Arena Pharmaceuticals

Arena Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company founded in 1997 and located in San Diego, California.[3] The company has small molecule drugs in development for possible clinical utility in multiple therapeutic areas. The company’s most advanced investigational clinical programs are ralinepag (formerly APD811) in testing for pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH), etrasimod (formerly APD334) in evaluation for inflammatory indications and APD371 for the treatment of pain associated with Crohn’s disease.[4] In 2016 the company downsized and shifted its focus to developing new drugs currently being tested in clinical trials.[5][6]

Arena Pharmaceuticals
TypePublic
NASDAQ: ARNA
Russell 2000 Component
IndustryBiotechnology
Founded1997
Headquarters
San Diego, California
,
U.S.
Key people

Jack Lief, cofounder
Dominic Behan, co-founder and senior scientist
Amit Munshi, CEO
Kevin Lind, CFO
ProductsBelviq
RevenueUS$27,600,000 (FY 2012)[1]
US$−57,000,000 (FY 2012)[1]
US$−85,500,000 (FY 2012)[1]
Total assetsUS$261,000,000 (FY 2012)[2]
Total equityUS$98,600,000 (FY 2012)[2]
Websitewww.arenapharm.com

History

Arena Pharmaceuticals Inc. is a biopharmaceutical company founded in 1997 and located in San Diego, California. Arena focused on discovering drugs that act on G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). The company developed technology it called Constitutively Activated Receptor Technology (CART) that identified drug leads targeting GPCRs and other classes of receptors to. CART was used to identify drug leads able to act as receptor inhibitors to decrease a biological response or act as receptor activators to increase a biological response.[7]

  • In January 2000, Arena entered into a collaborative agreement with Fujisawa Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. to validate up to 13 drug targets.[7]
  • In April 2000, Arena entered into a research collaboration with Eli Lilly and Company focused on the endocrine and central nervous systems.[7]
  • In May 2000, Arena entered into a research collaboration with Taisho Pharmaceutical Co. focused on several GPCRs selected by Taisho in therapeutic areas of interest.[7]

Products

The company has one drug on the market, Belviq (lorcaserin), a weight-loss medication. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved lorcaserin on June 27, 2012. The company committed to a sales force commitment of 200.[8] Lorcaserin is approved for use in adults with a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or greater, which is considered obese, or adults with a BMI of 27 or greater and who have at least one weight-related health condition, such as high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, or high cholesterol. However, sales of Belviq were disappointing. In 2015 the company laid off 80 workers; this was followed in July 2016 by the layoff of another 100 employees (approximately 73% of remaining workforce).[5] In January 2017 Arena announced that it is selling Belviq to its Japanese partner, Eisai Co. Ltd., which will manufacture and market the drug; Arena will draw a royalty on global sales.[9]

The sale completes a pivot in emphasis toward drugs still under development. Drugs in the company's pipeline includes medications designed to treat pain, ulcerative colitis and pulmonary arterial hypertension. As of September 2014, potential products that had not yet been approved by the FDA included Temanogrel (thrombotic diseases), Ralinepag (pulmonary arterial hypertension), APD334 (autoimmune disease), APD371 (pain), and Nelotanserin.[10]

In 2018, Arena's Etrasimod, a drug directed at treating ulcerative colitis (and a competitor with Ozanimod from Celgene[11]), passed phase II clinical trials successfully and moved on to phase III.[12]

See also

References
  1. Arena Pharmaceuticals (ARNA) annual SEC income statement filing via Wikinvest.
  2. Arena Pharmaceuticals (ARNA) annual SEC balance sheet filing via Wikinvest.
  3. "Arena Pharmaceutical, Inc" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on November 16, 2016. Retrieved November 16, 2016.
  4. "arna-10k_20161231.htm". www.sec.gov. Retrieved 2017-04-26.
  5. Meiling, Brittany (July 4, 2016). "Arena Pharmaceuticals Is Slashing Its Workforce 73%". San Diego Business Journal. Retrieved 5 July 2016.
  6. "Arena Axing 100 Employees, 73% of Workforce". News: Industry Watch (online: GEN News Highlights). Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News. 36 (14): 10. August 2016. Retrieved 17 September 2016.
  7. "NASDAQ | SEC Filing". secfilings.nasdaq.com. Retrieved 2017-05-25.
  8. "FDA approves Belviq to treat some overweight or obese adults" (Press release). US FDA. June 27, 2012. Retrieved January 3, 2014.
  9. Meiling, Brittany (January 4, 2017). "Arena Pharmaceuticals Bails on Its Weight-Loss Drug". San Diego Business Journal. Retrieved 5 January 2017.
  10. "Arena Pharmaceuticals". Arena Pharmaceuticals.
  11. Osborne, Spencer (2 May 2018). "Arena Investors Need To Pay Attention To Celgene And Ozanimod". Seeking Alpha. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
  12. Al Idrus, Amirah (19 May 2018). "Midstage success prompts Arena to push bowel disease drug etrasimod into phase 3". Retrieved 3 July 2018.
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