Astellas reports a revenue win for 2023, cuts two early programmes

2024-04-25

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Astellas saw an uptick in revenues for fiscal year 2023 that beat its own projections, the Japanese firm announced Thursday. Its earnings report also revealed that a pair of early-stage programmes have been discontinued.

The pipeline trim comes just weeks after the company booked an impairment charge of JPY 70 billion ($453 million) for the first quarter of 2024 due to sluggish sales and clinical setbacks for a trio of therapies.

The axed programmes are ASP2074, a bispecific antibody targeting TSPAN8 and CD3, and PPAR-delta modulator ASP0367. The former, an internally developed candidate, was in Phase I testing for metastatic or locally advanced solid tumours.

The second compound was acquired via Astellas’ 2018 purchase of Mitobridge. ASP0367 was in a Phase I trial for Duchenne muscular dystrophy and a Phase II study for primary mitochondrial myopathies, an indication for which it held fast-track designation from the FDA.

Xtandi sales increase

On the more positive side, Astellas reported 2023 revenues of JPY 1.6 trillion, up 5.6% from the year prior and ahead of its internal forecast of JPY 1.56 trillion.

The beat was driven by increased sales of prostate cancer drug Xtandi (enzalutamide), which brought in more than JPY 750 billion for the year, representing a 14% increase over 2022 sales. The figure also surpassed projections of JPY 719.8 billion.