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Novartis snaps up Selexys for sickle cell

Nature Biotechnology volume 35, page 106 (2017)Cite this article

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Selexys, founded in 2002, was initially backed by venture capital; then, in 2012, it granted Novartis the option to acquire the company pending phase 2 trial results for its lead compound crizanlizumab. The data that prompted the acquisition were presented in December 2016 at the American Society of Hematology meeting in San Diego, California, and simultaneously published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The humanized monoclonal antibody cut the number of painful crises by 45.3% compared with that experienced by patients receiving placebo (N. Engl. J. Med. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa1611770, 2016). The phase 2 study tested the highest dose of intravenous crizanlizumab—5 mg/kg administered 14 times over 52 weeks—and enrolled nearly 200 patients, including those already being treated with hydroxyurea, the only approved therapy for sickle cell disease. Hydroxyurea, originally approved to treat blood cancers and available as a generic, is only modestly effective in preventing vaso-occlusive crises, and is burdened by serious side effects.

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  • 30 March 2017

    In the version of this article initially published, it was stated that “Modus is developing sevuparin, a P-selectin and E-selectin…” instead of “…a P-selectin and L-selectin…”. The error has been corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of the article.

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  1. Yardley, Pennsylvania

    Chris Morrison

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Morrison, C. Novartis snaps up Selexys for sickle cell. Nat Biotechnol 35, 106 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt0217-106

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