Category Archives: myelofibrosis

Updates from #CowenHealthCare 2020 – CAR T and it’s competitors

Aleta Biotherapeutics, ALL, AML, B cell lymphoma, B cell lymphomas, biologics, BITE bi-specific, cancer, CAR T, CAR T cells, Chimeric Antigen Receptor, chimeric antigen receptors, CNS pathologies, immunotherapy, leukemia, lymphoblastic leukemia, lymphoma, Lymphomas, Leukemias, Myelomas, myelofibrosis, , , , ,

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If you work in cell therapy you have follow all kinds of therapeutic developments in indications of interest which for us at Aleta Biotherapeutics (www.aletabio.com) includes specific solid tumor indications, and several hematologic malignancies.

Over the last few days we’ve gotten interesting updates regarding diverse hematologic malignancies, including news about therapeutics for front line (newly treated) or relapsed or refractory (r/r) Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma (NHL), multiple myeloma (MM) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML) patients and the myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS). Note here that the reference to different lines of therapy – front line or early line vs r/r, because the treatment paradigms change as patients fail earlier lines of therapy, ie. as they become refractory to or relapse from their current therapy. This can become a long and arduous battle for patients who repeatedly fail treatment. Unfortunately, this is often the case in r/r MM, r/r AML and MDS and in some subtypes of r/r NHL.

On Monday (2 March 2020) I attended the “Cell Therapy & Myeloma” panel at the 40th Annual Cowen Heath Care Conference. This panel covered much more than the title implies, and I really liked the format which is built on the back of questions posed to the audience, to an (unnamed) group of specialists in the field who were polled in advance, and to the seated key opinion leaders (KOLs), in this case Dr Deepu Madduri (Mt Sinai) and Dr Jacob Soumerai (MGH).

They covered a lot of ground.

The first series of questions sought to pin down trends in r/r Follicular lymphoma (FL) a subtype of NHL that can become difficult to treat if patients fail successive lines of treatment. The Leukemia Lymphoma Society has a primer here –https://lymphoma.org/aboutlymphoma/nhl/fl/relapsedfl/.  There has been brisk drug development in r/r NHL including FL. Novel drug classes include CAR-CD19 T cells, bispecific T cell engagers, small molecule drugs (targeting PI3K, Bcl2, BTK, EZH2) and new antibodies. The Cowen panel worked through a series of questions regarding this landscape and there were several key takeaways.

One was the clear preference, by the anonymously polled specialists and by the seated panelists, for CAR-CD19 therapy as the most exciting new drug for r/r FL. The driver here is the durability of response (DOR) in really late line patients and the sense that both overall response rate (ORR) and DOR will only improve as these cell therapeutics move to earlier lines of therapy. It was striking that several classes of bispecific antibodies (the CD3 x CD20 and CD3 x CD19 bispecifics) elicited strong enthusiasm from the audience (mostly analysts and investors) but only muted enthusiasm from the KOLs. This lack of enthusiasm had 2 distinct bases: 1) limited data to date, and 2) “I can give a bispecific after I give a CAR T, but not the other way around”, which was a very interesting thought (and given despite of the few case reports of CD3 x CD20 bispecific therapy working in several relapsed CAR-T patients). I think that in later line patients these clinicians want to keep their options open as long as possible.

Among the other classes of therapeutics, Epizyme’s EZH2 inhibitor tazemetostat received significant support based on the ability to select EZH2-mutated patients, and on good DOR and on good tolerability, the latter thought to be better than the PI3Kdelta class inhibitors, BTK inhibitors or BCl2 inhibition. The consensus was that tazemetostat could see up to 20% market penetration in third line FL after the expected launch in June 2020.

Among the PI3Kdelta inhibitors, Bayer’s copanlisib was singled out as best-in-class with little differentiation among the others (from Gilead, Verastem, MEI, Incyte, or TG Therapeutics). Finally, in this setting of r/r FL, both venetoclax (a Bcl2-inhibitor) and polatuzumab vedotin (a CD79b antibody-drug conjugate), were relegated to minor use by the specialists and panelists.

The uptake of CAR-CD19 therapies has been brisk, and the panelists highlighted quicker payor approvals and the accelerating pace of referrals to cell therapy centers. The consensus is for 30% increase in patient number treated in 2020 (so roughly 1350 patients in the US, vs 1050 treated last year).

