Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla, Ph.D., has pulled back the curtain on his $1.25 billion bet on a PD-1xVEGF bispecific, revealing that his team went through individual scans and interviewed investigators to gain reassurance about the quality of the Chinese data.
The question of whether promising data generated at Chinese sites will hold up in global trials has hung over the PD-1/L1xVEGF sector since Summit Therapeutics and Akeso’s ivonescimab beat Merck & Co.’s blockbuster oncology drug Keytruda in a head-to-head study last year. Despite the doubts, companies have bet billions on assets in recent months.
Pfizer joined the race last month by paying 3SBio $1.25 billion upfront for ex-China rights to SSGJ-707. Speaking at a Goldman Sachs event Monday, Bourla said (PDF) 3SBio’s data looked “very good” but “of course they were data in China.”
The Chinese origins of the data meant Pfizer wanted to get to know 3SBio and be “very careful” with due diligence, Bourla said. Pfizer’s due diligence process involved people from Bourla down and boots on the ground in China.
“We sent teams [to] China. They spent weeks. They went to the sites. They viewed the scans one after the other. They interviewed the physicians that [ran] the study,” Bourla said. “We didn't do due diligence in a data room. We sent people on-site. We feel very comfortable. I met the CEO. They are credible guys.”
Asked by an analyst about the size of the deal, Bourla said Pfizer will only pay the full $6 billion “if the whole thing is very successful and sells a lot.” The comment suggests some payments are tied to sizable sales milestones but, even at the current level, the deal is a significant outlay on a single investigational asset.
Pfizer sees SSGJ-707 as a strategic asset because of its potential to displace PD-1/L1 checkpoint inhibitors and combine with its portfolio of antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs). The portfolio, the core of which came to Pfizer in the Seagen takeover, features ADCs that use vedotin as a payload. The vedotin-based Pacdev and Keytruda work well together. Pfizer is betting SSGJ-707 will also pair nicely with its vedotin ADCs.
“Vedotin has been proven that, because it creates immunogenic cell death, it has synergistic effects with PD-1s,” Bourla said. “For us to have the new, let's say, standard of immunotherapy as part of our portfolio is very strategically important given that we have all the ADCs.”
The potential for SSGJ-707 to enhance ADCs led Pfizer to pick up the asset despite the company having bigger gaps in other parts of its portfolio. Bourla said the bar for Pfizer striking a deal in oncology “is much higher” than in other therapeutic areas “because we have plenty of assets.”
Pfizer is looking at obesity assets, Bourla said. The company axed an asset in April after seeing a potential drug-induced liver injury, sparking speculation that it would buy itself back into the race. Pfizer sees “a lot of risk with pricing” in obesity, Bourla said, and is considering lower prices in its calculations of asset value. With Bourla saying premiums are “very, very high,” Pfizer is staying on the sidelines for now.
“We are not going to overpay. And, right now, there are a lot of crazy demands,” Bourla said.