Bloomberg noted that Takeda’s CEO is looking at making Takeda a nimble company, but one with a deeply entrenched R&D focus.
One month after leaping into the $40 billion market for nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and other diseases of the liver through a partnership with Virginia-based HemoShear Therapeutics LLC, Takeda Pharmaceutical is looking for a few more deals that will expand its global presence and create a stronger international profile.
Bloomberg analyzed recent moves and goals of Takeda Chief Executive Officer Christophe Weber and his goal of turning Takeda into a company focused on drugs that are more expensive and have a smaller pool of patients. Bloomberg noted that Weber is looking at making Takeda a nimble company, but one with a deeply entrenched R&D focus.
“The more productive we can be with the R&D, the more flexibility we will have,” Weber told Bloomberg. “Our successes pay for all our failures.”
Since assuming the helm of Takeda, Weber, the first non-Japanese CEO of Takeda, has been under pressure to generate greater profits for the company. Part of that goal is building research partnerships, such as the one with HemoShear. Takeda has forged about 180 such partnerships and is looking to develop more, but not at the same frenzied pace it has over the past two years. Weber told Bloomberg that the company is likely to slow its developmental deal-making in order to “make the best use of the tie-ups it already has.”
Last year, BioSpace reported that Takeda had set aside $15 billion to go after U.S. pharmaceutical acquisitions in an effort to reduce its dependency on the Japanese domestic market. Some of that funding has already been tapped into this year. Takeda began the year by acquiring Ariad Pharmaceuticals for $5.2 billion. The deal expands Takeda’s oncology pipeline with the inclusion of Iclusig for chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) and a subset of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), and brigatinib, still in trials for a subset of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. In July, the company acquired development and commercialization rights for Tesaro’s Zejula (niraparib) in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Russia and Australia. Takeda said it has development rights for niraparib for the treatment of all tumor types in Japan, and all tumor types excluding prostate cancer in the other previously mentioned companies. This fall, Takeda and pharma giant AstraZeneca established an R&D deal to develop the antibody MEDI1341 for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease. MEDI1341 is due to enter Phase I clinical trials later this year. Takeda is banking up to $400 million on the development of the drug. Under the terms of the agreement, AstraZeneca will lead Phase I development while Takeda will lead future clinical development activities.
Takeda has also been divesting its assets and deals that no longer fit with its new focus, freeing up money to pursue acquisitions, as well as enhance its vaccine pipeline with drugs battling Dengue and the Zika virus.
Although Weber did not hint at any big acquisitions coming up, he hinted to Bloomberg that Takeda would be willing to plunk down more money for a profitable business.
Part of the company’s shift included an increased presence in Boston. In July, Takeda said it was reducing its workforce in the greater Chicago area and transitioning hundreds of positions to Boston. For the past couple of years, Takeda has slowly been moving its Illinois-based research and development and vaccine business units to Boston and Cambridge, Mass. At the end of July, Takeda employed approximately 2,150 people in the Boston area. A greater presence in Boston, as well as other biotech hotspots around the globe, is part of the company’s key to developing a stronger international profile.
