Lundbeck snaps up Abide Therapeutics for $400m

Danish drugmaker Lundbeck has moved to bolster its pipeline with a $400m deal to acquire Abide Therapeutics and its lead drug for Tourette’s syndrome and neuropathic pain.

The deal – which comes a few months after Lundbeck recruited new chief executive Deborah Dunsire to orchestrate a turnaround of the business – includes an upfront payment of $250m and another $150m in development and sales milestones.

Neuroscience specialist Lundbeck has been facing declining sales of its older drugs and needs to reinvigorate its pipeline, a task made more difficult as developing neurology and psychiatry drugs is notoriously challenging.

Efforts to bring forward its own drugs have been undermined by a couple of late-stage failures, including idalopirdine for Alzheimer’s disease and Lu AF35700 for treatment-resistant schizophrenia.

Under the deal, Lundbeck will gain access the US biotech’s lead candidate ABX 1431, a potential first-in-class inhibitor of the serine hydrolase monoacylglycerol lipase (MGLL), as well as a discovery platform targeted at serine hydrolases based at a research unit in La Jolla, California.

The Abide deal is the first for Dunsire, although her interim predecessor Anders Götzsche – who took the helm for a few months after former CEO Kåre Schultz was poached by Teva – agreed a $1.1bn deal last year to buy Prexton Therapeutics and its mid-stage Parkinson’s disease candidate foliglurax.

“The acquisition of Abide provides us with a differentiated chemo-proteomic platform to discover new classes of drugs for a broad spectrum of brain diseases starting with those that harness the therapeutic potential of the endocannabinoid system,” she said.

ABX 1431 is in a phase 2a trial in Tourette’s syndrome – which is characterised by involuntary sounds and tics – on the premise that MGLL regulates a key system that serves as a natural brake on excessive brain signalling. Results are due later this year.

Meanwhile, a phase 1 titration study is also ongoing in neuropathic pain, enrolling subjects with post-herpetic neuralgia, diabetic neuropathy and other indications.

Lundbeck said that the deal will be financed using existing cash reserves and will have no impact on its previously issued financial guidance.