The discussion stayed on CAR-CD19 therapeutics to touch on some of the newer trials and entrants. Kite/Gilead is running a Phase III trial of axi-cel (axicabtagene ciloleucel, brand name Yescarta) in second line DLBCL patients vs a standard of care regimen of high dose chemotherapy followed by an autologous stem cell transplant. Data are anticipated in the second half of 2020. The Cowen moderators passed the question: will this trial show a progression free survival (PSF) benefit?  Mind you, this is a low bar since overall survival – the shining triumph of cell therapy – is not part of the question. The audience (again, mainly investors and analysts) was overwhelming positive, giving about 70% odds of a positive impact on PFS. Here the panelists agreed, citing the fact that this trial was enrolling high-risk patients and therefore the comparator arm of the trial (chemo + ASCT) should do very poorly. Success with this trial would move axi-cel up a line of therapy (from 3rd or later to 2nd or later) and bolster the health care value argument that patients may avoid ASCT altogether.  We are apparently already seeing this effect, as a talk at #TCMT20 highlighted the steep decline in transplants being done in DLBCL.

Sticking with axi-cel, this CAR-CD19 cell therapy was highlighted as the one most likely to be the market leader by 2023, based on the (currently) much shorter manufacturing and turnaround time as compared to tisa-cel (tisagenlecleucel from Novartis, brand name Kymriah). The panelists agreed with the specialist poll, despite the fact that they also felt that tisa-cel may be better tolerated by patients overall. Further, the panelists did note that the difference in manufacturing turnaround was likely to diminish as Novartis improves its product workflow. So we’ll have to wait and see.

Competition may also play a role.  The long-awaited Juno > Celgene > BristolMyers Squibb CAR-CD19 liso-cel (lisocabtagene maraleucel) should see its first approval soon, and several allogeneic and non-T cell based programs are advancing. Cowen’s moderators highlighted a number of these for discussion. Allogene CAR-CD19, called ALLO-501 is currently in a Phase 1 trial enrolling r/r diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL) and r/r FL patients, with initial data expected later this year. The moderators put forward the question: what percent of (responding) patients have to show a durable response for this to be an exciting option to the autologous CAR-CD19 products. It’s a complex question since the current approved CAR-CD19s show about a 50% durable response rate within the responders, where a goodly proportion of the patients that do not have a durable response are relapsing after a response, sometimes with CD19-negative lymphoma or leukemia (ie. the cancer has undergone natural selection and loses target antigen expression). The polled specialists and the panelists wanted to see a pretty high durable response rate, 35-40% (specialists) up to 50% (the panelists). If the field were to see responses as good as axi-cel, tisa-cel and liso-cel, this would be “a huge advance”, according to Dr Soumerai of MGH.

Of note, Allogene itself was a bit more cautious at their public company presentation later in the day. Dr David Chang, Allogene’s CEO, provided some guidance and set expectations. He noted that the company would report early data form the ALLO-501 program at #ASCO20 and/or #EHA20 but stressed the readouts of safety and degree of lymphodepletion from up to 3 dose cohorts, and with several different doses of their lymphodepletion agent ALLO-647, and anti-CD52 antibody. In the ALLO-501 trial this is given along with the lymphodepeleting chemotherapy combination of cyclophosphamide and fludarabine (Cy-Flu). Among the other allogeneic and off-the-shelf CAR-CD19 programs several were highlighted either by the audience (Fate Therapeutics induced CAR-NKs) or the panelists (the Takeda/MD Anderson NK program). Other programs from Atara, CRISPR, and Precision all would have to show some or more data in order to get the specialists or the panelists to take notice.

Notably, there was consensus among the audience, polled specialists and panelists that CD3 x CD20 bispecifics would be less efficacious than CAR T cells, regardless of the specific therapeutics (eg. from Roche or Regeneron or Genmab). Further, Dr Madduri expressed concern at the need to keep dosing patients both because of inconvenience and possible safety over time. Her view is that patients prefer a single dose CAR.

