AstraZeneca Drops Phase III Asthma Drug as Company Posts Disappointing 2017 Financials

AstraZeneca saw revenues and product sales fall over the course of 2017. In a year-end financial report for 2017, AstraZeneca said its total revenues declined 2 percent to $22.46 billion and product sales fell 5 percent to $20.15 billion.

Those failing numbers put a strain on Chief Executive Officer Pascal Soriot’s pledge of achieving $45 billion of annual revenue by 2023. The company said it did see a much stronger fourth quarter in comparison with the first three and Soriot sees that as a sign things are turning around.

“AstraZeneca’s revenues improved over the course of the year, a sign of how our company is steadily turning a corner. Strong commercial execution helped us bring our science to more patients, making the most of our exciting pipeline,” Soriot said in a statement.

Soriot added that the company’s strategy is propelled by a strong pipeline that includes oncology drugs Tagrisso and Lynparza. Soriot also noted that cardiovascular drug Brillinta and diabetes drug Farxiga both hit blockbuster status this year, each bringing in more than $1 billion in revenue.

As AstraZeneca looks to drive revenue from core products, the company quietly dropped some drug candidates as well. One of the candidates it dropped was tralokinumab, a Phase III asthma drug. AstraZeneca said it discontinued development of the drug after it failed to meet endpoints in three separate trials. Tralokinumab, an IL-13 human immunoglobulin-G4 monoclonal antibody, was being developed for the treatment of uncontrolled asthma.

While AstraZeneca kept tralokinumab in its own development as a potential asthma treatment, the company did sell off rights to the drug for dermatological uses. In July 2016, Denmark-based LEO Pharma struck an agreement with AstraZeneca worth up to $1 billion for the rights to develop tralokinumab.

In addition to tralokinumab, AstraZeneca also cut another experimental asthma treatment, AZD9898. On ClinicalTrials.gov, the company noted that the therapy, which was acquired from Sweden-based Orexo, was terminated based on an interim review of Phase I data.

As the company looks to achieving that $45 billion in revenue, it will have to continue to field numerous blockbuster drugs. Its PARP inhibitor Lynparza is an example of a drug that AstraZeneca is finding new indications for. Earlier this month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Lynparza for use in patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious germline BRCA-mutated (gBRCAm), human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-negative metastatic breast cancer who have been previously treated with chemotherapy in the neoadjuvant, adjuvant or metastatic setting. That approval makes Lynparza the first PARP inhibitor approved for metastatic breast cancer, and the only PARP inhibitor approved beyond ovarian cancer.

Another AstraZeneca cancer drug, Imfinzi (duravulumab), could generate nearly $4 billion in annual sales if it gains regulatory approval for use in lung cancer. The FDA is set to rule on the use of Imfinzi, a PD-L1 inhibitor, in lung cancer this year. The drug has been approved for some bladder cancers. The company filed the New Drug Application based on strong Phase III results.

Shares of AstraZeneca are up slightly in morning trading to $35.73 as of 9:31 a.m.