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news.Quark Biotech and Sanwa Kagaku Kenkyusho Co, a division of Suzuken, the second largest pharmaceutical wholesaler in Japan, have entered into a licensing agreement for a phase II compound for dyslipidemia.
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The license provides Sanwa with exclusive development, manufacturing and marketing rights for the compound, BT16, in Japan and other Asian countries. According to the agreement, Quark will receive an upfront payment as well as payments at development milestones with additional royalties on sales.
The compound was found to have a potent efficacy of suppressing triglyceride levels in animal and human studies. Further studies demonstrated that it has also insulin-sensitizing properties, and the possibility of this compound being developed as a metabolic syndrome therapy in the future has been suggested. In addition, all studies have shown BT16 to be safe and well tolerated.
“We are very excited at licensing BT16 from Quark Biotech Inc,” Satoshi Terao, vice president of R&D at Sanwa, commented. “Since we are focusing our R&D efforts on diabetes-related areas, the potential of BT16 as a metabolic syndrome therapy makes this product a very important addition to our R&D pipeline.”
Dyslipidemias, including elevated triglyceride states, are blood lipid disorders that result in abnormal lipid and lipoproteins levels in the blood stream, leading to a significantly increased risk of cardiovascular diseases. An estimate of 20% to 30% of the dyslipidemic population need alternative therapies to current treatments.