By Andrew Silver
HANGZHOU (Reuters) -China’s Sciwind Biosciences is in talks with a U.S. company interested in licensing its experimental weight-loss drug for American patients, the drugmaker’s chief executive told Reuters.
Overweight patients treated with Sciwind’s ecnoglutide drug lost an average of 10% to 15% of their body weight, roughly in line with results from Novo Nordisk’s top-selling obesity treatment Wegovy, according to a late-stage study published in medical journal The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology in June.
“We also hope we are able to successfully license out, and they will apply for approval in the U.S.,” Sciwind Biosciences CEO Pan Hai said, declining to identify the firm or disclose financial terms under discussion.
Reuters is the first to report on the potential U.S. licensing deal.
Pan said its potential partner hoped to gain U.S. marketing approval to prescribe ecnoglutide for multiple medical conditions and would carry out further clinical development. The talks are not yet at the stage of discussing a detailed contract, he added.
Sciwind is hoping the partner could use clinical data accumulated in China and Australia to accelerate the development.
Pan expects it would take at least three years for a U.S. partner to bring Sciwind’s drug to market in the United States, and said the FDA might require a bridging study to compare ecnoglutide’s pharmacokinetics – how it moves through the body – among different patient populations.
Ecnoglutide is administered as a once-weekly injection. It belongs to a class of drugs called GLP-1 receptor agonists, which work by helping control blood sugar levels and triggering a feeling of fullness.
Novo’s Wegovy and Eli Lilly and Co’s Zepbound lead the U.S. market for weight-loss drugs, but their relatively high prices leave room for new competitors to offer cheaper alternatives.
Sciwind has applied to sell ecnoglutide in China for weight management and the treatment of type II diabetes. Other approved weight loss medicines in China also include drugs from Novo, Lilly and other drugmakers. Pan said he could not give an estimated time of approval.
The company is also in talks to license the drug to partners for other markets, including in Latin America and the Middle East.
Pricing in China would be in line with other approved competitors, Pan said, adding the company would not engage in a “price war” there.
(Reporting by Andrew Silver; Editing by Kim Coghill)
