October 5, 2016
By Mark Terry, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
Seattle Genetics , based in Bothell, Washington, is on something of a roll these days, expanding its headquarters with 100,000 square feet of additional space, and hiring and expanding operations.
In July, the company, along with Takeda Pharmaceutical Company in Osaka, Japan, announced final data for its Adcetris (brentuximab vedotin) monotherapy Phase II clinical trial. It showed positive results in patients with relapsed or refractory classical Hodgkin lymphoma. U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Adcetris to treat classical Hodgkin lymphoma after failure of autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, for the treatment of classical Hodgkin lymphoma patients at high risk of relapse or progression, and accelerated approval in patients with systemic anaplastic large cell lymphoma (sALCL) after failure of at least one prior multi-agent chemotherapy regimen.
It also received conditional marketing authorization in 2012 by the European Commission for treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory CD30-positive Hodgkin lymphoma following autologous stem cell transplant (ASCT) and in patients with relapsed or refractory sALCL.
The drug is being evaluated in more than 70 ongoing clinical trials. In 2015, Adcetris brought in $226 million.
On August 1, Seattle Genetics and Takeda announced that its Phase III ALCANZA trial of Adcetris in cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL) met its primary endpoint, showing highly statistically significant improvement in the rate of objective response that lasted at least four months. That trial compared Adcetris to a control arm of standard therapies, methotrexate or bexarotene, chosen by the investigator.
And on September 19, the company enrolled its first patient in a Phase I trial of SGN-CD123A in patients with relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia I(AML). The compound is an antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) that targets CD123 using the company’s proprietary technology, an engineered cysteine antibody (EC-mAb) that is stably linked to a potent DNA binding agent, pyrrolobenzodiazepine (PBD) dimer.
Seattle Genetics started expanding Building 5 in May and projects that it will be completed and occupied in the first half of next year. Another structure, Building 6, is being designed. They will be utilized for both office and laboratory space, and can house 100 employees each. The company currently has about 850 staffers, and has added about 100 new employees per year.
The company’s chief operating officer, Eric Dobmeier, told the Puget Sound Business Journal that Seattle Genetics expects to continue hiring at that rate.
Casey Coombs, writing for the Puget Sound Business Journal, says, “The company has a diverse pipeline of cancer-fighting therapies, including several trials to use Adcetris as a frontline treatment instead of as a last resort. The expanded use of Adcetris would open massive revenue streams and could make Seattle Genetics Seattle’s only profitable biotech.”
At its second quarter financial reporting, the company showed $95 million in revenue for the quarter and $32.7 million in losses. Adcetris was responsible for $66.2 million of the revenue.
Seattle Genetics is currently trading for $54.54. Although it’s had a slight drop recently that it’s recovering from, it’s had a pretty steady climb since February 10, when shares traded for $26.87.
Capital Market Laboratories gives the stock as of today, a rating of four out of five bulls. “The company has a four bull technical rating which indicates some strength. The risk here is a potentially overbought situation, but for now, the stock price is moving slightly higher and does have room to rise before it hits an overbought technical rating of five bulls.”
