Daiichi Sankyo, a Tokyo based pharmaceutical company, has received approval to market and manufacture Inavir, a single dose flu treatment. Biota, a Melbourne based pharmaceutical company, is to share the royalties and their shares surged by 17 percent after the news.
Biota is also the research company behind Relenza, another flu antiviral. Biota has apparently seen a collapse in royalties from Relenza following the swine flu pandemic last year but we wonder if there have been manufacturing problems with this drug as we have not been able to source Relenza for over a year now.
The two pharmaceutical companies merged their respective ideas seven years ago when they realised that they were working on comparable 2nd generation flu compounds. Inavir is considered a breakthrough drug; a neuraminidase inhibitor that is inhaled in powder form like Relenza but only needs a one off dosing. The company states that just one dose is as powerful as a five day course of Tamiflu.
Biota is looking for alternative partners to take the compound forward for licensing in Europe and North America.