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Courtesy of Roland Magnusson/Getty Images AstraZeneca is unloading rights to Alvesco (ciclesonide) to treat persistent asthma, and Omnaris and Zetonna (ciclesonide) to treat nasal symptoms associated with rhinitis. The company indicates that the rights cover markets outside the United States and the U.S. royalties for the drugs. Roland Magnusson / Shutterstock.com As AstraZeneca focuses on its strategy of divesting assets and spending on its own pipeline, the company sold rights to three older drugs to Covis Pharma for $350 million. AstraZeneca is unloading rights to Alvesco (ciclesonide) to treat persistent asthma, and Omnaris and Zetonna (ciclesonide) to treat nasal symptoms associated with rhinitis. The company indicates that the rights cover markets outside the United States and the U.S. royalties for the drugs. Covis already commercializes the three drugs in the U.S., but upon closing, will own them. No AstraZeneca staff or facilities are transferred as part of the deal. “One of our strategic objectives is to divest parts of our portfolio, allowing us to allocate resources to develop innovative new medicines to address unmet patient needs,” stated Mark Fallon, AstraZeneca’s executive vice president, Global Product and Portfolio Strategy. “Covis Pharma has strong capabilities in marketing medicines around the world, and our agreement with them means patients will continue to benefit from Alvesco, Omnaris and Zetonna.” Under the terms of the deal, Covis is paying AstraZeneca $350 million in addition to conditional sales-related payments of up to $21 million over four years from 2019. AstraZeneca notes that because it will “not maintain a significant ongoing interest in the medicines following completion, the payments will be recognized as Other Operating Income in the Company’s financial statements.” In 2017, the three drugs brought in $106 million. Covis was founded by Cerberus Capital Management in 2011, an investment firm with over $30 billion in managed assets. Between 2011 and 2015, Covis bought 17 branded drugs. Then in 2015, it divested 12 products to Concordia Healthcare for $1.2 billion. The drugs sold included branded drugs, injectables and authorized generics in a broad range of therapeutic areas including cardiovascular, central nervous system and acute care. Some of the products were Nilandron for metastatic prostate cancer; Dibenzyline for pheochromocytoma; Lanoxin for mild-to-moderate heart failure and atrial fibrillation; and Plaquenil for lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. Consistent with today’s deal, in July 2017, Covis Pharma acquired several asthma and allergy products from Sunovion Pharmaceuticals . Covis acquired Alvesco (ciclesonide) Inhalation Aerosol; Omnaris (ciclesonide) Nasal Spray; and Zetonna (ciclesonide) Nasal Aerosol. All three drugs were licensed by Sunovion from Takeda GmbH (formerly Nycomed ) in 2008. No financial details were released concerning the Sunovion deal. “With the divestiture of asthma and allergy products, Sunovion is reinforcing its strategic focus on chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in the respiratory area,” stated Nobuhiko Tamura, chairman and chief executive officer of Sunovion, at the time. “Sunovion has the broadest COPD portfolio in the U.S., offering both handheld and nebulized treatment options that can be tailored to individual needs.” A year ago, on October 30, 2017, AstraZeneca signed a licensing deal with Mereo BioPharma to out-license the oral inhibitor of neutrophil elastase (AZD9668) to the smaller Mereo. It, like today’s deal, is reverse of the typical deal, where large companies acquire or license products from smaller companies. That deal, like today’s, is an example of AstraZeneca offloading an under-developed or abandoned product that it outside its primary focus. At the time, Kumar Srinivasan , AstraZeneca’s vice president of scientific partnering and alliances, stated, “This transaction reaffirms AstraZeneca’s commitment to patients by repositioning an asset into an orphan indication with a high unmet need. We will continue to divest or out-license deprioritized assets where we believe it will help accelerate the development of new medicines.”

March 9, 2015 By Krystle Vermes , BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff Canadian healthcare company Concordia announced today that it has acquired commercial assets from Covis Pharma worth $1.2 billion. The drug portfolio from Covis contains 18 branded and authorized generic products with stable revenue. Key products included in the transaction include Nilandron for the treatment of metastatic prostate cancer, as well as Dibenzyline, which treats pheochromocytoma. In its fiscal fourth quarter for 2014, Covis expects to receive up to $52 million in revenue from the products in its pipeline. “ Covis ’ strong commercial momentum will have an immediate and material impact on our top and bottom line financial results,” said Mark Thompson , chief executive officer of Concordia . “In the longer-term, this transaction creates greater scale and diversification for Concordia , which should support the continued execution of our aggressive growth plans.” The acquisition is expected to close in the second quarter of 2015. The Board of Directors of both parties have agreed to the transaction and given it their approval. Concordia Continues to Grow The company announced a similar acquisition designed to help Concordia ’s bottom line in September 2014. However, this deal did not focus on another company’s portfolio, but rather a single successful drug. Concordia acquired Zonegran, a treatment for partial seizures in adults with epilepsy, from Eisai Inc. for $90 million in cash and an additional $1.5 million in inventory. Zonegran has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) , and it’s often administered in 25mg or 100mg capsules. “The acquisition of Zonegran for commercialization in the United States and Puerto Rico represents another advancement in the execution of Concordia ’s legacy product strategy, which management believes will provide significant and sustainable revenue going forward,” said Thompson, at the time of the announcement. Eisai , which developed the drug, focuses on oncology and specialty care. It is the U.S. pharmaceutical subsidiary of Eisai Company, Ltd. , which is based in Tokyo. Concordia has several of its own drugs in its pipeline, including Kapvay for the treatment of Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Kapvay, also known as clonidine hydrochloride, comes in the form of an extended release tablet. With Zonegran on its list of products, Concordia is now marketing six potential treatments in its pipeline. BioSpace Temperature Poll Vertex Pharmaceuticals made news last week when it terminated leases on three properties in Cambridge, Mass, that freed up 313,000 square feet of space in the Genetown area . The company has spent a significant part of 2014 consolidating its operations on the South Boston waterfront, leasing 291,000 square feet of office space at West Kendall Street in Cambridge’s Kendall Square. So we wanted to ask the BioSpace community: Is Boston going to be getting more biotech leases anytime soon, or fewer tenants? var _polldaddy = [] || _polldaddy; _polldaddy.push( { type: "iframe", auto: "1", domain: "biospace.polldaddy.com/s/", id: "after-vertex-pulls-up-stakes-will-boston-see-a-biotech-exodus", placeholder: "pd_1425682894" } ); (function(d,c,j){if(!document.getElementById(j)){var pd=d.createElement(c),s;pd.id=j;pd.src=(' '==document.location.protocol)?' ':' ';s=document.getElementsByTagName(c)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(pd,s);}}(document,'script','pd-embed'));