Merck acquires OncoImmune to ramp supply of promising Covid drug

Pharmaceutical giant Merck said it plans to acquire privately held OncoImmune for $425 million in cash, gaining rights to an under-the-radar drug that has shown striking results in hospitalized patients with Covid-19.

The medicine, CD24Fc, was shown in a late-stage clinical study in September to reduce the risk of respiratory failure or death by more than 50% in patients hospitalized with Covid-19 and requiring oxygen, Merck said Monday.

The drug was given as an intravenous infusion in addition to standard-of-care, which could include remdesivir and dexamethasone, and was compared to standard-of-care alone. The data, in 203 patients, also showed that patients receiving CD24Fc had a 60% higher probability of seeing improved clinical status.

“The results are remarkable,” Merck’s research chief, Dr. Roger Perlmutter, said in a telephone interview.

With cases of Covid averaging almost 170,000 a day in the U.S. and a record number of people in the hospital with the disease, a drug that could significantly speed recovery and reduce the risk of death or of patients getting so severely ill they require ventilators could make a major difference in the pandemic.

OncoImmune is a privately-held, clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company that is actively engaged in the discovery and development of novel biopharmaceuticals for the treatment of cancer and autoimmune disease.

The company’s lead therapeutic candidate CD24Fc has a novel mechanism of action that has potential applications to a number of inflammatory diseases and has shown good safety and tolerability in a Phase 1 clinical trial in healthy volunteers. Clinical activity has been observed in two Phase 2 trials in GVHD and the Phase 3 trial in COVID-19. In addition to CD24Fc, OncoImmune has a rich pipeline of immuno-oncology candidates that will be the focus of the new spinout. OncoImmune has initiated a Phase 1 clinical trial evaluating a novel CTLA-4 antibody candidate that selectively eliminates immune suppressive regulatory T cells in the tumor microenvironment while preserving their physiological function to protect host against autoimmune diseases (NCT04140526).

For more than 125 years, Merck, known as MSD outside of the United States and Canada, has been inventing for life, bringing forward medicines and vaccines for many of the world’s most challenging diseases in pursuit of our mission to save and improve lives. We demonstrate our commitment to patients and population health by increasing access to health care through far-reaching policies, programs and partnerships. Today, Merck continues to be at the forefront of research to prevent and treat diseases that threaten people and animals – including cancer, infectious diseases such as HIV and Ebola, and emerging animal diseases – as we aspire to be the premier research-intensive biopharmaceutical company in the world.