Coherus Biosciences expects to have an approval decision on its pegfilgrastim biosimilar from the Food and Drug Administration by November 3, 2018. On a quarterly investor call on May 10, Chief Executive Officer Denny Lanfear also related that an approval decision from the European Medicines Agency (EMA) on this product is expected by June 28, 2018. “In the meantime, he said, we will continue building product inventory and establishing our commercial infrastructure to ensure a successful product launch.”
The conference call highlighted several notable items, including a distinct focus on the US market over the EU, primarily because of the latter’s reliance on a tender system. James Hassard, Senior Vice President, Market Access, explained that the tender system magnifies the competitive nature of biosimilar pricing. Individual countries, he said, because of their specific systems and environments can still be attractive. Mr. Hassard pointed to Scandinavia as a potential European target.
In addition, Mr. Lanfear noted that the $4 billion US market for pegfilgrastim in the US is far larger than that in Europe (< $1 billion). As a result, Coherus will likely seek a partner to help commercialize its biosimilars outside of the US, while tackling the American market itself.
The executives announced another hopeful sign for actual approval of CHS-1701—the FDA and EMA have already passed preapproval inspections of the manufacturing facilities. This could address some of the issues that have tripped up other biosimilar drug makers.
Mr. Hassard believes that Mylan will also receive approval for its delayed pegfilgrastim biosimilar around the same time as Coherus. Rather than plan for a first-to-market launch, he said they were anticipating a launch in a competitive space. “There’s a great deal of room for both us and multiple players. Our plans have always incorporated multiple players. A good example is Zarxio® and Granix®,” he said. “They’ve experienced significant success and have taken about 30% market share each.,” he said. Nonetheless, “We have plans in place to enable us to meet that level of demand even if we are the only biosimilar on the market.”
In addition, Coherus reported progress on the phase 3 clinical development of its adalimumab (CHS-1420) and etanercept (CHS-0214) biosimilars, although timing of its 351(k) submissions are not anticipated soon. The company pointed to extended patent life (adalimumab and etanercept) and lack of commercialization partners (etanercept) for delaying these filings.
