Joseph Turgeon
Analyst · Laura Engel with Stonegate Capital Partners. Your line is open
Thank you, Kurt. Thank you, Dr. Raj, and thank you, Shiv and thanking everybody on the call. These are really exciting time to Spectrum. First, let me talk about poziotinib, our oral irreversible tyrosine kinase inhibitor, which is shown potential on lung cancer patients with exon 20 insertion mutations and also in breast cancer patients. As Dr. Raj mentioned, just two weeks ago, we announced encouraging preliminary data from a current ongoing trial at MD Anderson Cancer Center studying poziotinib in non-small cell lung cancer patients with exon 20 insertion mutations in EGFR or HER2. Patients with such tumors are generally non-smokers, younger and have very few options for treatment. The prognosis for these patients is poor with a medium progression-free survival of about two months and current therapies are unsatisfactory. There is a significant unmet need for this population. Poziotinib has shown evidence of significant antitumor activity in non-small cell lung cancer and patients with EGFR exon 20 insertion mutations. Dr. John Heymach reported that all 11 patients who received the daily poziotinib show tumor shrinkage. The objective response rate using RECIST criteria was 73%. It was also evidence of central nervous system in a patient with central nervous system metastasis and another with leptomeningeal disease. This is especially exciting news because these patients are generally resistant to available treatments. We just announced Monday that we have initiated in currently enrolling patients in our own multicenter Phase II trial of poziotinib. This trial has been designed with input from leading KOLs as well as the FDA. The goal of the Phase II trial is to evaluate both the efficacy and safety of poziotinib in patients with non-small cell lung cancer that is locally advanced or metastatic and have an exon 20 insertion mutations in either EGFR or HER2. The trial is to enroll up to 87 patients with EGFR exon 20 insertion mutations and up to 87 patients with HER2 exon 20 insertion mutations. In addition to lung cancer, poziotinib is also being studied as a single agent in a Phase II trial in the third-line setting with breast cancer patients who have failed other HER2 directed therapies and we've seen encouraging responses. We continue to enroll out breast cancer trial and we'll keep you updated on the progress. Data from Hanmi’s Phase II study of breast cancer was reported in September at asthma. In patients that were heavily pretreated including four prior anti-cancer therapies and a medium of two directed therapies, the disease control rate was 74.7% and confirmed ORR was 21.1%. This trial use a 12-milligram of poziotinib versus 16-milligrams in our ongoing study and also had two weeks time and one weeks of dosing compared to our continuous dosing. So while the exposure of the drug was much slower than the exposure in our ongoing breast cancer trial, we are encouraged by these data. The Grade 3 diarrhea of 14% and the study also compares favorably with the comparable treatments at this stage of development. We have worldwide rights to poziotinib except for South Korea and China. Our team is embarking upon an overall strategy for global clinical development and regulatory filings for poziotinib. We are in early discussions with key opinion leaders in Europe and Japan to discuss regulatory pathways to maximize the potential of poziotinib. Next ROLONTIS, a long-acting granulocyte colony-stimulating factor or GCSF. ROLONTIS is a novel molecule that has been designed using a proprietary platform based technology. In Phase II study ROLONTIS has shown encouraging safety and efficacy. We are building a strong regulatory package for this program. We have designed a comprehensive clinical program with two Phase III trials to evaluate ROLONTIS. These registration trials are multicenter, randomized, and active-controlled studies. Enrolled patients receive chemotherapy every 21 days. ROLONTIS is administered subcutaneously as a fixed dose once per cycle. The primary study endpoint is duration of severe neutropenia assessed to the absolute neutrophil counts in cycle one of chemotherapy based on central lab assessment over the 21-day cycle. Secondary endpoints include the incidents of neutropenia complications, incidents of febrile neutropenia, relative dose intensity and safety. The ADVANCE trial was completely enrollment ahead of schedule. We have randomized 406 patients in this trial and expect to have topline results in the first quarter of 2018. We are running a second trial for this program called RECOVER study which is similar to the ADVANCE trial and design. RECOVER study is an international study that will enroll around 218 patients from Europe, the U.S. and other selected countries. This study is enrolling well and should year results next year and time for us to file a BLA for ROLONTIS in the fourth quarter of 2018. With ROLONTIS, we'll have the opportunity to compete in the multibillion dollar market with a novel agent. As a reminder, ROLONTIS is not a biosimilar, it’s a novel agent, if successful, and this drug could change the growth trajectory of our company. Now let’s move on to QAPZOLA, our tumor-activated drug for bladder cancer. We initiated the Phase III trial in August and are currently enrolling patients. We have used learnings of our previous research and recommendations from the FDA in designing our new Phase III trial. This trial has been conducted under an SPA from the FDA. The Phase III study is expected to enroll 425 evaluable patients, using a single dose of 8-milligrams, and has 2:1 randomization in favor of QAPZOLA and is evaluating time-to-recurrence as the primary endpoint. This is being study in low and intermediate risk patients and based on the SPA, we required to complete only this one trial for NDA submission. At the upcoming ASH meeting, we will present more than a dozen abstracts across our current portfolio. Two of these are Oral Presentations in Apaziquone including a Phase I dose escalation study of FOLOTYN in combination with CHOP in frontline patients with newly diagnosed PTCL. And the second report from the comprehensive measures for PTCL. Thus far 2017 has been a highly productive year at Spectrum. We have progressed our advanced stage pipeline and have executed on our goals. We look forward to updating you on the progress as we work towards bringing more treatments options to cancer patients. I really appreciate your interest in Spectrum and now I am going to turn the call back over to Dr. Raj.