BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Verastem, Inc. (NASDAQ: VSTM), focused on discovering and developing drugs to treat cancer, today reported financial results for the year ended December 31, 2016, and also provided an overview of certain corporate developments.
“2016 was a year of significant achievement for Verastem with the in-licensing of duvelisib, a late-stage, clinical product candidate with broad potential across B-cell and T-cell lymphoid malignancies, and the advancement of defactinib into clinical development in combination with immuno-oncology agents,” said Robert Forrester, President and Chief Executive Officer of Verastem. “As we enter 2017, we are laser-focused on several important milestones, beginning with reporting top-line duvelisib data from the Phase 3 DUO™ study in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) expected mid-year 2017. There remains an unmet medical need for patients with relapsed CLL. We believe duvelisib has potential as a convenient, oral monotherapy with an expected and manageable safety profile for patients with relapsed CLL. For defactinib, we look forward to advancing our ongoing combination trials into important expansion cohorts across several high unmet need indications.”
Mr. Forrester continued, “On the financial front, we ended 2016 with $80.9 million in cash, cash equivalents and investments, which we believe is sufficient to support our research and development programs and operations into 2018. In March 2017, we entered into a loan facility with Hercules Capital, Inc. for up to $25.0 million, subject to certain conditions including positive DUO data, which would provide us with additional financial flexibility to advance duvelisib.”