Finally in the r/r DLBCL space, both polled specialists and the panelists saw minimal roles for the anti-CD79b-drug conjugate polatuzumab vedotin (brand name Polivy, from Roche) or the anti-CD19-ADCC competent antibody tafasitamab (from Morphosys, which now has a 30 August PDUFA date with FDA).  Both of these biologics need to be given in combination with other therapeutics and there did not appear to be a benefit over standard combinations. More specifically, polatuzumab vedotin is given with rituximab and bendamustine and was considered “tolerable” but perhaps best used in a bridge to transplantation setting or a bridge to CAR-CD19 cell therapy. Tafasitamab was recently written up by Jabob Plieth here: https://www.evaluate.com/vantage/articles/analysis/why-2020-spotlight-will-fall-tafasitamab.

Turning to r/r MM there were a series of questions about lines of therapy and which were preferred. For newly diagnosed patients and for second-line patients the clearly favored standard of care was an ‘ImID’ (immunomodulatory agent, eg. revlimid) plus the anti-CD38 antibody daratumumab (brand name Darzalex, from Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen division) plus dexamethasone (aka triple therapy) with perhaps a proteasome inhibitor added (thus, a quad). The use of daratumumab in early line therapy will continue to grow as it is payor-approved for early-line use.

For later line therapy, the moderators first brought up selinexor (brand name Xpovio, from Karyopharm Therapeutics), a first-in-class, oral Selective Inhibitor of Nuclear Export (SINE), which was granted accelerated approval last year for use in in combination with dexamethasone for adult r/r MM patients who received at least four prior therapies and whose disease is refractory to at least two proteasome inhibitors, at least two ImIDs, and an anti-CD38 monoclonal antibody. There was a consensus view that this drug will see flat to diminishing use due to poor tolerability. Dr Madduri noted that she gives this drug once week rather than twice a day (as labeled) in an effort to improve patient tolerance and only used it as a bridge to clinical trial enrollment (ie. on something else, for example, CAR-BCMA cellular therapy. Curiously there were no questions about isatuximab-irfc (brand name Sarclisa, from Sanofi-Aventis), newly approved in combination with pomalidomide and dexamethasone for adult patients with r/r/ MM and at least two prior therapies (see this SITC writeup: https://www.sitcancer.org/aboutsitc/press-releases/2020/isatuximab-irfc).

As for CAR T cells for multiple myeloma, the panelists were hesitant to pick a winner between the two advanced CAR-BCMA programs: bb2121 (Bluebird) and JNJ-4528 (from J&J, formally called LCAR-B38M) until J&J updated PFS data. At their public company presentation Nick Leschly, Bluebird’s CEO, noted that they will file the BLA for bb2121 (now called idecabtagene vicleucel or ide-cel) in the first half of this year, and would release longer-term follow-up data from the ide-cel clinical trials KarMMa and CRB-401 in the second half of the year. The BLA will be filed despite the “slow-down” from FDA necessitated by the agency’s request for additional lentivirus production characterization information from their chosen cell suspension manufacturing method (no details given). What the FDA has asked for apparently is both different from and more than the EU agency (EMA) wanted.

On the allogeneic CAR T cell front, Dr Chang at Allogene noted that they would have early data on ALLO-715 (their version of a CAR-BCMA therapy) at #ASH20. Here he noted they are considering dropping the Cy-Flu lymphodepletion and just using their anti-CD52 antibody to lymphodeplete, we’ll see (this doesn’t strike me as realistic).

In general both the polled specialists and the panelists were more enthusiastic about CAR-BCMA therapy than several other modalities, including belantamab mafodotin (from GSK), an antibody-drug conjugate, composed of an anti-BCMA monoclonal antibody bound to auristatin F. This drug was thought to be not quite good enough given the unmet need, there remain concerns about the ocular toxicity (the bane of ADC technology) and keen disappointment that the response rate dropped below 30% ORR in daratumumab-refractory patients. Clearly this therapeutic will see some use in late line therapy, and further clinical development has yielded results in earlier line as reported on 2 March (see https://www.evaluate.com/vantage/articles/news/trial-results/karyopharm-comes-boston-springtime). A similar wait-and-see approach is being taken by these specialists and panelists to the CD3 x BCMA bispecifics, which are currently viewed as best for community hospital settings without CAR T cell capacity or for patients who cannot wait for the cell therapy production.

