Biogen to buy Pfizer schizophrenia drug for up to $590m

Biogen has agreed to buy a phase 2b trial-ready schizophrenia treatment from Pfizer for up to $590m.

The price includes an upfront payment of $75m with up to $515m in additional development and commercialisation milestone payments, as well as tiered royalties in the low to mid-teen percentages.

Biogen said the drug, PF-04958242, has previously demonstrated an acceptable safety profile and treatment effect trends across multiple domains of cognition in phase 1b clinical studies. The company plans to initiate a phase 2b trial in the second half of this year.

Biogen's chief executive officer, Michael Vounatsos, said: "Given the significant unmet patient need and Biogen’s ability to apply its scientific expertise in this area, we are enthusiastic to advance development of this asset as we continue to expand our neuroscience pipeline, including in our emerging growth areas such as neuropsychiatry."

The company, whose mission is to be a pioneer in neuroscience, said there are more than 20m people worldwide living with schizophrenia, with the majority of them estimated to have some degree of cognitive impairment attributable to the disease. It added that cognitive impairment is increasingly recognised as one of the greatest unmet needs in the effective treatment of schizophrenia.