Talk about burying the lede.
Small Philadelphia-area biopharma Trevena divulged on Thursday that it has slashed 25% of its workforce, delivering the bad news 15 paragraphs into an announcement that appeared to be little more than a breakdown of the positive results of a clinical trial.
Deep into the release, below the primary and secondary endpoints from the “randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, dose-ranging” study and the expected quotes from the chief executive and chief scientific officers, there was a late reveal that no one saw coming.
In the second bullet point underneath Trevena General Business Updates, the firm unveiled its “realignment of Company resources.” Besides the 25% reduction to its full-time staff, the move includes the termination of its “contract sales force agreement” with Syneos Health.
“There’s not much further to share at this time,” a company spokesperson said via email.
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The so-called realignment is designed to extend Trevena's “cash runway to mid-2023," according to the release. As of June 30, it had cash and equivalents totaling $49.5 million.
Trevena registered $0 sales for Olinvyk in the second quarter. The opioid receptor modulator is Trevena's only marketed product and was approved in August 2020 to help ween patients off more powerful and addictive opioids.
To address the stubborn uptake, Trevena has signed on with an unidentified group purchasing organization (GPO), which “will allow for broad Olinvyk access for member hospitals,” it said in the release.
“Our recent corporate realignment will help us increase financial flexibility to drive forward our strategic priorities,” Trevena CEO Carrie Bourdow said in the release. The company will carry on with its internal commercial and medical affairs units supporting Olinvyk.
Along with other cost-cutting measures, Trevena said it now can drive commercial adoption of Olinvyk and develop its pipeline drug TRV045 for diabetic neuropathy. Trevena's website also still lists two other phase I assets: TRV250 for acute migraine and TRV734.
“Despite an interesting early pipeline, meaningful data catalysts remain in the distance,” Oppenheimer analyst Jeff Jones wrote in a note to clients.
The company, which has $43.5 million market cap, said that the phase I TRV045 diabetic neuropathic pain is on track to complete in the second half of this year.
When it comes to Olinvyk, Trevena is hoping that a recent postmarketing trial, with data just released, will improve its commercial performance. The study evaluated Olinvyk versus IV morphine on 23 patients, and Trevena’s drug showed a reduced impact on neurocognitive function. The observed measures included sedation/reaction time, visual tracking, higher-order cognitive processing, motor function and hand-eye coordination.
“We view the cognitive function data as generally positive, with the sedation and posture/stability endpoints being particularly relevant," Jones wrote. “However, we would anticipate any impact from this data on Olinvyk adoption by clinicians to be gradual—following presentations at conferences, publications and ample time for the pain community to experience this impact in practice.”
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This isn’t the first time the 15-year-old company has had to reduce its staff. In 2017, it dropped 21 staffers—or 30% of its workforce—and halted all R&D to focus on Olinvyk's development.
A year later, after an advisory committee voted the drug down in a narrow decision, the FDA followed suit with a complete response letter. Trevena eventually won over the regulator, but the company has since discovered that marketing an opioid is a tough sell.