One theme in r/r MM is the concern that patients are still not being cured, even with cell therapies. The gradual relapse from CAR-BCMA treatment that one sees in all the clinical studies has been linked either to CAR T persistence being limited or to diminished BCMA antigen expression on the cancer cells. Of course, these two things may be related. One desire expressed by Dr Madduri was for a CAR-BCMA therapy with better persistence properties.

Two short notes while we’re here. Gilead stated at their public company presentation during Cowen Health Care that the value driver for the Forty Seven acquisition was the MDS data (https://xconomy.com/san-francisco/2020/03/02/gilead-boosts-cancer-drug-pipeline-with-4-9b-deal-for-forty-seven/). And hematologic drug heavyweight venetoclax (the Bcl-2 inhibitor from Abbvie) scored a miss in an AML confirmatory trial (https//pharmaphorum.com/news/abbvie-roches-venclexta-fails-in-confirmatory-aml-trial/). In summary, a busy couple of days.

As many readers know, Aleta Biotherapeutics builds cellular therapeutics with exemplary persistence and fitness properties. We have two cell therapy programs heading for the clinic now. One will treat r/r AML patients both in the pediatric and adult patient populations. Our solid tumor program is designed to treat patients relapsing from breast or lung cancer with brain metastases. We also have a biologics program specifically created to ‘rescue’ CAR-CD19 T cells in patients relapsing from therapy. You can find out more at www.aletabio.com or email me at paul.rennert@aletabio.com or just call me at 1-508-282-6370 and of course follow me on Twitter @PDRennert and @BioAleta.

That’s it for now.  Stay tuned.

ASH13 SnapShots, part 6, Myelofibrosis: How Many Jak Inhibitors Are There?

ASH13, Flt3, Jak1, Jak2, myelofibrosis

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November 25, 2013. by P.D. Rennert (I keep forgetting to sign these entries)

Part 6a. Myelofibrosis: Therapeutic agents in Phase 2/3.

 The American Society of Hematology Meeting will take place in New Orleans, December 7 – 10, 2013. The abstracts are available at http://www.hematology.org/Meetings/Annual-Meeting/Abstracts/5810.aspx

I’m splitting this into 2 parts because, well, lets just say there is always a lot to learn. Myelofibrosis is a proliferative cancer of myeloid lineage cells, characterized by bone marrow infiltration and fibrosis, splenomegaly and heptomegaly caused by extramedullary hematopoiesis, and overall disruption of hematopoiesis leading to cytopenic conditions such as anemia and thrombocytopenia. Patients experience diverse symptoms, which has led to the development of patient symptom scoring systems. They are at risk for transformation to acute myeloid leukemia, and in general have greatly reduced overall survival due to chronic anemia leading to bone marrow failure.

Myelofibrosis (MF) is one of a class of myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN) that also includes Polycythemia Vera (PV) and Essential Thrombocytopenia (ET). In 2005 it was found that nearly all PV cases and about half of MF and ET cases had a mutation in Jak2 (V617F). This marked the beginning of novel drug development for MPN that culminated with the 2011 approval of ruxolitinib (Jakafi) for the treatment of intermediate risk (intermediate-2) or high risk MF. Ruxolitinib is a Jak1/Jak2-selective inhibitor.

The clinical landscape for MF remains dominated by Jak inhibitors, and to go through them is an exercise in duration. Lets spare you all that, and try to summarize quickly, hitting high and low points when they appear. At the outset its fair to make a few generalizations. First, Jak inhibitors are not curative and do not induce PRs or CRs in the way we have discussed in earlier sections. Second, Jak inhibitors themselves can cause cytopenias, and they are therefore dose or duration limited. So, this becomes a balancing act between efficacy (by inhibition of myeloid-lineage cell proliferation) and toxicity (due to inhibition of hematopoiesis). 

Lets sort these by clinical stage.

