Rights To UCLA-Developed Prostate Cancer Drug Sold For $1.14B
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — The royalty rights to a prostate cancer drug developed by UCLA researchers has been sold to a pharmaceutical company for an initial cash payment of $1.14 billion, university officials said Friday.
A large portion of the proceeds of the sale of Xtandi to Royalty Pharma – approximately $520 million – will support research programs aimed at generating additional discoveries that lead to medications and other products that serve the public good, UCLA officials said. Much of that money will also support scholarships and fellowships.
Research into the drug began in the early 2000s and was conducted by teams led by Michael Jung, a professor of chemistry and biochemistry, and Dr. Charles Sawyers, a former professor of medicine urology and pharmacology and a researcher at UCLA's Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. Sawyers is now at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.
According to UCLA, Xtandi is based on a chemical compound developed at the Westwood campus.
The oral medication inhibits the production of testosterone, the hormone that fuels the cancer cells, reducing risk of death by 37 percent and increasing median survival by 4.8 months in one clinical study, according to the university. In a separate study of patients who previously underwent chemotherapy, Xtandi reduced the risk of death by 23 percent and increased median survival by four months.
