As­traZeneca cuts Alex­ion's PhI­II Wil­son dis­ease drug, takes $244M write­down

As­traZeneca is call­ing it quits with a Phase III rare dis­ease pro­gram it ob­tained via the $39 bil­lion ac­qui­si­tion of Alex­ion.

ALXN1840, or bis-choline tetrathiomolyb­date, had in turn come to Alex­ion from a buy­out. In 2018, Alex­ion of­fered $855 mil­lion in cash to ac­quire Wil­son Ther­a­peu­tics for the can­di­date, de­signed to treat Wil­son dis­ease — a rare con­di­tion where pa­tients can’t re­move cop­per from the body, re­sult­ing in ex­ces­sive amounts of cop­per ac­cu­mu­lat­ing in the liv­er, brain and eyes.

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