Sanofi is presenting results from a phase 3 trial of fedratinib, a Jak2-selective inhibitor (Abstract #393). In this trial of patients with high risk or primary (i.e. active) MF the primary endpoints are splenomegaly and patient reported symptoms. Patients have to present with platelet counts above 50 x 10^9/L. 67% of the patients were positive for the V617F Jak2 mutation. 40% of evaluable patients reached the spleen response rate of > 35% reduction in spleen volume as measured by MRI or CT. About the same percent recorded improvement in platelet counts and about 30% of patients reported improved symptoms. This is very much like the ruxolitinib results, as are the AEs reported, which include diarrhea, anemia, higher risk for infection, among others.

UPDATE: via FierceBiotech “A few days ago the pharma giant had to shutter a program for fedratinib after the FDA ordered a clinical halt when their myelofibrosis patients developed Wernicke’s encephalopathy–a neurological condition spurred by biochemical brain lesions.”

Well, thats the end of that drug (another abstract below, just to be thorough). This tox issue is clearly not a class effect, that is, not a Jak inhibitor issue. Instead this drug either hits another signaling or other protein target (that might be interesting). Alternatively, and perhaps more likely, this is compound specific toxicity. Either way, the fact that this tox issue was missed until now (phase 3) is remarkable.
Sanofi also has results (Abstract #661) from a phase 2 trial of fedratinib in MPN patients who were previously on ruxolitinib (so these are ruxolitinib resistant or intolerant). These patients presented with splenomegaly, as evidence of disease activity, and had to have platelet counts above 50 x 10^9/L. The presentation is of results obtained at the 12 week interim cutoff point. Somewhat remarkably (to me anyway) the spleen response rate (defined above) was about 40%. The patient reported outcome was modest, but measurable. This suggests that moving from one Jak inhibitor to another is not as silly as it might sound (we’ve seen this before: anti-TNFs in RA; IFN betas in MS). The downside was the toxicity: 26% of patients discontinued due to AEs that included some grade 3/4 (severe) diarrhea, and a very high rate of anemia and thrombocytopenia. It will be important to track patient outcomes and AEs going forward in this trial.

Incyte will report on a Jak1-selective inhibitor INCB039110 that is in an open-label MF Phase 2 trial (Abstract #663). The primary endpoint in this trial is patient reported symptom score (TSS). Inclusion/exclusion criteria were similar to what is described above. While there was a dose dependent improvement in TSS, there was only a modest improvement in the more objective endpoint of change in spleen volume. Importantly however, Hb level (a measure of RBC count) and platelet counts were preserved. This suggests that Jak1 inhibition might be useful, assuming that there is reasonable efficacy.

Just to remind us how confusing this all can be, Cell Therapeutics will present results obtained in a Phase 2 trial of its Jak2.Flt3 dual inhibitor, pacritinib (Abstract # 395). This trial enrolled patients with primary or secondary MF and included patients whose platelet counts were below 100,000/microliter. This low number is prognostic for transformation to a leukemic state and further, patients with such low counts were specifically excluded from the ruxolitinib registration trials (COMFORT III). 82% of patients had the Jak2 V617F mutation. So, Cell Therapeutics is trying to differentiate pacritinib here, and they are successful. Approximately 40% of patients achieved > 35% reduction in spleen volume. Most patients maintained stable platelet numbers if Hb levels. Notable also were the modest AEs reported. This is an interesting therapeutic to watch.

Next we’ll look at some earlier therapeutics, including novel (i.e. non-Jak targeting) therapies, coming up in part 6b.

Targeted kinase inhibition in inflammation & oncology: lots of gambling, and some winners

B cell lymphoma, fostamatinib, Ibrutinib, myelofibrosis, RA, Rheumatoid arthritis, ruxolitinib, SLE, tofacitinib

