “strategic restructuring and refocusing”, Anadys says it will instead focus on two key compounds that it believes has the highest commercial potential, ANA598 for hepatitis C and ANA773 for cancer.
The company expects that the reduction in its workforce will generate annual savings of between $4 and $5 million. It will incur a one-time cash charge of approximately $0.8 million as part of severance arrangements.
“Our new streamlined organization is designed to optimize the efficient use of our solid cash position and enable us to achieve key clinical milestones that we believe are attainable in the next 12 to 18 months,” commented Lawrence Fritz, president and chief executive officer of Anadys.
In addition to this announcement, the company reported revenues of $1.3 million for the second quarter of 2007, compared to $1.6 million for the second quarter of 2006.