Suven Life Sciences is betting $25 million on U.S. clinical trials for its SUVN-502 as a necessary step to attract other companies to license the drug based on a molecule for treating Alzheimer's disease.
Chairman and CEO Venkat Jasti said in an interview with the India publication Livemint that the drug has failed to attract licensees even though it went through a Phase I trial 6 years ago.
The company wants to hire a U.S.-based CRO to conduct the trial, he told the newspaper.
Jasti said several prospects wanted proof of concept, so he decided to invest the money in Suven's own human clinical trials to test the efficacy and safety of its drug candidate for Alzheimer's disease. The candidate is said to be similar to Lu AE58054 of Denmark's H. Lundbeck that was licensed to Otsuka Pharmaceuticals, the newspaper said.
Jasti also said Suven was seeking collaboration with a U.S.-based clinical research organization to carry out the tests. He said the initial trial phase could be completed by the end of 2017 and that he expected to out-license the molecule at that time.
- here's the story from Livemint