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We’ve had a lot of news in the last 6 weeks from ACR, ASH and the release of clinical trial results. Here’s what we’ve learned in, and some thoughts on what might come next:
1) Rigel and partner AstraZeneca threw craps in the RA game. Syk inhibition is less effective than Jak inhibition in Rheumatoid arthritis (RA), per ACR presentations on Jak inhibitor tofacintinib and clinical trial data released on Syk inhibitor fostamatinib. Whether the difference in efficacy is due to suboptimal dosing of the Syk inhibitor fosta’nib, or reflects distinct biological readouts is a critical question, particularly as fosta’nib has off-target activity on Jak1 and other relevant kinases. It is interesting that Pfizer’s tofacitinib, widely viewed as a pan-Jak inhibitor with potential toxicity issues, has scored approval in DMARD-IR patients, and can therefore be prescribed before biologic therapy.  I’ll admit I did not see this coming and felt tofa’nib would get approval, to start, in TNF-IR patients only. AZN is clearly running the clinical trials needed to show a clean safety profile for fosta’nib, but may now lose out in the marketplace on the basis of efficacy. It remains to be seen how this will play out as Rheumatologists weigh the safety/efficacy profiles of these drugs, but clearly in a “treat to target” regimen, where the target is no clinical sign of disease and no advance in joint degradation, fosta’nib has a tough road ahead. They may yet persevere but it will take a combination of squeaky-clean safety data and a clear demonstration of protection from joint damage. The compound is also moving forward in B cell malignancies (see below).

            We will not learn anytime soon if better Syk inhibitors would be better RA drugs, as Biogen Idec may have lost its bet on Portola’s Syk inhibitor. Biogen has quietly withdrawn its phase 2 clinical trial for PRT062607, aka BIIB057 (clintrials.gov). The withdrawal occurred prior to the recent data coming out on fosta’nib and seems more likely to be related to the specific compound than to the pathway. Looking more widely at drug development in this space, the only other clinical stage compound is the inhaled Syk inhibitor R343, for asthma and other lung diseases, currently in phase 2 and unlikely to provide any insight into the systemic inhibition of the pathway in RA. We may have to wait for clinical readouts in RA following inhibition of Btk – this is the next kinase downstream of Syk – before we understand the utility of targeting this pathway. More on Btk to follow.
2) Jak inhibitors: does three of a kind equal two pair? There are actually four Jak kinases: Jaks 1,2,3 and Tyk2. People used to spend a lot of time discussing the specificity of different Jak inhibitors and the toxicity/efficacy expectations of targeting Jak3 vs Jak2 vs Jak1. The reality is that all Jaks are obligate hybridizers: distinct Jaks hybridize to transduce signals from cell surface receptors. It is very likely that different Jak specificities matter less than we think and that the current crop of Jak inhibitors are more alike than they are different, off target specificity aside. That being said, the Jak inhibitors appear to be poised to reap hefty winnings, in wildly distinct diseases. Novartis’ and Incyte’s ruxolitinib (Jakafitm),first-in-class “Jak2-selective” inhibitor, was approved for use in myelofibrosis in early 2011 and in 2012 is already poised to take in $100MM in sales as patients move onto this drug earlier in the treatment paradigm. The therapeutic rationale of Jak inhibitor use was well understood from genetic analysis of myelofibrosis, and the commercial and clinical validation is now clear, prompting Gilead to recently pay ~$400MM to buy the phase 1 Jak1/2 inhibitor CYT387 along with the rest of YM Biosciences. Other Jak2-selective inhibitors in development include the Sanofi Aventis compound SAR302503, currently in phase 2, and the Cell Therapeutics compound pacritinib. While myelofibrosis is the clear POC arena for these compounds, look for companies to begin moving these into new therapeutic areas as the compounds advance.

 3) Jaks are wild in RA. I’ve already mentioned the success of Pfizer’s pan-Jak inhibitor tofacitinib (brand name Xeljanztm), recently approved for use in RA patients who have an inadequate response to DMARDs such as methotrexate. Other Jak inhibitors being developed to compete in the inflammation area include the Jak1-specific inhibitor GLPG0634 from Galapagos, licensed in early 2012 by Abbott (now AbbVie), who paid $150MM upfront for rights to the Phase 1 compound. It should be noted that GLPG0634 does appear to have a different side effect profile than the other Jak inhibitors, in that no impact on lipid levels were seen, nor signs of anemia and neutropenia. These side effects have been seen in clinical trials of ruxolitinib and with tofa’nib and are generally ascribed to Jak2 inhibition. Given the promiscuous nature of Jak heterodimerization this differentiation remains somewhat surprising. Indeed, Cell Therapeutics, who is developing S*BIO’s Jak2-inhibitor pacritinib in myelofibrosis, claims not to see anemia or thrombocytopenia (another class side effect) in the clinic. Finally, Vertex has moved its Jak3-selective inhibitor VX-509 into phase 2b following decent results in a phase 2a RA trial. No matter how you look at it, the data suggest that hitting any combination of Jaks, or just one if we believe the Galapagos selectivity data, is sufficient for efficacy in RA. This is almost certainly due to the prevalence of heterodimerization, as mentioned, but also due to the sheer number of pathogenic pathways impacted by Jak inhibition, including numerous cytokine and growth factor pathways. Despite the risk of side effects from such broad blunting of the immune system, this approach so far appears to be more efficacious, and at least as safe, as inhibition of Syk. On the basis of efficacy in RA, one might be tempted to move Jak inhibitors into stubborn and complex diseases like systemic lupus erythematosis. That’s another bet altogether but I’ll be looking for those investigator trials!

