Bristol-Myers Squibb Company and Incyte Corporation announced the companies have agreed to advance their clinical development program evaluating the combination of epacadostat, Incyte’s investigational oral selective IDO1 enzyme inhibitor, with Bristol’s Opdivo into phase 3 registrational studies in first-line non-small cell lung cancer across the spectrum of PD-L1 expression and first-line head and neck cancer.
Incyte is based in Wilmington.
Additionally, the companies are expanding the ECHO-204 Phase 1/2 study, established under a collaboration between the companies in 2014, for melanoma.
The expanded clinical development program will be co-funded by the two companies.
“We are very pleased to expand our partnership with Bristol-Myers Squibb and move the combination of epacadostat plus Opdivo forward into pivotal studies,” said Steven Stein, M.D., chief medical officer, Incyte. “We believe that further expanding the ECHO development program for epacadostat, including the initiation of this new Phase 3 trials, will bring us closer to our goal of providing new treatment options for patients with certain cancers.”
Epacadostat is a first-in-class, oral inhibitor of the IDO1 enzyme that is designed to reverse tumor-associated immune suppression and restore effective anti-tumor immune responses. In single-arm studies, the combination of epacadostat and immune checkpoint inhibitors has shown proof-of-concept in patients with a type of advanced melanoma.
Opdivo is a checkpoint inhibitor that is designed to uniquely harness the body’s immune system to help restore anti-tumor immune response. By harnessing the body’s immune system to fight cancer, Opdivo has become a treatment option on many types of cancers.
