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Compilenewborn
Sanofi's Principia Biopharmaceutical Company is suffering a double blow
.
Just days after the company's key BTK inhibitor failed in a clinical trial, Sanofi now revealed that it will close Principia's laboratory in San Francisco and lay off more than 30 employees
According to the latest report from the California State Workforce Adjustment and Retraining Notice (WARN), the 38 layoff applications submitted to the state for the first time at the end of August will take effect on October 8
.
A spokesperson said that according to Sanofi, after experiencing a high churn rate, the company had to reconsider its plans for the Principia San Francisco laboratory
Sanofi now plans to end the laboratory’s drug discovery research activities, close the laboratory by the end of this year, and vacate it all by April 2022
.
Sanofi said in an e-mailed statement: "It was a difficult decision, we plan to responsibly carry out this process, and help our staff to complete this transformation
.
"
About a year ago, Sanofi invested $3.
68 billion to acquire Principia, which is the sixth largest biopharmaceutical acquisition in 2020
.
At the time, Sanofi believed that complete control of Principia would make the commercialization of its lead drug more efficient and would eliminate future royalties
However, Sanofi did not complete these payments, but began to take over the entire company after SAR442168 released promising Phase 2 data
.
The data showed that SAR442168 reduced new lesions in MS patients
But the acquisition was strongly criticized by the hedge fund Kerrisdale Capital, calling Principia’s pipeline “worthless” because SAR442168 “has a mode of action that does not seem to be related to the etiology of MS
.
”
Less than a week ago, Principia's other promising pipeline drug, rilzabrutinib, failed in the first key phase 3 clinical trial and failed to meet the primary and key secondary endpoints in the treatment of the rare autoimmune skin disease pemphigus
.
Rilzabrutinib is an oral drug that targets BTK
However, Sanofi has not given up on rilzabrutinib, and the company plans to continue testing rilzabrutinib in rare blood diseases, immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) and autoimmune IgG4-related diseases
.
In the past year, Sanofi has been busy with mergers and acquisitions
.
In August of this year, the company also acquired Translate Bio for US$3.
Reference source: Sanofi dumps Principia Biopharma's San Francisco labs with plans to immediately cut 38 jobs
