reduce obesity, along with an extended-release formulation of lorcaserin that could be taken once a day, and to explore the drug’s effect on diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.
“There remains significant potential for the chronic weight management market,” Lief said, according to Seeking Alpha’s transcript of the call. “We believe that Belviq represents the much needed innovation in pharmacotherapy to drive the discussion between physicians and patients forward.”
Lorcaserin is Arena’s first drug to win FDA approval. The company was founded in 1997 to discover and develop new drugs for treating cardiovascular, central nervous system, inflammatory, and metabolic diseases. Most of the other drug candidates in Arena’s pipeline remain at an early stage of development. Yet with its lead drug candidate on the threshold of global distribution and with almost 300 employees worldwide, including 220 at Arena’s San Diego headquarters, Lief says the company is well-positioned re-focus on drug research and development.
Under the terms of their expanded agreement with Eisai, Arena said it gets an upfront payment of $60 million and is eligible to receive as much as $176.5 million in milestone payments. Lief says Arena also is eligible to get a total of $1.5 billion in one-time purchase price adjustment payments, based on Eisai’s sales of lorcaserin in countries covered by the agreement. For example, in the third quarter that ended Sept. 30, Arena said it received $1.7 million, or 31.5 percent of Eisai’s $5.4 million in net sales under our agreement, and $300,000 from customer redemptions of a 15-day free-trial discount offer.