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 Now some investors wonder if the same fate might await Genmab, worth
$12 billion, given the soaraway success of its blood cancer drug
Darzalex.
J&J sells the drug and pays Genmab a royalty of 12 to 20 percent.
With 2017 Darzalex sales already over $1 billion and analysts on
average expecting them to reach more than $8 billion annually, those
royalties are adding up to serious money.
Bernstein analyst Wimal Kapadia is among those who think J&J might
just decide to buy Genmab and avoid royalties altogether, while
bringing onboard a smart team of scientists.
For now, however, both J&J and Genmab are lauding the success of
their existing relationship.
"It's one of the most successful collaborations we have. We love the
partnership," J&J's Chief Scientific Officer Paul Stoffels told
Reuters.
He declined to comment on the U.S. healthcare giant's possible
interest in buying Genmab in future but said the Danish group had
the capital needed to go forward on its own, adding: "They don't
need us to be successful."
Indeed, Genmab's strategy is to plough the growing royalty stream
from Darzalex into its next wave of medicines. Darzalex is now
established as a key treatment in multiple myeloma, where it is
moving into earlier stages of the disease.
It is also showing promise in other areas, with clinical trial
success in fighting amyloidosis, a rare disease caused by the
build-up of an abnormal protein, triggering a $20 million milestone
payment from J&J to Genmab on Wednesday. [nASB0BVU4]
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Genmab Chief Executive Jan van de Winkel says the decision on any
eventual sale of the company will be up to shareholders, but he is
confident the fast-growing biotech business has a bright future as
an independent operation.
"Our focus is to build an independent antibody innovation powerhouse
and we think we can create more value for our stakeholders by
staying independent than being a part of a larger entity," he said
in an interview in London.
Van de Winkel also sees important differences between Genmab and
Actelion, with the decision by J&J to snap up the Swiss group driven
in large part by a need to plug a revenue hole left by declining
sales of J&J's ageing biotech drug Remicade.
"They needed to replace that income and that is exactly what the
Actelion products will do. That is a completely different reason, I
think, from potentially looking at a company like ours," he said.
"It is up to J&J ... but I hope that we can continue like this for
many, many more years."
(Reporting by Ben Hirschler; Editing by Adrian Croft)
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