4) PCI’s Btk inhibitor shows its hand. The recent American Society of Hematology (ASH) meeting was a showcase for Pharmacyclics’ (PCI) and JNJ’s Btk inhibitor ibrutinib, aka ib’nib. This Btk inhibitor produced remarkable efficacy in several B cell lymphomas, including chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) and Mantle Cell Lymphoma, the latter being generally viewed as a very intractable disease. The data have been reviewed in detail elsewhere (e.g. fiercebiotech story), but clearly ib’nib has validated Btk inhibition as a therapy with broad application in B lymphoma oncology. The field is still young, with the next closest drug in development Avila’s AVL-292, who reported phase 1b data at ASH. AVL-292 demonstrated efficacy in Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (NHL), CLL, multiple myeloma (MM) and other indications. Avila was acquired by Celgene earlier this year, further highlighting the interest in Btk inhibition in oncology. Ib’nib and AVL-292 covalently bind to the kinase domain of Btk, forming an irreversible bond that prevents substrate from accessing the active site of the enzyme. Historically, covalent inhibition has been associated with off-target toxicity, as it is possible for the drug to link irreversibly to unwanted targets. Happily, this does not appear to be an issue with this new class of covalent inhibitors, and toxicity is generally considered mild. Regardless, non-covalent inhibitors are being developed by several companies, perhaps with the goal of differentiating from the leading compounds. The CGI compound GDC-0834, now held by Genentech, in a non-covalent active site inhibitor under development for inflammatory disease, as is the Roche compound RN486.  Given the current status of the Syk inhibitor fosta’nib in RA, it will be interesting to see if these companies stay the course, or move their inhibitors onto new disease targets. It was the success of Syk inhibition in early RA and B cell lymphoma trials that stirred interest in Btk, and the field will respond accordingly to any new Syk inhibitor data.

This is a lot of information to absorb, but it stimulates the obvious question: What’s next? Here are just a couple of thoughts:

– What is considered safe and efficacious today will change tomorrow. As combination therapy takes hold in B cell oncology, additive toxicity may become problematic. If we consider the obvious combination of a Btk inhibitor with other kinase inhibition, or with biologic therapy, the safety/efficacy profile of these compounds will evolve. This is even more true in RA, where toxicity will drive physicians away from drugs.

– Escape is possible (or inevitable). As has already been described in myelofibrosis, patients needing chronic therapy may select for drug resistance. In myelofibrosis, such resistance is associated with the recruitment of other Jaks to take over for Jak2. Having a well-stocked armory may allow continued control over the disease, even as signaling pathways shift – in the context of B cell lymphomas this may mean Syk inhibitors, Btk inhibitors, PI3K inhibitors, mTOR inhibitors, in succession or in tolerable combination therapies.

– In RA the success of tofa’nib heralds a new wave of oral medications that can challenge biologic therapies, in particular the anti-TNF biologics. This is no surprise, and it will be of considerable interest to watch how clinical practice evolves. I’m hoping that diligence is being applied to the collection of samples for analysis of response and non-response in patients receiving the new, targeted orals as it will be fascinating to understand why some patients fail while some succeed – something not yet adequately understood in RA.

– Finally its important to remember that “success” in RA still means that most patients fail to reach ACR 50 and ACR 70 scores, suggesting that they are continuing to experience disease despite treatment. Until these numbers come up, perhaps in the context of personalized medicine, we cannot declare that the work in RA is done. We note in passing that there are a plethora of diseases that could benefit from these new kinase inhibitors, and expect to see their use tested more widely.