Biotech Strategy Blog

Commentary on Science, Innovation & New Products with a focus on Oncology, Hematology & Cancer Immunotherapy

Posts tagged ‘KRAS G12C’

Seeing the wood from the trees in early stage oncology pipelines

One of the many challenges in the oncology space is seeing the bigger picture of how companies evolve their early stage pipelines.

For some, it’s a bit like taking a walk in the forest and not being able to see the wood from the trees – the targets chosen are rarely random, especially those involving collaborations.  There’s a reason for pursuing a given approach, particularly i it is intended to be employed in combination with an existing, approved therapy.

There are many choices out there and even those with the deepest pockets can’t have everything, so often I’m fascinated by the selections that are taken and how they might fit in.

In our latest company review, we talked to a big pharma company active in the immunotherapy niche and sought to explore the early stage agents they are developing in the context of future doublet and triplet combinations.

Why are they doing what they’re doing and how might their approach be differentiated from others?

To find out more, check out our latest expert interview, which has a few surprises in store…

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A critical review of five different targeted therapy approaches at ASCO

Can we scale new heights with next generation anti-cancer agents?

One of the fascinating things about ASCO is how early new product development readouts outside of ‘hot’ names (or stock tickers) can often be ignored, forgotten, or simply dismissed as me-toos with seemingly comparable data.

The thing is, two people can look at a mountain and see it differently, much like five blindfolded people might describe various aspects of an elephant based on their perceptions of what’s in front of them – imagine what a tail versus a trunk or ear might produce, for example.

This is also particularly true with targeted therapies, which are undergoing something of a renaissance of late.

In this post, we look at five targets (and tumour types) where we are seeing some solid progress either with single agent therapy or with combination approaches, some of which – be warned – are rather controversial…

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ASCO22 Highlights from Day 1

Graffiti in Adams Morgan, Chicago

After weeks of waiting ASCO has finally arrived!

There are a surprising number of intriguing presentations at this meeting for those prepared to hunt off the radar, with some interesting implications to be considered in a broader context.

There were several to be found even on the very first day of action – they don’t all have to be massive phase 3 studies to make an impact.

Here we look at some of the highlights we heard about in between doing expert interviews for colour commentary and context.  One such example is included here where it turned out there were some strategic commercial considerations involved as well…

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Five key areas to watch out for at ASCO22

Star of the show?

In our latest ASCO Preview this year we highlight five key areas to watch out for, why they have been selected for attention, and also offer some broader competitive context.

In short, it’s time to talk about some of the key abstracts I’m excited about at ASCO this year.

Please note this particular selection excludes immunotherapy and cell therapy products since they will be covered separately…

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Watch to watch out for at ASCO22

Hot or not? A saucy look at some oncology products in early development

One of the most common questions we receive heading into ASCO is what’s hot in in Developmental Therapeutics?

This is a really hard question to answer in any concrete fashion bearing in mind we have only titles and no data to speak of at this stage.

What we can do is highlight some intriguing topics, targets, or molecules we have been following and put their potential in the context of recently published data or announcements.

While it’s easy to over react to skimpy top line announcements from companies, sometimes the early warning signs (positive or negative) were visible a couple of years ago because the devil, as always is in the finer details.

Here we take another five new product developments and put them through their paces with some discussion on the broader context from either BSB or experts we have interviewed on the various topics…

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AACR22 Part 2 of the RASpalooza

Voodoo in NOLA? Say it ain’t so!

A few years ago long before the advent of the KRASG12C inhibitors, a scientist once drolly stated to me that trying to drug RAS, and KRAS in particular, was akin to the med-chemist’s version of voodoo. Hah!

Fast forward a few years to AACR in New Orleans and we have a veritable feast of RAS targeted agents now coming through quite a few company pipelines in all shapes and forms from covalent and non-covalent inhibitors to molecular glues, and even bifunctional degraders.

Some voodoo, man.

In this review, we look carefully at three different companies (including biotechs and big pharma) who are actively developing various inhibitors in the RAS niche with early stage developments and look at what’s coming along behind Amgen and Mirati… the first isn’t always the best in the long run, so what should we be looking at and learning from in the next tranche?

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AACR22 Preview 1 – Key topics to watch out for

Opening the door on our AACR22 coverage

Yes, it’s that time of the year already…

In our first Preview from the AACR annual meeting coming up next month, we’re going to highlight a couple of key topics of interest to many of our readers and also offer some context for where the selected fields are currently at and just as importantly, where they are likely headed.

The abstracts haven’t dropped yet – the regular abstract titles, authors, and text will be released tomorrow (March 8th) at 4:30 pm ET – although based on our knowledge of the field, recently published data, or presentations already rolling out we can put a good picture together of what’s what and where things are at…

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Sotorasib impresses unexpectedly in pancreatic cancer

It’s time to go through the keyhole and take a look at progress with the KRASG12C inhibitors beyond lung cancer.

Years ago, there really wasn’t much hope in pancreatic cancer – it was an area big Pharma avoided because just about nothing worked well.  But those were the days of chemotherapy and promiscuous dirty kinases akin to a blunderbuss approach.

As we learn more about the biology of the disease and develop more selective inhibitors against oncogenes known to be active, have things improved at all?

In our latest cancer conference Preview, we pivot from a cell therapy meeting to the ASCO plenary series and take a look at how Amgen’s sotorasib is doing outside of lung cancer, an area where Mirati’s adagrasib was thought by some to have an advantage.

It’s always tricky to make judgment calls on the basis of a few patients in a catch all phase 1 trial – sometimes it’s better to wait until there’s a larger sample in a given cohort before rushing to declare winners and losers.

Often though, the data is something of a kaleidoscope – it depends on which angle or lens you view the data from.

In this post we include some expert reaction and commentary too…

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Oncology trends and directions to watch out for in 2022

Proof that the sun came on a Wednesday in England this winter – hard not to be upbeat on days like this!!

As we continue our journey looking forward in 2022 and beyond, it’s time to start putting some meat on the bones, so to speak, in terms of what specifically we can look forward to hearing more about.

January brings a renewed sense of hope, despite the dreary weather in many places around the world, even in the Blighty the sun sometimes shines (right).

With this uplifting comes a fresh sense of new directions too, which is as true for both life in general as it is for oncology R&D.

With this in mind, in our latest review, we highlight six key areas to watch out for and explain why we are interested in following them with regards to early oncology new product development…

BSB subscribers can read up on our ongoing commentary and analysis on oncology new product development – you can either log-in or click to access the back story behind the latest innovations!

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New trials and tribulations in drugging KRAS mutations

Is the ride going to be a thrilling long or disappointingly short one?

The KRAS niche continues to rattle on at an incredible pace with new findings, new trials, or even a new molecular entity (NME) coming along seemingly every month.

In this latest update on the landscape, we discuss some important new findings, as well as a novel agent to thing about in this space, which is quite different from what we have seen before.

To be clear – this doesn’t mean a novel approach doesn’t have any legs, nor that the latest science behind where we should be going with combinations is doomed.  Indeed, sometimes finding a balance is a bit akin to a highwire act.

The important thing is to focus on the learnings and determine where the field might be headed…

BSB subscribers can read up on our ongoing commentary and analysis from the cancer conference season – you can either log-in or click to access our latest analysis.

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