Novartis, Conatus in borad deal to make treatments for liver diseases

Novartis and Conatus Pharmaceuticals have signed a multipurpose deal which will help the two drug makers to make liver-disease treatment, emricasan.

Emricasan is an investigational, first-in-class, oral, pan-caspase inhibitor for the treatment of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) with advanced fibrosis (scarring) and cirrhosis. About 3-5% of the US population is affected with NASH, which could become the major cause of liver transplants in the US  in five years. This collaboration has the potential to expand treatment options for people in various stages of fatty liver disease, where no approved medicines currently exist, Novartis said on late on Monday.

Under the terms of this agreement, Novartis will make an upfront payment to Conatus of $50 million.

“Our collaboration with Conatus is a major step forward to delivering innovative oral treatments for NASH patients, who are in urgent need of new approved options,” said Vasant Narasimhan, Global Head, Drug Development and Chief Medical Officer, Novartis. “Emricasan shows great promise as a single agent and in potential combination with our internal FXR agonists as a treatment for NASH patients”.

Novartis also said that it was developing Farnesoid X receptor (FXR) agonists for the treatment of chronic liver diseases. As part of this collaboration, Conatus will conduct multiple Phase 2b clinical trials with emricasan in NASH.

If concluded positively, Novartis would then conduct Phase 3 studies of emricasan as a single treatment and start development of combination therapies with an FXR agonist.