Lexicon Gets Pain Drug Candidate Rights Under Bristol-Myers Link

Lexicon Pharmaceuticals acquires exclusive rights to development candidate for neuropathic pain from its alliance with Bristol-Myers Squibb.

Lexicon Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced that it has obtained exclusive research, development and commercialization rights to LX9211 (BMS-986176), a development candidate for neuropathic pain that was jointly developed by Lexicon and Bristol-Myers Squibb Company as part of their neuroscience drug discovery alliance. Additional small molecule compounds acting through the same target as LX9211 are also included in the exclusive arrangement. LX9211 is currently completing IND-enabling studies, with Phase 1 clinical trials anticipated to commence during 2017.

“In our alliance with Bristol-Myers Squibb, we jointly discovered and extensively characterized a promising new target and novel compounds for neuropathic pain, ultimately selecting LX9211 as a development candidate,” said Jeffrey L. Wade, Lexicon’s executive vice president, corporate and administrative affairs and chief financial officer. “This program demonstrates the utility of Lexicon’s science and the value that we have been able to create through our strategic alliance with Bristol-Myers Squibb. Our acquisition of full development and commercialization rights to this program furthers our strategy of developing drug candidates with the potential for changing the standard of care in areas of high unmet medical need.”

“Working together with Bristol-Myers Squibb, we have accumulated an extensive amount of data supporting the potential of LX9211 for neuropathic pain and other chronic pain indications,” said Praveen Tyle, Ph.D., Lexicon’s executive vice president of research and development. “With the nearing completion of IND-enabling studies, we are planning to advance LX9211 into the clinic next year so that patients in an area of high unmet need can benefit from this innovation.”

LX9211 is an orally-administered small molecule for the treatment of neuropathic pain. In preclinical studies, LX9211 has shown robust efficacy in models of neuropathic pain and is well-tolerated at and above efficacious doses in animals.

Lexicon and Bristol-Myers Squibb established a drug discovery alliance in December 2003 to discover, develop and commercialize small molecule drugs in the neuroscience field. Lexicon initiated the alliance with a number of neuroscience drug discovery programs at various stages of development and used its gene knockout technologies to identify additional drug targets with promise in the neuroscience field.

For those targets that were validated and selected within the alliance, Lexicon and Bristol-Myers Squibb have been working together, on an exclusive basis, to discover, characterize and carry out the nonclinical development of small molecule drug candidates, and have shared equally both in the costs and in the work attributable to those efforts. Lexicon received $86 million in upfront payments and research funding under the agreement during the target discovery portion of the alliance, which expired in October 2009.

Lexicon has acquired the rights to LX9211 under an amendment to the neuroscience alliance, pursuant to which Lexicon has agreed to pay Bristol-Myers Squibb development and regulatory milestones starting with the commencement of the first Phase 2 clinical trial in the first indication. Lexicon has agreed to pay additional development and regulatory milestones for each of the second and third indications, if applicable. Finally, Lexicon has agreed to pay royalties on worldwide net sales of small molecules related to the alliance that act through the target of LX9211 as well as certain sales performance milestones. www.lexpharma.com.

(Source: PR Newswire)