Invest KOREA

According to Pulse by Maeil Business News Korea,

Yuhan Corp., a South Korean leading pharmaceutical company, has entered into an exclusive license agreement with China’s Luoxin Biotechnology Co. for the development of YH25448, an investigational lung cancer drug. Yuhan said it will receive a milestone payment of $120 million from Luoxin, with an upfront payment of about $6 million and royalties on sales in China.

YH25448 is Yuhan’s investigational drug to treat patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The drug is expected to provide promising therapeutic benefits for EGFR mutation positive metastatic NSCLC patients who are resistant to existing therapies.

The two companies plan to launch multinational clinical trials until the end of this year with a goal to get approval in Asian countries.

Luoxin, a publicly-listed company traded on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, has exclusive rights for development, regulatory approval, production and commercialization of YH25448 in China under the agreement.

The Chinese NSCLC market is estimated to be valued at about $1.4 billion in 2019. The number of NSCLC patients is expected to reach about 690,000 in 2022.

The license agreement was derived from Yuhan’s open innovation where Yuhan began to invest to co-develop the investigational drug with Korean biotech company Oscotec Inc. last July.

Yuhan shares rose 4.3 percent, or 12,500 won, to 306,500 won as of 1:38 p.m. in Seoul trading on Friday.

By Lee Dong-in

Copyrights Pulse by Maeil Business News Korea. All Rights Reserved.

Source: Pulse by Maeil Business News Korea (Jul. 29, 2016)