Our Focus
Arena is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company committed to discovering and developing innovative therapies offering significant medical advances and new options for patients. Our lead drug candidate, lorcaserin, is intended for the treatment of obesity and is being evaluated in a Phase 3 clinical trial program. We have other proprietary programs where we are evaluating compounds independently as well as programs where we are evaluating compounds with partners, including Merck & Co., Inc. and Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Our Technologies
We focus our research and development efforts on GPCRs because they are a validated class of drug targets that mediate the majority of cell-to-cell communication in humans. A high percentage of today's prescription drugs target one or more GPCRs, and we believe that approved GPCR-based drugs target about 30% of the known non-sensory GPCRs. Selective targeting of specific GPCRs is intended to increase the likelihood of the desired pharmacology and minimize the risk of "off target" effects.
Our proprietary GPCR technologies provide the capability to find drugs that target both well-understood receptors with known function and promising novel GPCRs where the function is not yet understood. We believe our GPCR-focused technologies and integrated discovery and development capabilities will allow us to continue to build our pipeline of novel and selective drug candidates.
Our Development Pipeline
We have harnessed our technologies to create a broad clinical-stage pipeline and additional compounds in preclinical and research testing. Our lead drug candidate, lorcaserin, is intended for the treatment of obesity and is being evaluated in a Phase 3 clinical trial program. BLOOM, BLOSSOM and BLOOM-DM comprise the entire planned Phase 3 clinical trial program for lorcaserin. Phase 2 clinical trials of lorcaserin found that patients given the drug experienced statistically significant, clinically meaningful and progressive weight loss. In addition, lorcaserin was generally well tolerated.
Our other proprietary development programs include our program evaluating APD791 an oral drug candidate that we discovered and are investigating for the treatment of arterial thrombosis and other related conditions. Our lead anti-thrombotic drug candidate, APD791, has completed Phase 1a and Phase 1b clinical trials. In the Phase 1 program, APD791 was generally well tolerated and dose-dependent inhibition of serotonin-mediated amplification of platelet aggregation was demonstrated. APD791 was rapidly absorbed and exposures were related to dose. Results from the Phase 1 program further support APD791's novel mechanism of action and the preclinical data.
In addition to internal programs, we have clinical-stage partnerships with pharmaceutical companies, including Merck & Co., Inc. and Ortho-McNeil-Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Our partnership with Merck is focused on niacin receptor agonists as treatments for atherosclerosis and other disorders. Our partnership with Ortho-McNeil-Janssen is focused on receptor agonists of an orphan GPCR, the Glucose-Dependent Insulinotropic Receptor, or GDIR, as treatments for type 2 diabetes and other disorders.
Our Strategy
The key elements of our scientific and business strategy are to:
- Advance our lead programs. We intend to continue to advance our drug candidates, with a partner or independently, through clinical development and, if successful, to commercialization.
- Discover and develop additional small molecule drug candidates targeting GPCRs. We intend to continue to discover and develop oral, small molecule compounds for GPCRs identified or validated through our research efforts.
- Focus on attractive market opportunities. Obesity, diabetes, atherosclerosis and arterial thrombosis each represent large market opportunities. We intend to continue to focus on these and other markets with attractive commercial potential.
- Recognize significant economic value for our drug candidates under development. We intend to maximize the value of our drug candidates through both independent development and licensing and other partnership opportunities with pharmaceutical and larger biotechnology companies.
- Continue to build our development capabilities. To capitalize on our discoveries, we plan to continue to improve and expand our capabilities as our drug candidates enter into, and move through, clinical trials and to commercialization.
- Maintain strong discovery research capabilities. Our proprietary technologies, our drug discovery infrastructure and the integrated approach to research used by our scientists have allowed us to identify a number of GPCR targets and novel compounds. We believe these and other discoveries will continue to fuel our pipeline.
(This page was last updated: January 5, 2009. Additional information regarding Arena is available in its SEC filings.)
