“We are off to a strong start in 2018 as we continue to make progress advancing all our HAE development programs and remain on track to read out top-line data from APeX-2 in the first half of next year,” says Jon P. Stonehouse, the BioCryst Pharmaceuticals, Inc. President and CEO, at the announcement of the financial results for the first quarter ended 31 March 2018.

“We remain excited about our proposed merger with Idera Pharmaceuticals, Inc., which we believe will create greater and more sustainable value for the benefit of our stockholders and our patients. We look forward to positive data readouts from Idera in early June, which would reinforce the value creation potential in combining our synergistic discovery engines and creating a more robust and diversified late-stage pipeline.”

Clinical Development Update & Outlook

  • On February 28, 2018, BioCryst announced the dosing of the first patient in APeX-S, a long-term safety trial evaluating two dosage strengths of BCX7353 administered orally once-daily as a preventive treatment in patients with HAE. APeX-S is an open-label two-arm trial to evaluate the safety of two dose levels of BCX7353 (110 mg once daily and 150 mg once daily) over 48 weeks in patients with Type I and II HAE. The trial will enroll approximately 160 patients.
  • On March 15, 2018, BioCryst announced the dosing of the first patient into APeX-2, a Phase 3 clinical trial evaluating two dosage strengths of BCX7353 administered orally once-daily as a preventive treatment to reduce the frequency of attacks in patients with HAE. APeX-2 is a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, three-arm trial testing two doses of BCX7353 (110 mg and 150 mg) for prevention of angioedema attacks. The trial is expected to enroll approximately 100 patients with Type I and II HAE in the United States, Canada, and Europe. The primary efficacy endpoint of APeX-2 is the rate of angioedema attacks over 24 weeks of study drug administration.
  • Enrollment in both the 750 mg and 500 mg cohorts of the ZENITH-1 proof-of-concept Phase 2 clinical trial liquid formulation of BCX7353 for treatment of acute angioedema attacks in HAE have been completed, and the 250 mg cohort is enrolling. We expect to report top-line results from the first cohort in the second half of 2018.
  • On May 1, 2018, BioCryst announced that the European Medicines Agency (“EMA”) has approved peramivir with the brand name of ALPIVABTM, a single intravenous infusion for the treatment of uncomplicated influenza in adults and children from the age of 2 years. The EMA approval of ALPIVAB under the centralized licensing procedure provides marketing authorization for all 28-member states of the European Union, Norway, and Iceland.
  • BioCryst has a license agreement with Seqirus regarding peramivir. As previously disclosed, BioCryst and Seqirus are engaged in a formal dispute resolution process involving many items under the contract including, but not limited to, the EMA approval milestone of $5 million, which BioCryst maintains is due.
  • In April 2018, the Therapeutic Goods Administration approved RAPIVAB (peramivir injection), an intravenous treatment for acute influenza, for commercial sale in Australia.

(Source: BioCryst)